A Whole Mess of Kegging

Eagle Face Oatmeal Stout, ready for kegging

It's only five weeks until AHA (American Homebrewers' Association) in San Diego, and in preparation I've been brewing up a storm the past few weekends. In order to give everything sufficient time for conditioning, carbonation, and such, tonight was the night to keg it all.

Gondwana Pale Ale 1.2

• This beer had been in the primary fermenter for 3.5 weeks, for the first 10 days at 66°, and the rest of the time at ambient temperature.
• I racked the beer onto 2 ounces of Citra hops (13.2% alpha, 3.7% beta), weighted down in a bag at the bottom of the keg.
• Final gravity was 1.010; down from 1.048, this works out to 5.0% abv. The beer was wonderfully clear, with a medium yellow color and clean flavor.
• I'll let this dry hop at room temperature for a week or two before carbonating.

Eagle Face Oatmeal Stout 1.1

• This beer had been in the primary fermenter for 2.5 weeks; I cold-crashed it for the final 24 hours down to 38°.
• Final gravity was down to 1.021 from 1.061, which works out to 4.1% abv. The beer has really nice body to it, and should be delightful once carbonated.
• I began carbonating this beer immediately.

Bonedigger Brown Ale 1.1

• This beer had been in the primary fermenter for 11 days (cold crashed during the final 24 hours).
• Final gravity was 1.013, down from 1.052. This works out to 5.1% abv. Both flavor and appearance are on the mark.
• I began carbonating this beer immediately.

To move things along, I'm going to try a "quick carbonation" technique. For the oatmeal stout and brown ale, I began carbonation under 40 psi at 38°. In 24 hours, I'll lower pressure to 20 psi, and after another 24 hours I'll check out the carbonation.