I think Fly Me to the Moon is the right title for my latest homebrew for all sorts of reasons. It is based on Graham Wheeler’s recipe for J W Lees Moonraker, a beer I don’t think I’ve ever tried but a strong, malty, dark ale sounds appealing to me. I’ve also got the song of the same name on the potential playlist for a jam I’m going to tomorrow afternoon (if anyone is near Fulham in London tomorrow afternoon, let me know). And then, when I went to fire up my thermonitor program on my Raspberry Pi to monitor the temperature, the line number of the last command was 1969; I could fire it up by typing !1969 and it reminded me that this year is the 50th anniversary of the first moon landing (July 1969).
I used the oven for mashing again and managed to exceed the expected efficiency, with an original gravity of 1.066 instead of 1.058. Depending on what the yeast does (Safale S-04) it is either going be extra strong or extra thick, either of which would be fine as outcomes. I’ve got it fermenting and made sure I’ve put the brewbelt into the right plug socket. Now the waiting (and watching) begins.