in the middle of 1st ag

I'm in the middle of my first AG batch and all I have to say is what a fiasco. Outside is dirty, and it's hard to keep that out of my wort.

I'm missing both my mash and sparge temps by a good 15 - 20 degrees and I'm wondering what kind of beer, if any...

Heating water in pot, mashing in converted cool and generally banging my head against a wall...

Well, that sounds like a pretty typical first time, unfortunately. The first time is when you learn your system and how to hit your mash temperatures with your equipment.

I wouldn't worry too much about the "dirty" though, unless you're brewing in a garbage dump. I mean, if a leaf falls it, scoop it out. It won't hurt the beer. In the summer, sometimes the bees are so bad some brewers use a piece of screen over the brewpot to keep them out.

Try not to worry too much about it, and just roll with the flow. Or, RDWHAHB.

Just keep s.hite out of the carboy. Anything else will get killed in the boil but once you've cooled that baby down yuh need to keep clean.

I prefer a flame thrower for the bee's. Saw my first wasp here today. Damn, there goes the wasp free brew days. Just got rid of the rats and now wasps... sigh

The beer is cooling now. It's cloudy as @#%! and I can actually see A LOT of stuff crashing out as it chills. I'm 0.001 off on my target gravity...how'd that happen?!

all that stuff settling out is normal, as for only being 1.001 off, WAY TO GO!

When I did my first AG, I thought I was perfect, and then I ran my efficiency, and I was at a pathetic 65% and I missed my OG by .010! As far as I'm concerned, you did a hell of a job!

Congratulations. Several batches from now you'll realize how much you learned from your fiasco today.

Oh...and make sure to save a few bottles of this batch for posterity.

Okay if I dump it straight to the fermenter (my method of airating), taking a lot a lot of the precip with it will I be okay, or should I try to rack and leave the precip behind?

If you have a strainer, sanitize it, and pour through it. that helps aerate alot and keeps out the junk. If you don't, just pour it all, and agitate the crap out of it, to aerate it. It'll all settle out in the fermenter, so don't worry about it either way.

I don't mind the cold break. My yeasties eat it up. It will settle to nearly nothing by the time you're done.

It's quite a bit darker that I thought it would turn out. The grain bill and recipe are the Sierra Nevada Pale Ale Clone from the Clone Brews book. I hope I didn't get too many unfermentables. I did one mash, and two sparges. Here are some pics:

Going in the Primary

Post boil and cooling

My beers always seem drker in the carboy than they acually are

I wanted to thank all of you, for all of your help. You folks are awesome! And Yooper, thank you for the initial encouragement! You folks really helped me to stick with it when I felt like kicking the whole vat over and calling it a day.

And you know what, it tastes good now. Check this out: The beer you all helped me brew!

Thanks!

That taste of good beer should make you realize that getting upset about brewing is not doing you any good. I just go through each brew day and do the best I can and if something goes wrong I just shrug it off and figure out how to get the best out of what I have done so far. Relax and enjoy the process and try to be better next time. You will have some really good brew days and great beer too.