Sunday, November 25, 2012

Batch 2: 'Merican IPA: Tasting Day

This one turned out pretty good. It's quite hoppy and not far from Two Hearted Ale. It's just a touch greener and a tad sweeter. I think a few more days of conditioning will take care of some of that grassiness, but I'm guessing the barely-noticable sweetness was because the beer didn't fully attenuate since it was somewhat underpitched. The color, like my last batch, is darker than anticipated. I'm not entirely sure about that, but I think it might have something to do with the boil. Overall, though, it's a good beer.


Sunday, November 11, 2012

Batch 2: 'Merican IPA: Bottling Day

I bottled this afternoon. I'm certainly getting better at that--although I somehow managed to step on and crush my airlock. I'm really optimistic about this one. This is going to be a long two weeks.

Thursday, November 8, 2012

Batch 2: 'Merican IPA: Fermenting

The fermentation ramped up about 16 hours after pitching. It was going gangbusters for about 48 hours. It slowed enough four days into fermentation that I replaced the blowoff tube with the airlock. When I made the transition, I added the additional 0.7 oz. of hops for dry-hopping, and then left for a weekend out of town. When I returned 48 hours later, I found the airlock clogged and ejected from the carboy and a bunch of blowoff residue on the carboy, the ground, and the burlap sack I use to keep the carboy shielded from light. It stunk, literally. I cleaned, re-sanitized, and reseated the airlock immediately. There were no signs of active fermentation. I quickly hopped on Facebook to consult my brewing buddies, and they assured me that there probably wasn't much to worry about.

Today, 11 days after pitching, I took a sample of the beer with a thief to measure the gravity. It ended up being 1.022 ("corrected" from 1.022 at 64ยบ). With an OG of 1.078, a quick calculation estimates the alcohol content (by volume) to be just over 7%, which puts it right on par with the actual Two(-)Hearted Ale. I tasted the beer, and while it's a bit on the sweet side, the hop character seemed right on. I'm planning to bottle this weekend.