Priorities
A correction from my last post: I’m now assuming that the taste I don’t like is from using raspberry flavoring, some of which was added directly to the fermented wort before bottling; it’s too much of a manufactured taste for my liking, and I think it gives the beer an unprofessional sweetness. Ah well, I’m not going to use kits anymore and so any fruit additions can come from crushed fruit in the secondary from now on.
I’ve been wanting to go all grain/partial mash for a bit, and bought a 5 gallon cooler for the purpose. As I was reading up on what to do I briefly worried that I had gotten too small a cooler for going AG; while this is true, my brewpot is also too small for AG and so I’ll have to be content with doing partial mashes until I can get a suitable turkey fryer for outside AG batches. It’s still going to give me better beer and help me feel like I’m actually “brewing,” so it’s fine.
However, as my exuberance depletes my raspberry wheat supply I realized that I need to brew again; this desire is compounded by wanting to flex my PM muscles. Ideally, I’ll brew this Saturday but I’m not sure if I’ll be knowledgeable enough by then; I don’t want to totally screw things up. Then I realized if I don’t do it now, next weekend I’ll have to balance the urge to brew against that shiny new Halo 3 sitting in my 360.
Decisions, decisions…