7:40 Gas on.
8:11 Adding strike water to mash tun. Temperature 170 °F.
8:16 Strike water stabilized to 165 °F.
8:20 Grains mixed into mash.
8:26 Mash stabilized at 155 °F. 6.87 gallons (26 liters).
8:57 Just realize that I forgot to add my mash salts. I stirred them in and remeasured the temperature at about 152 °F. Also, the volume is dropping which seems to indicate that the grain is absorbing more as time goes by.
9:20 Beginning vorloff for first runnings. Volume is 6 gallons in mash tun.
9:27 Boil salts are in the kettle. Collected just shy of 3.5 gallons. Gravity of first runnings was 1.075 (1.065 at 118 °F).
9:30 Flame is on under the first runnings while collecting the second. Sparge water temperature is 180 °F. The batch temperature when the sparge water was added is 167 °F.
9:40 Collected just shy of 3.5 gallons for the second runnings for a total of about 6-15/16 gallons in the kettle. Second runnings gravity was 1.029 (1.012 at 143 °F). Boil gravity is 1.052 (1.050 expected).
9:55 Boiling. Waiting for hot break.
10:00 Bittering hops added.
10:19 Smacking yeast packs. One manufactured on 5/4 (78% viability). The others on 5/16 (87% viability). Together providing 252 billion cells. The recipe calls for 225 billion.
10:45 Flavor hops added. Immersion chiller in. Irish moss in.
10:50 Yeast nutrient in.
11:00 Aroma hops added. Flame out. Lid on loosely. Letting hops steep for 20 minutes.
11:20 Started chilling and lifted hop bag to drain.
11:47 Wort chilled to 68 °F. Turning off and removing chiller. Removing hop bag. Stirring to form whirlpool and letting the wort settle for 20 minutes.
12:09 Taking original gravity sample and draining the kettle to the carboy. Original volume is 5.5 gallons.
12:17 Original gravity is 1.059 (1.056 @ 82.4 °F) as expected.
12:25 Kettle is drained. Rocking carboy to aerate wort.
12:36 Carboy in fridge. Yeast pitched. Temperature is 72 °F. Set for 68 °F. When it reaches that temperature, I will lower it to 64 °F.
Wednesday Evening, June 1 Added dry hops.
Monday Evening, June 6 Final gravity is 1.016 (8.3 Brix). Expected 1.018. 5.7% ABV. 72% ADF. Cold crashing to 38 °F.
Saturday, June 11 Kegged. Gravity 1.015. Added a hop bag containing 15.4g Chinook 11.4% AA, 14g Chinook 11.1%AA, and 28.9g Cascade 7.1%AA. So, that’s about an ounce each of Chinook and Cascade. Carbonating to 2.3 volumes (15 psi at 50 °F).
I sampled the beer while testing the carbonation in the keg. I did detect a low level flaw. While reading the notes from Wyeast, I found the following:
A thorough diacetyl rest is recommended after fermentation is complete.
Yeah… I didn’t do that. I cold crashed right after fermentation completed. Next time, I will let the beer sit warm for a few days while the yeast cleans up after itself.
Friday, June 23 I am going to say this beer is at its peak, 12 days after packaging. The last one was 19 days.
Sunday, July 3 Kicked. Good to the end.