I went to the homebrew shop on Sunday to get ingredients to brew an IPA next weekend and I am pretty excited about what I got.

The centerpiece of the batch is three ounces of Simcoe hops plugs! Their alpha acid content is 13.2%.

I also stepped up from dry yeast and got a Smack-pack of Wyeast Laboratories Northwest Ale strain. This is a link to the details of the yeast strain.

For steeping grains I got a pound of 60 Lovibond crystal malt and a pound of victory malt. I tasted a few grains of the victory malt before he crushed it and it has a very pronounced toasty bread taste. Lovibond is a measure of grain's darkness. The higher it is the darker it will make the beer. Crystal malt has a nice sweetness to help offset my Simcoe hops.

Finally I got a 3.3 pound can of amber liquid malt extract (LME) and one can of light LME.

On Saturday I finally bottled the batch of beer that my family drove 4 hours to help me brew 6 weeks ago on August 23, 2008. It is tasting really good and it is going to be really difficult for me to wait until this weekend to try a bottle. Friday after work I will bring a bottle up from my beer cellar and put it in the fridge so it will be ready to inspire me while I am brewing Saturday morning.