Another great weekend of weather here, perfect for spending outside brewing beer.   Today’s recipe was the second batch of Bishop’s Farewell, a wonderful hoppy golden ale brewed with Cascade for a nice citrusy flavour.  The malt is all Maris Otter with a bit of wheat, and hops were Phoenix pellets for bittering and Cascade at 15 minutes and at the end of the boil.  Target gravity was 1.044 but we hit 1.042 instead.

We used a bit more icce in the immersion chiller kettle, so the chill was able to proceed while the wort was racked at the maximum flow rate, and we had a little bit of ice left over.  That isn’t too bad for mid-August and the hottest ground water of the year.

The aeration stone gave up the ghost today, it’s gotten completely clogged from years of use, so I aerated with the tried and true method of shaking the carboys.  A new aeration stone will be needed.

On Sunday I picked some more of the Cascade hops growing in the back yard.  Last weekend was the first picking, I have only harvested a few ounces so far.   The total crop looks good again this year, though, there’s a lot of big cones left on the bines.