Kegging The Bitter

To start, a photo of the pictures on one of the brewery walls.

Well the bitter has been in the primary for a week now and the gravity has been at 1006 for at least 2 days, so today was the day to rack to the fermenter. As is normal whenever I decide to anything in the brewery, it has to be hot. It was 42 deg C in there at lunchtime today (33 deg C outside) and this is supposed to be the early stages of winter ! I didn't get quite as much as I expected into the kegs, probably 35 litres to my expected 38, but the beer looks (and tastes good). The final gravity was 1006 and the ph 4.3 (not sure w
hether the ph is good, bad or in between, but have meter must measure). I managed to collect quite a bit of yeast which I intend using next weekend for a dry irish stout.

The lager which I made a few weeks ago still hasn't cleared and leaves a strange aftertaste in the back of the throat, not sure what it is but it doesn't taste infected or off in any way. I'm going to add some finings later and then forget about it for a couple of months. Not a good first experience with dried lager yeast.

The hops appear to be still growing will despite the fact thats its early winter and they should be dying back by now, mind you with the weather its not suprising they don't know what season it is. You can see on the photo all the new growth. The Great Gardening Experiment continues !