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Nice job! Nothing like a happily bubbling carboy to give you a little boost of confidence in your day. Welcome to the hobby, here's to many more beers!

Great thread, congrats on a good-looking brew (and a well-documented one!) As Brewkinger suggested, mashing at 158 likely contributes to your higher-than-expected FG. That's at the high range of the typical mash temp window (usually given as 150-158F, but of course there is some leeway). At...

Do you find that the temp at the top (where the thermometer floats) is a good representation of the rest of it? Maybe you just have to stir well to take care of it?

Holy cow. That is some good stuff. I know what I'm reading the next few days... (I tried to like your post but I think the Like button doesn't work for me).

I had never heard that issue about the temp probe, but if it's true it's fascinating. I use the same probe, and I also have weird temperature issues in mashing. (Also, I use it while boiling, and one thing that happens is that it will routinely show the wort at over 220 degrees F before any...

Thanks all! The new starter went pretty well. I was a little concerned because it looked like it finished bubbling after about 24 hours, but I guess a vial of yeast can chomp through 4 oz of DME in about that long. The good news is that it took to the wort like a duck to water, and this...

Well, yeast is pitched... it's maybe not so bad. I whirlpooled a bit while the cooling was finishing off, and it looks like it'll come out pretty clear. Post-boil gravity was 1.080 for (I'm estimating) 3 gallons. I added a gallon of cold water, which brought the OG to 1.055, which is pretty much...

So - everything was going swimmingly at first. 1) Strike water was at PERFECT temp and came up to temp quickly. Dough-in went swimmingly, and the grain was right at 122F. It looked pretty, too: 2) 1st decoction went pretty well. It took a little while to get to the target mash temp in...

So! Litany of woes happened today... 1) We "fixed" the leaky MLT by tightening the spigot with a couple of wrenches. 2) All was going pretty well, until we were stirring in the 1st decoction. Then? THE SCREEN TUBE FELL OUT OF ITS COLLAR. At that point we were pretty much hosed, because there...

Sweet, CastleHollow, let us know how it goes! I heated the strike water at about 11:20 and it's ready to go. As of now, the first problem cropped up: I tried to fix a small leak in the valve on the mash tun (just had some hot water in it to pre-heat the insulation), and now we need to...

Turns out it was really tasty! I don't remember tasting notes now but people were fans. It could easily be the house brew here if I work out an AG version.

Well, tomorrow is brew day! Our crew's 1st Double-D Beer, and maybe our 4th AG brew overall (numerous partial-mashes done as well over the years). I'm pretty excited about the recipe and the decoction process, so I want to document it here for posterity. Feel free to jump in with...

Right, so, I think we've arrived at a final recipe/mash schedule here. Starting in the morning, but always up for feedback! Note: because I've only done AG a few times and this is the first decoction I've done, I'm putting in a lot of process notes that aren't strictly part of a "recipe."...

Tomorrow we're doing a brew day and drinking down a lot of the home-brewed stash, so tonight I'm drinking a commercial brew to compensate. Weihenstephaner Pils. I think I like their hefe better, but this is still pretty great.

Took your advice and trashed the original starter. Unfortunately I didn't have another of the yeasts (WLP 830), and neither did the LHBS, so I'm going with WLP 838, Southern German Lager. Doing a Marzen, but I want it drier/more balanced than a lot of the recipes I've seen. Hopefully this guy...

Welcome! Let us know how the gelatin/cold crash works out if you do that? Tomorrow we're brewing our April-Zen, first double-decoction beer!

Hi all, I made my first yeast starter , but I did something kind of dumb. I didn't really dissolve the DME in the water - I just kind of mixed it into the warm water and shook it, but didn't boil or really heat the water in any way. The yeast is in there now. A) Is this going to work at...

I think the original recipe may have too much Vienna in it; Brewing Classic Styles recommends a 5:4:3 mix of Classic Pilsener, Munich, and Vienna. I think I like that approach, so I've adjusted the recipe below to use that instead. Thoughts? 5 lb American 2-row malt 4 lb Munich malt 3 lb...

I usually feel like having an extra hand around is a good time to try something complex, but then I also wonder whether bringing in an inexperienced 1st-time brewer will be more trouble than it's worth. Like, "Hey, you just, uh, stir this thing for me. That's important. Go on an' stir there."

After a long winter hiatus, we're brewing again! The April-Zen, because it's never too early to think about Oktober. (Link to recipe thread sneakily provided to encourage input/feedback).