The ceiling fan turned slowly, doing nothing to alleviate the heat, just pushing the tendrils of cigarette smoke around. The heavy oak desk was littered with papers -- nervous scribblings about extract temperatures alongside the crossword on a battered newspaper, hopping schedules on the remnants of a napkin -- and empty beer glasses. A knock on the door rattled the windows like hail on a tin roof. The man behind the desk kicked up his feet and mumbled something that might've been "come in."
It was a blonde.
The trouble always starts with the blondes.
She was the kid, so she claimed, of a fellow from the Continent, Belgium probably, who ran away to St. Johns to smuggle rum to the Americas -- and he ended up finding a nice girl and settling down in Montreal. She was raised amongst those big stone buildings that froze you to death in the winters and made you wish for something to keep your spirit hot. And then one day he walked in his office, a little third-floor walk up overlooking San Francisco Bay. He knew the minute she strode through the door, tossing that saucy blonde hair over one shoulder -- she was Trouble.
--
The story: a "mini mash" clone (from "Clone Brews") of La Fin du Monde. The gravity of the wort came out a touch low, so I got 4.3 gallons instead of my expected 5 at the correct specific gravity of 1.084. Pitched with Wyeast 3725PC. Ambient temperatures during primary fermentation got a little warm (up into the mid 70s during the hottest part of the day), but averaged out to about 68-70 F. Krausen started to fall on day 4, and fermentation appeared to slow to almost nothing by day 5. It looked really stopped on day 6, and unfortunately I didn't think to take a hydrometer reading until after I'd racked almost all of it into secondary.
While it tastes promisingly good, the SG is still quite high: 1.040. According to the recipe, it should be about 1.013. I suspect I should have let it sit longer (or used the right tool for the job to actually figure it out... lesson learned).
So do I let it sit and trust the yeast still in suspension, or should I consider re-pitching into the secondary?
It was a blonde.
The trouble always starts with the blondes.
She was the kid, so she claimed, of a fellow from the Continent, Belgium probably, who ran away to St. Johns to smuggle rum to the Americas -- and he ended up finding a nice girl and settling down in Montreal. She was raised amongst those big stone buildings that froze you to death in the winters and made you wish for something to keep your spirit hot. And then one day he walked in his office, a little third-floor walk up overlooking San Francisco Bay. He knew the minute she strode through the door, tossing that saucy blonde hair over one shoulder -- she was Trouble.
--
The story: a "mini mash" clone (from "Clone Brews") of La Fin du Monde. The gravity of the wort came out a touch low, so I got 4.3 gallons instead of my expected 5 at the correct specific gravity of 1.084. Pitched with Wyeast 3725PC. Ambient temperatures during primary fermentation got a little warm (up into the mid 70s during the hottest part of the day), but averaged out to about 68-70 F. Krausen started to fall on day 4, and fermentation appeared to slow to almost nothing by day 5. It looked really stopped on day 6, and unfortunately I didn't think to take a hydrometer reading until after I'd racked almost all of it into secondary.
While it tastes promisingly good, the SG is still quite high: 1.040. According to the recipe, it should be about 1.013. I suspect I should have let it sit longer (or used the right tool for the job to actually figure it out... lesson learned).
So do I let it sit and trust the yeast still in suspension, or should I consider re-pitching into the secondary?
