Saturday, November 7th, was Teach A Friend to Brew day. This year I had a chance to do just that. I invited Craig over to see how I brew. I chose to make a milk stout using all grain mashing. The initial wort (unfermented beer) came out of the mash tun looking as black as midnite and thick like used motor oil. The flavor was a nice chocolate/coffee flavor.
We ended up with about 6-1/2 to 7 gallons. I only have 3 & 5 gallon carboys for fermentors. The bulk of the wort when into a 5 gallon fermentor with the Wyeast 1099 (Whitbread) yeast. The rest went into the 3 gallon carboy with Safale US-05. Both carboys are bubbling away. I think that fermentation might be done this week, but it might be almost Thanksgiving before I can bottle.
One of the nice things about inviting someone over to brew is that you can get them to help you bottle. We bottled the Better Red Than Dead – Irish Red ale that I brewed earlier. It looks wonderful. After bottle conditioning we will see how it turned out. Should be ready for Thanksgiving.