Alright! I'm still nervous, but this looks like it's going to turn out alright. I'm happy.

The primary fermentation stage has come and gone, and its time to let the beer condition. It could, possibly, be bottled right now, but I don't think that'd turn out as well as it could, and I really need to let it sit for a while away from the hot and cold break, and the hop and yeast sediment.

As it sits right now, the carboy and transfer hose are sterilized and I'm waiting for the carboy to cool down to do the transfer (I used hot, near-boiling water to rinse out the sodium bisulfite sanitizer). And, by the way, sodium bisulfite is some interesting stuff. It puts off a smell thats reminiscent of chlorine, and its extremely strong. (If I remember correctly, it releases sulfur into the air).

Anyways.. As I was waiting for the rinsing water to heat up, I decided to take a hydrometer reading. It looks like its around 1.015 or so, which is about what the finishing gravity should be if I did my math right. I will double check that later. While I was doing this, I decided to take a whiff, and it smells like a hef. I love it. I'm not quite brave enough to try it just yet though, for a few reasons. One, I didn't filter out anything from the wort after boiling before I put it in the fermenter. Therefor, whats refered to as the hot break (as well as the cold break), and all of the hops are sitting in the primary fermenter right now. When I move this all to the carboy, most of that will stay behind (some will come, but thats ok, it should help add to the flavor). Two, it has only fermented for about 3 days so far, and isn't conditioned. At all. And therefor, its probably going to be extremely bitter, and carry one hell of an after taste. I would rather wait and try it around bottling time after this all settles down.

And now, looking at how this is turning out, I don't expect it to be the best beer ever, but I think it'll be drinkable. It has fermented at a slightly higher temp then I would have liked (by probably at least a good five to ten degrees), but it looks like it may come out alright, despite my minor mistakes. Which is damn good, in my opinion, and definitely helps my confidence.

Right now, it looks like I'll probably get to bottling the first weekend of September. Depending on my schedule, I'm guessing I'll probably do it on the third or fourth. I could potentially do it a little earlier, but a few extra days conditioning shouldn't hurt. My only real fear is the yeast will die too much by the the time I bottle to provide much carbonation, if any, but thats mostly from lack of experience, and it'll probably turn out just fine.

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I have now started moving the beer from the primary fermenter (big plastic bucket) to the secondary fermenter (big glass water jug, aka, carboy).

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Alright! The beer is now transfered and sitting in the secondary fermenter conditioning. It will sit here for about one to two weeks. Everything looks good. In the process I got about a sips worth to try, and I must say, even now, it tastes alright. It seems a little weak, and very light, but thats not a bad thing. Either way, things are looking good. I do kind of worry I transfered too soon, but I probably shouldn't be. It was sitting in the primary fermenter for about.. 75 to 80 hours, which should be plenty of time for the Adaption and Attenuative fermentation stages to come and go. Now its just on to condition, and hopefully create a bit more alcohol.

Pictures of the transfer can be found here.

So now that all that is taken care of, there is a couple other quick things I would like to mention. Transfering took forever. I think a large part of this was due to the fact that I didn't filter out the hops and whatnot from the wort when I first poured it into the fermenter. It would continually clog, and then spurt out a bunch at once, causing it to aerate a bit, and sometimes cause a tiny bit of foaming. I don't think it happened enough to spoil it, but I know it didn't help. I think from now on, I'll make a habit to, at the very least, strain the wort into the fermenter to help clear the beer up a bit. As you can see from the pictures, the current stuff is pretty cloudy, but I personally think thats a good thing. It should turn out as a decent hef, which is good, and comforting for a first attempt. I know I will need to do things differently in the future, but things are looking good so far. Yay!

--nullpuppy(out)