March 20th Brew Session at Will Leger

I just wanted to report that the Scottish Heavy is off to a great start...a small creamy head has formed and there is some good activity in the airlock. For everyone else's info, we made a 9-gallon, all-grain Scottish heavy. We started heating water and grinding grain at 12:30 in the afternoon, and finished racking the beer into the primary just after 6 pm. Everything went well, except for spilling (leaking) about a gallon of hot sparge water onto the garage floor. Oops. Then we were too lazy to heat more and just went with what we got. I was really trying to keep on schedule, and had already put the water filter away and cleaned up the water pot and everything...and didn't want to get it all back out. Lazy...or was it all the beer we were drinking? We measured an OG of 72 (a little below my target of 80), but we'll see how far it goes...if it goes to 15 (which it should), then that's a drop of 57, and dividing that by 7.2 gives an alcohol of 7.9%...which IS what I was shooting for. We mashed in the 140°'s which will yield more fermentable sugars than if we mashed in the 150°'s...so it will probably attenuate pretty well. Can't wait!

I would like to thank Lee, Marlond, Eric, and Jim for making the effort, making some fun conversation, helping in lots of ways...including senses of humor! Thanks for ALL the GREAT beers you all~!!!! I hope everyone enjoyed the brats, and home made cole slaw and potato salad. I had more fun brewing than I ever have...! I cleaned everything up (brewing pots got washed and put away), put my VW back in the garage (before it rained?!!!), and drank a bunch of water and went to bed early. What a day. Lee took pictures and will work with Gary to get them posted...


Cracking the grains	What a spread !

Enjoying the day	What a mash

The boil is underway !	Wow ! Wish I could have been there !