Brew Day!!! S.O.B. ESB

Feeling good after a very efficient 3 1/2 hour brew day. Brewed our first Extra Special Bitter (ESB), which we're calling S.O.B. ESB. The label can be found to the left, and for those of you who aren't Blackhawks fans (which is pretty much everybody except me and ten other Chicagoans), the man pictured is one Bill Wirtz, the worst owner in all of professional sports. Anyway, here are the specs. The beer came in with an original gravity of 1059, one mere gravity point shy of our 1060 target (!). I then pitched roughly 10 oz. of a dry London yeast graciously provided to me by Matt and Andrew over at Flossmoor Station brewpub. Everything went smoothly (except for the City of Chicago deciding to spray for mosquitos while I was chilling the wort). I also discovered that I enjoy the smell of Challenger hops--a nice, floral quality. Of course, I used them as flavor hops, not aroma hops, so hopefully they taste as well as they smell. Anyway, I think that's about it for now. Should be ready to go in three weeks. Mmmm... ESB.