Christmas Day 1st AG Brew plan!

Ok, got the 12lb grain bill today, home grown hops in the freezer, S04 ready and waiting...

It's going to be a Great X-Mass AG Brew Day for ME!!!!

Best X-Mass day since 3rd Grade.. Skii's for Ski Jumping.... Knocked the Bejebus out of myself repeatedly that day but got one full hill jump.... 90'.

Maybe this Christmas you'll get one whole fantastic brew....'09

Well, it was an interesting day...

Didn't get the strike temp right... a little low 148 and tried my best to add cups of boiling water to bring it up... 152 was all I could get.

The hop addition, my home grown first year hops, well they calculate way over bitter, like 97 Ibu... but we shall see.

I added Nugget for bittering 60 min, Centenial for 25 and 15 min boil, and Hallertauer for the last 5.

I added 2oz of orange Zest at flame out.... WOW what a smell! I sure hope it comes out as good in taste as well as it smelled!

OG was supposed to be 1.069 with the grain bill, but due to my horrible efficiency due to the temps.. I only got 1.058.

A couple of weeks in primary, then to secondary with a Dry hop of more Hallertauer.


Well I hope that everyone else that brewed had a great brew day, I can't say mine was bad... just a new experience and something to learn.

Guess I'm going to have to get a bigger kettle or two.. I need to be able to heat more water than I can in my 3gal SS. My turkey fryer 7.5 I only use for boil as I can't use it on the stove.

4 weeks and it will be an interesting first taste.
Cheers to all