British Bitter first attempt

Mash

I used 3 gallons of water despite this style's usual recommendation of using 1 quart per lb of grist. I heated this mash up to 150F, then let it rest for ~30 minutes, and then turned the heat back on and accidentally let it get to a boil. Not sure that is a good thing for the flavor, but it looks to be turning out OK so far, but the color is a little dark and I suspect that the boil is the reason for that.

Boil

I really had to drag out the boil on this one in an attempt to get the IBU as high as I wanted, but it falls short compared to my other batch. I was working with 1 oz of Kent Goldings and 1 oz of U.K. Fuggles. My final IBU was 31.5.

Fermentation

This batch turned out nicely, and I added gelatin finings when I transferred to the secondary fermenter as my brew store recommended to clarify the beer, and it's looking beautiful. I forgot to add yeast nutrient to this batch, but I don't think the yeast had any problems, as after a week the gravity is down to 1.003. I transferred this one to a secondary fermenter while I was working on the second batch, and I wanted to let the finings do their job, so I'm leaving it in the secondary, and will transfer to the keg later and add bottling sugar. That should help me calibrate how much sugar to use in the competition batch.