The Witches Brew

Does anyone have experience with fermenting the Scotch Ale in a 65-68 degree basement? The thing is, I was making a safale-04 starter, and broke the container while looking for Irish Moss of all things... So I used safale-05. I haven't done anything else but open it to take gravity readings. FG and the bucket is 66 degrees, but still slowly bubbling. 1 per minute after 2 weeks. I leave the hydrometer in the bucket / Coopers fermentor and give a spin to minimize contamination and exposure time It is down to 1.016 at 66 from 1.078 at 74 degrees OG.

I am hoping to rack it tomorrow night and get the same recipe and add the safale 04 on top of the yeast cake + more light DME.

One day I hope to get drunk and have someone enjoy my homebrew.

-Mike D

Temperature seems OK, a bit on the warm side for this time of year; but, should be fine.



Dry yeast is rehydrated at best. No need to make a starter and usually I just sprinkle the dry yeast on top of the wort.



If it's been @ 1.016 for a couple of readings then it's done.



Good Luck!

+1 to no need to make a starter with dry yeast. It's a waste of time. The 11.5g packets contain enough yeast to ferment anything up to about 1.06-1.07. If you make a big beer consider 1 1/2 packets.

+1 You're at about 80% attenuation right now - which is just about right for S-05. If it's been stable, it's done.

Not sure what you mean by make the same recipe and add S-04 on top of the yeast cake. If you mean make the same recipe except use S-04, sounds good. If you mean make the same recipe and pitch it on top of the yeast cake, sounds good. I wouldn't make the same recipe, put it on the same yeast cake AND add S-04. There's problems caused by too much yeast just as there's problems caused by not enough.

Oh - one other thing. I wouldn't bother to rack it to a secondary. If it's done, go ahead and bottle it.

Thanks, you guys rock!

I didn't dry hop it. It tastes REALLY good already IMO, but it doesn't have the .5 ounce of dry hop.

-Mike

IMHO a dry hop does not belong in a scotch ale... and anything in that amount is going to get lost in all the other flavors you have going on. Ageing it for 6+ months (as that beer needs to really get the flavors to peak) would also mean the aroma the dry hop might infuse would be virtually gone.