Since the Falcons are hosting the February 2007 AHA Club Only Competition for Session Beers, it was decided that we ought to insure that we had an entry!

The day turned out to be one of the coldest in the Los Angeles area for years. Ice was everywhere. The 101/405 interchange was shut down because a sprinkler sprayed water all over the road and in the morning Angelenos were confronted by that thing of legend, black ice!

Fletch showed up the evening before and filled the HLT with water and set the burners to keep the water heating through the night. Thanks to Fletch's efforts, the brew crew started with a mass of hot water in the morning. Of course, we still had to deal with frozen water pipes and hoses that kept us from mashing in for a while. The mash temp fluctuated a little bit, but eventually we stablized around 154 and rested.

A slow sparge lead to steady extraction from the mash and we ended up with 33 gallons of wort. Boiling for an hour, we added enough hops to yield about 20 IBUs in the strong wort. After a full and vigorous boil of the total volume, the crew extracted a full 5 gallons of wort into Drew's carboy to ferment as a full strength (1.075) "throwback" mild. During the brewing process everyone measured and marked the 2.5 gallon mark on their carboys. With the cold chill to the air and water, the therminator chiller was blasting through the wort. After each brewer received their wort, the chiller was hooked to the boiling water in the HLT (25 gallons). Brewers were then filled to the 5 gallon mark to produce a modern mild at 1.038.

The recipe is based upon a recipe evolved from the CDJK Mild first brewed at a Falcons' Oktoberfest by Cullen, Drew, Jim and Kent. With newlywed Jim showing up to help for part of the brew, the original team brewed this recipe for the first time since that festival.