Racking Day

Okay, so I've been doing this homebrew thing for a day or two. First batch was in the spring of 1995. But learning new tricks even at batch #119.

So I read Steve Piatz's book, dunno what too me so long. I've known him pretty much the whole time I've been brewing and judging, and the techniques he espouses are a big part of why judging mead entries has gone from 'poison until proven otherwise' to 'an this many be so good?'

So today I kegged up a beer failure that had me fairly demoralized. It's super sweet, but it has enough alcohol that repitching is likely futile. It tastes good, smells good, but it's like a 1.040 final gravity (down from 1.100). Strikes me as a Belgian interpretation of a Wee Heavy.

But then the meads, when I racked them, they not only had attenuated down nicely they smelled and tasted, well, maybe the best meads I've ever made. So then I was looking at my beer fail and going, when your failures are this good and your wins are this huge...

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