second brew (red ale), part 3

As of Saturday morning the specific gravity is 1.016 measured at about 67 degrees. Adjusted is 1.017.

Tasted. Not bad. Pronounced bitterness and hoppiness. I wonder whether I detect a hint of metallic flavor. I tasted from a sample extracted from the primary fermenter's spigot, which perhaps gave me a little sediment.

Palmer identifies two causes of metallic off-flavors as unprotected metals dissolving into the wort and hydrolysis of lipids in poorly stored malts. I doubt the former, although it is true that this was the first use of the big All-Clad pot. Perhaps I did not wash it adequately? The LME was from The Cellar's big drum. I'd be surprised if there was a general quality problem with their storage; surely this would be a big problem for the many brewers who must make use of it. It's also possible that is not at all what I am tasting. Something to pay attention to.

Decided to rack to the carboy for secondary fermentation. Learned that cleaning and sanitizing will be much easier with a second bucket. The wire sticking out of the carboy is my retrieval hook for the tube soaking inside the cleaner-filled carboy.

Filling the carboy was a piece of cake with the spigot. I guess I'll have a chance to master siphoning when refilling the bottling bucket from the carboy.


I will be very interested to see the process of clarification. There's no noticeable particulate matter swimming around, but the level of opacity is pretty high.

I resisted my urge to taste everything and did not sample the trub.