I suppose this is the stereotypical "Did I ruin my beer" thread, but please bear with my on my cluster you know what of an adventure.
This is my second batch. The first I had my younger brother coach me through and despite him only filling to the 4 gallon mark on my 5 gallon beer , I feel it turned out nicely. It was an IPA and I tend to like mine on the as bitter as you can get side, so I enjoy the extra bite I suppose. On to the second batch I chose to do on my own. Walk with me on this magical mystery debacle. Mind you this is a rye IPA, equinox your sox off, extract if anyone is familiar.
Everything is going just swimmingly. Grain in at exactly 170F, side pot added at exactly 170F over grains at the 20 min mark. Flawless. I was more than pleased. Boil, extract, first hop addition. And then the train missed its station and it's all down hill from here.
I missed second hop addition mark by almost a minute after being distracted by my lovely girlfriend. All other hop additions were perfect as was the Whirfloc. Go to chill wort in ice bath (last time took 8 minutes) and realize I've over filled the sink with water.. No biggie I thought, and I reached down to pull the plug to drain a bit. Didn't realize I didn't put it back all the way and lost quite a bit of water in the process. Refilled and added more ice. Once it hit about 95 I hydrated my yeast and set my 15 minute timer thinking that should be plenty. 1/2 an hour later I'm sitting with hydrated, stirred yeast, and a wort sitting, almost mocking me, at 90 degrees. I added cool water to the wort out of desperation to almost no avail. Finally being overly frustrated I decided to just aerate and pitch my yeast.
I used a nylon bag to try to catch the hop scum left behind from the boil. When that filled and refused to drain, I went into a fit of utter frustration and squeezed the bag with my hands to filter the wort out of the bag. Filled the bucket and capped and then took a shot of makers and now I'm writing this to you all. I'm sorry for the novel. I didn't know how to make it any shorter.
On a scale of one to ten, how awful did I mess this up....
This is my second batch. The first I had my younger brother coach me through and despite him only filling to the 4 gallon mark on my 5 gallon beer , I feel it turned out nicely. It was an IPA and I tend to like mine on the as bitter as you can get side, so I enjoy the extra bite I suppose. On to the second batch I chose to do on my own. Walk with me on this magical mystery debacle. Mind you this is a rye IPA, equinox your sox off, extract if anyone is familiar.
Everything is going just swimmingly. Grain in at exactly 170F, side pot added at exactly 170F over grains at the 20 min mark. Flawless. I was more than pleased. Boil, extract, first hop addition. And then the train missed its station and it's all down hill from here.
I missed second hop addition mark by almost a minute after being distracted by my lovely girlfriend. All other hop additions were perfect as was the Whirfloc. Go to chill wort in ice bath (last time took 8 minutes) and realize I've over filled the sink with water.. No biggie I thought, and I reached down to pull the plug to drain a bit. Didn't realize I didn't put it back all the way and lost quite a bit of water in the process. Refilled and added more ice. Once it hit about 95 I hydrated my yeast and set my 15 minute timer thinking that should be plenty. 1/2 an hour later I'm sitting with hydrated, stirred yeast, and a wort sitting, almost mocking me, at 90 degrees. I added cool water to the wort out of desperation to almost no avail. Finally being overly frustrated I decided to just aerate and pitch my yeast.
I used a nylon bag to try to catch the hop scum left behind from the boil. When that filled and refused to drain, I went into a fit of utter frustration and squeezed the bag with my hands to filter the wort out of the bag. Filled the bucket and capped and then took a shot of makers and now I'm writing this to you all. I'm sorry for the novel. I didn't know how to make it any shorter.
On a scale of one to ten, how awful did I mess this up....