Well, I got about 1/2 way through this a couple of weeks ago, and promptly closed out the window... maybe this time I'll do the right thing :)

So, on March 3rd we brewed up another batch of beer. It was a BYO recipe for an Oatmeal stout. I'm scared to say it, but everything went perfectly. We spent the first hour or so cleaning the Ryan's kegerator which got us started about an hour late, and I was worried (as usual) that we would be rushed and screw something up. Well, this time we crushed the grain into a bucket, had accurate thermometers, a giant stainless steel spoon (which still isn't big enough, really) and things went really well. The worst problem we encountered (oh, and it was a big one) was that Ryan hadn't noticed that the recipe called for a 11.3 gallon mash. Our mash tun is 10 gallons. We wound up, oh say 1.3 gallons short in the boil kettle. We took a gravity reading hoping that our lower efficiency calculations would allow us a bit of leeway, and that we could just top up w/ water and maybe some DME. Well, like I said earlier, perfection was the word for the day. Our increased efficiency from the good grind and mash temps saved us. We just had to add the 1.3 gallons to hit exactly our desired OG. Cleanup went quickly and we were done with the entire thing in 5 hours.

I snagged a book Brew Like a Monk while at the beer store grabbing yeast for this brew. I'd be willing to be the next brew will be a Belgian :)