I can confirm hop absorption was higher than usual, but probably normal considering nearly a pound of hops was in there.
Brew day went well, hit my strike temp dead on, and held it within a couple of degrees, stepped up to 162 and sparged with 170 water. Acidified with 10% phosphoric acid (just used 8.8 times as much) to good effect. Below is my boil. At flame out (well, 'switch off") I lowered the temperature a bit to maybe 180, added the hops (in bags) and continued to cool it using the chiller to 170, and let it sit 20 minutes. Decanted just under 21 quarts to the fermenter, pitched at 74 F (went in at 92 F, counterflow chiller was off its game a bit, I think I know why) and today it is happily bubbling away at 67 F.
Hit my OG perfectly at 1.058, could've easily fit more grain in there but that made stirring the mash really easy. In a BZ35 I used the malt pipe but not the false bottom, and recirculated at almost full speed the whole time. As usual (for me) the temp controller was set at 158 to hold 150.
You can watch progress
here:
Click to expand...