Steamed Bee CCB

To set the record straight, I am a genuine newbie to homebrewing (with one batch under my belt). However, I am also the kind of person who can't pass up an opportunity to "see what happens", especially when confronted with a nice tool like the Recipator. I decided to see what I could do with a modified "California Common" recipe to produce a good Summertime beer.

Brewer:	DarkBrew		Email:	smsandvig@yahoo.com
URL:	http://webpages.charter.net/smsandvig/beer_index.htm
Beer:	Steamed Bee CCB		Style:	California Common
Type:	Extract w/grain		Size:	5 gallons
Color:	8 HCU (~6 SRM)		Bitterness:	40 IBU
OG:	1.055		FG:	1.016
Alcohol:	5.0% v/v (3.9% w/w)
Water:	The only thing I do with the tap water I have at home is to boil it long enough to drive off the chlorine. I normally boil the water I am going to put into the fermenter the night before, put it in sanitized milk jugs, and chill it in the refrigerator.
Grain:	0.75 lb. American crystal 10L
Steep:	The grain was steeped in 1.5 gals. of water over high heat until it was just below boiling. The resulting tea was then strained into the brewpot and 2 cups of hot water were used to sparge the grains in the strainer.
Boil:	60 minutes	SG 1.078	3.5 gallons
	3.3 lb. Light malt extract 1.5 lb. Light dry malt extract 1.75 lb. Honey
	I added 2 gallons of water to the "grain tea" in the brewpot. As I wanted to both get improved hop utilization and preserve some of the honey's aromatics, I added my fermentables in stages as follows: Bring wort to boiling, add Chinook hops (1 oz.) Boil 20 minutes, add malt extracts (both DME and LME). Boil 20 minutes, add honey. Boil 10 minutes, add .5 oz. Cascade hops. Boil 15 minutes, add .5 oz. Cascade hops. Boil 5 minutes and remove from heat, add enough cooled water to bring to 5 gallons.
Hops:	1 oz. Chinook (11.9% AA, 60 min.) .5 oz. Cascade (6.3% AA, 10 min.) 0.5 oz. Cascade (6.3% AA, 5 min.)
Yeast:	Wyeast 2112
Log:	Primary: 4 days @ 70°. Secondary: 7 days @ 68°. Aged 1 week in bottle.
Carbonation:	Carbonated with 1.25 cups DME.
Tasting:	Aggressive hop character when sampled at the end of 1 week of bottle- conditioning. I thought at first that overutilization of my bittering hops had occurred. After additional bottle aging (3-4 days), flavors mellowed and blended. Good mouthfeel and sweetness contrasting the hops. The beer is golden, but very cloudy. This could be due to the fact that I had neither a good hot or cold break, due to the volume of the wort (3.5 gals.). In the future, I will reduce the amount of water in the boil and add irish moss to improve the hot break. I have recently made an immersion chiller which greatly improved the cold break on my currently fermenting batch. I am very happy with the flavor, but would like to get a better appearance. Head formation is good, but would like to improve retention a bit also. Far better than my first batch, which was an IPA kit. It lacked both mouthfeel and hop flavor/aroma.

Recipe posted 05/26/03.