New brew: Mindbender IPA

Just brewed my second batch! Started at 11am, finished at 2:30pm cleaned and all.

California ale yeast (liquid) this time. Also used wort chiller. Took 40 mins without stirring. Lesson: STIR!

Specific gravity looks to be 5%.

Also used strainer this time, no tshirt! We will see how it turns out this time.

In other news, my Hefe turned out pretty good, though I wish it had deeper flavor and more alcohol. The same seems to be true of Sean's beers so far... We still have a few things to learn methinks.

Oh, 1 more thing. I am quite crafty, for those who don't know. I couldn't find my muslin bag for grain steeping. But I did find a zippered bag of some type of plastic, tested it in a boil, then confirmed that I have found myself a new, awesome, reusable grain bag!

Anyhow, I'm really looking forward to this IPA!

Hefe: bottled!

With help from my good buddy Sean, we have now bottled my Hefe yesterday. Obi Wan has taught me the ways of the force.

So, it was fermenting 3 weeks to the day we bottled it. It stopped bubbling sometime between the 2 and. 3 week mark. OG yesterday was 1.012. Oh, and correction on the starting OG: it was 1.04 not 1.4. Doh! I bought flip top bottles and 22oz bottles for this first batch. I mean, how often do you drink just 1 12 oz beer?

Anyhow, I thoroughly enjoy the hobby so far, I'm quite excited to brew my next one: an IPA!

Cheers,
R