I spent the morning brewing up a ballsy IPA with my buddy.  We started early—around 9:30am—but after spending extra time chatting with the folks at the homebrew supply shop we ending up running long.  I had to run to a meeting at work around 3pm and by the time I got back to my pal’s place to help clean up there was a slight problem.

“Something’s weird,” he told me.

After inquiring about the problem, I soon learned that our IPA which was supposed to end up around 7-8% alcohol by volume will now be at least 12% ABV.

We ran through our notes, recrunched the numbers and finally resolved to head back to the homebrew shop to borrow their knowledge and fancy equipment.  After fifteen minutes  of problem shooting and a quick look at the refractometer (this handy device gives us an accurate reading of a beer’s specific gravity, a number we use to figure out the ABV)  there was no logical explanation for the problem.

Basically, the only way we could have created five-gallons of beer that would end up so high in alcohol would be if we brewed with twelve-pounds of dry malt extract; we only used nine.

Now my question is—where did the three-pounds of ghost malt come from?