2112

Yes I'm a Rush nerd, but that has nothing to do with the title of this post. That honor goes to the yeast of the month - Wyeast 2112. I'm sipping right now on a pint of St. Croix Crossing Steam Beer and admiring the smooth  malty roundness you get with this yeast. That's not to say that it leaves a lot of sweetness. The finish is fairly dry, and leaves plenty of room for the palate cleansing hop bitterness of this beer.

Seeing that this yeast is amazing, we decided to use it in another beer. Last Monday, Memorial Day, we brewed an Amber Lager with Pale Malt, Bonlander (a 10L 2-Row Munich malt from Briess), and Caramel 60. It was hopped with 4 additions of Mt Hood and only Mt Hood. The brew day went off without a hitch and the beer had a starting gravity of 1.053, which was right where I wanted it. We'll be fermenting it cooler than we did the Steam beer to try to get a more traditional lager character out of it. I'll let you know how that works out.