Amber Brew Day

Today was my first venture into the world of Amber Ale. I was supposed to light the burners at 4:30 AM, when Sharon left to climb Half Dome, but I hadn't filtered my water or ground my grain last night, and at that time of the morning I started to doubt my choice for an Amber Ale so I started researching recipes and taking inventory of all my grains and hops on hand. After a few cups of coffee I decided to stick with the original plan and brew the Amber.














Mashing out at 9 AM. The first runnings were dark and sweet!















I took this picture for two reasons. First, I put a new piece of brewing equipment into rotation: The Ove Glove! It's much more convenient to grab hot pieces of aluminum, etc with this then trying to use a regular, square hot pad. Second, notice that there is NO BOIL OVER on the edges of the brew pot or on the ground. Why? I started using Foam Control on this brew and even though I had a great rolling boil, I didn't have all the foam associated with it. This stuff ROCKS!















11.5 gallons of Amber Waves of Grain in glass where it will sit for the next three weeks. I used a few drops of foam control in each carboy and it started eating through the foam from the aeration right away. 1/2 hour after pitching the 2 liter starter I had visible yeast activity.















Oops! I boiled off a little too much and over shot my starting gravity. Was supposed to be 1.055. As Mark would say, "This is going to be a big ole ale!"