ChuckinWA
Well-Known Member
So a couple of weeks ago, thanks to this forum, I find out that Austin Homebrew Supply has their Pliny the Elder clone kit on sale. As PTE is one of my favorite brews, I call up AHS and order it right away. I made my yeast starter a couple of days ago using some harvested WLP001 from a recent brew. Today, I finally manage to take a day off work and dedicate it to brewing! 
I'm off to a fairly slow start, with preparations inturruped by having to make a run to the hardware store and show my FSBO house to a couple of interested parties. I'm also brewing solo this time around, as my ususal brewing buddy had to work. No matter, by lunchtime I'm finally getting into it. Mashing is going OK, but I'm a bit over-temp since I'm using my new 10 gal MLT for the first time and over-estimated the water temp required to mash. Within 10-15 minutes though, I'm right on target at 150 degrees. After mashing for an hour, I have a MAJOR stuck sparge due to a lot of grain getting under my false bottom, which requires some real effort to correct (have to get a better bottom for my new MLT in the future). I buckle down and press on. The boil goes well - adding plenty of hops at the instructed time (or maybe slightly later, since I spent a good minute or two sniffing each packet I opened up before adding to the boil). At the end of the 90 minute boil, I chill the wort using my immersion chiller, and pour into my plastic bucket.
Here's where it starts to take a turn for the worse.
By now it's dinner time, and as mentioned before I'm brewing solo today, so I call the wife down to the garage to give me a hand. My intent is to transfer the wort between the bucket and a carboy a few times to aerate it. I need the wife to hold the large funnel steady in the carboy, since it isn't very stable in the small carboy neck. She does as instructed, and the wort splashes nicely into the carboy. I remove the funnel, pick up the carboy to pour back into the bucket.........at which time the carboy slips out of my grip and smashes on my garage floor!!!!!
I'm in a total daze for a good 5 minutes, not believeing what just happened. Thankfully my kegerator is a mere 10 feet away, so I can grab a homebrew and reflect......nope, still sucks. Many hours of work are slowly draining under my stored lawn furnature, lawnmower, gas cans, etc and out into the driveway drain. What was once a pristine and glimmering carboy is now a pile of broken shards. In my mind, it looks a bit like the World Trade Center at around noon on 9/11.
Sigh. I'm trying to RDWHAHB, but it ain't easy. On the upside I have one remaining keg which was only tapped last week, so at least I'll have a supply for the near future.
I'm off to a fairly slow start, with preparations inturruped by having to make a run to the hardware store and show my FSBO house to a couple of interested parties. I'm also brewing solo this time around, as my ususal brewing buddy had to work. No matter, by lunchtime I'm finally getting into it. Mashing is going OK, but I'm a bit over-temp since I'm using my new 10 gal MLT for the first time and over-estimated the water temp required to mash. Within 10-15 minutes though, I'm right on target at 150 degrees. After mashing for an hour, I have a MAJOR stuck sparge due to a lot of grain getting under my false bottom, which requires some real effort to correct (have to get a better bottom for my new MLT in the future). I buckle down and press on. The boil goes well - adding plenty of hops at the instructed time (or maybe slightly later, since I spent a good minute or two sniffing each packet I opened up before adding to the boil). At the end of the 90 minute boil, I chill the wort using my immersion chiller, and pour into my plastic bucket. Here's where it starts to take a turn for the worse.
By now it's dinner time, and as mentioned before I'm brewing solo today, so I call the wife down to the garage to give me a hand. My intent is to transfer the wort between the bucket and a carboy a few times to aerate it. I need the wife to hold the large funnel steady in the carboy, since it isn't very stable in the small carboy neck. She does as instructed, and the wort splashes nicely into the carboy. I remove the funnel, pick up the carboy to pour back into the bucket.........at which time the carboy slips out of my grip and smashes on my garage floor!!!!!
I'm in a total daze for a good 5 minutes, not believeing what just happened. Thankfully my kegerator is a mere 10 feet away, so I can grab a homebrew and reflect......nope, still sucks. Many hours of work are slowly draining under my stored lawn furnature, lawnmower, gas cans, etc and out into the driveway drain. What was once a pristine and glimmering carboy is now a pile of broken shards. In my mind, it looks a bit like the World Trade Center at around noon on 9/11. Sigh. I'm trying to RDWHAHB, but it ain't easy. On the upside I have one remaining keg which was only tapped last week, so at least I'll have a supply for the near future.
