Scotch Ale - Still Going, and Going, and Going...

I wasn't able to bottle the Scotch Ale this weekend like I had planned. The darn thing is still fermenting. Mind you, it's slowed down some, but it's been going pretty steadily for the past two weeks. I still have yet to put on the airlock, partly because I'm lazy and partly because it wasn't until very recently that I could tell the krausen had subsided. The blowoff tube is still attached, of course, and it's bubbling out about every 7 seconds or so. Hopefully it will stop some time this week so I can bottle next weekend. It looks like I might be bottling on Saturday and then brewing the Light Ale on Sunday.

Here's why I think this batch is taking so long to ferment. Primarily, the fact that the OG was 1.092. There's a lot of fermentables in there and the yeast need time to chew them all up. I should mention that I calculated what my OG should be based on the given ingredients and it was closer to my actual reading than to what the recipe said it should be. I'm not really sure if I should feel reassured by that or not.

Second, my cooling method works quite well and the carboy is kept down around 61-64F. I think this might slow down the yeast a little bit, but it's better than having fruity esters in the beer.

Anyway, that's what's going on. I'm waiting to take a SG reading until the primary fermentation has completed, but I'm guessing it's going to be around 1.020 so this beer is probably going to end up having an 8-9% ABV. I'm thinking it's going to end up being a Strong Scotch Ale. I'll update again when I finally do take that reading.