12August2008
Posted by Muddy under: Uncategorized.
Here’s some excellent beer news, three great beer brewers are poised to be the top 3 American beers (by sales volume): Sam Adams, Yuengling and Sierra Nevada. My tastes lean more towards 2 & 3, but it’s great to see quality brewers succeeding! (Of course, the truth of the matter is that the mega-brewers optimized the shareholder value by selling to the highest bidder, love the flag-waving jingoism in their commercials, reminds me of certain politicians.) For more of the real story, see this entry at slashfood:
25July2008
Posted by Muddy under: Uncategorized.
Trying out the new WordPress iPhone client app. Wonder if I can easily add a pic/snapshot and not seeing any way to do so. Oh well.
Well call me wrong! I just added a brand new photo of my hat!
18July2008
Posted by Muddy under: Biking.
Today’s installment includes a “aren’t I pleased with myself” theme. For the 4th day this week, I packed a change of clothes, filled my water bottle and hopped on my bike to ride to work. Today I decided to check my tires before leaving and brought them both up to their recommended pressure: approx. 70 psi. What a difference!! Combined with a decent night’s sleep, I was averaging a good 2 MPH faster for the entire ride. In fact, I made my best time ever for my commute to work by 1.5 min! Hurray for me! 6 miles in 24:00 minutes (my cyclometer stops when I’m stuck at a red light) = 15mph. The ride felt good, too, legs, lungs, “saddle” all operating as well as they have in a long time. I’m hoping to keep this up as long as the weather is conducive. 48 miles this week. That’s arguably worth 9 dollars in gas, as well.
11July2008
Posted by Muddy under: Brewing; Food.
Random tidbits from the big blue room: I heard a segment on NPR’s Marketplace program the other day (on my way to pick up our weekly CSA order from Two Small Farms) that the big soda companies are taking a serious look at stevia — hurray!! This stuff is amazing and I’d feel a lot happier about drinking a diet soda if it were sweetened with the stuff - all natural and almost no impact on blood glucose levels. The FDA (aren’t they supposed to be on our side?) has been blocking stevia as a sweetener and I’m hoping Coke has the sway to change that.
It’s been a hot summer and a busy summer for me, so I’ve finally transferred my last batch of beer (a California IPA I brewed in april) to bottles after a LONG time in the secondary fermenter. The temperatures have been through the roof so I’m hoping it’s going to survive. Taste samples have been inconclusive so now I just need to wait. The Pliney the Elder hoptacular beer has come through in spades. Just awesome. Sadly, I’ve only gone two bottles of the Celebration Ale clone left- I think it’s the best beer I’ve brewed yet.
I’m hoping to write up a full post detailing the work we’ve been doing on the back yard - specifically, building and installing a patio with raised beds and built in irrigation system. It’s looking awesome now, working great, too! We’ve got 6 tomato plants that are all sporting young, green fruit and the high temps should help (I think) with producing some tasty heirloom tomatoes in a few weeks.
This Saturday we’re heading out to a special meal / event called Out Standing In The Field, our event is being hosted in Petaluma, CA and it should be an amazing experience. At least that’s the idea! Hopefully, I’ll get some pictures and memories to share. Can’t wait.
Never a dull moment. G’night & happy iPhone 2.0 Friday!
14January2008
Posted by Muddy under: Brewing.
My fourth batch of home brew. I went to Fermentation Frenzy with a taste in mind, ran into Tim who’d brought some of his home-brewed Celebration Ale and it was a perfect match. I got the grains and extracts but due to the hops shortage I had to forage for the Chinook hops. Nevertheless, I was so impressed with the beer I picked up 2 kits and sent one as a gift.
Well, I called around for the Chinook hops but didn’t find them until I called a random place in Florida - Despite only needing 2 oz, I figured I might as well max out the order size at 5 oz. Now I’ve sent one ounce of Chinook hops to Chicago but since it hasn’t arrived yet, I’m going to send another batch out via trackable carrier.
I finally got around to brewing it up today and seems like it’s going to turn out great! I realized that this is the first brew I’ve brewed entirely solo. It should have taken 2-2.5 hours but wound up taking me almost 5. But I made no colossal errors!!! That’s definitely a first.
Here’s the recipe:
Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale
—————————–
8 lb ultralight liquid malt extract
1 lb Crystal-60 malt
.5 lb Carapils malt
1 oz Chinook hops (60 min)
2 oz Amarillo hops (1.5 oz 30 min, .5 oz dryhop) [orig ~3 oz Cascade]
1 oz Centennial (dryhop)
1 tsp irish moss (optional - for clarity)
.75 c corn sugar for priming
california ale yeast
Steep grains at 156 for 45 min
Boil wort 90 min
Ferment at 66º
Dry hop in secondary for 5 days at 60º
In reality it worked out a little differently. I wound up steeping the grains at a starting temp of 130 and keeping 156 for a full 30 min (total of 45). I wound up adding a little extra Chinook hops, 1 oz at 90 min and .7oz at 60 min. Other than that I was pretty good about sticking with the temperatures and timings. Transferred to carboy at 68ish deg, with O.G. 1.065.
This will also be my first use of a secondary fermenter. So next weekend, I’m going to transfer this brew over to the new carboy, add the dry hops and then brew a batch of Pliney the Elder (from More Beer). Can’t wait!
Should be ready to bring for our trip to Tahoe! Primary fermentation in 6.5 gallon carboy
UPDATE [1/21/08]: Racked it to a brand new 5 gallon carboy last night. The airlock was bubbling about once every 7 seconds so it seemed like the right time. I’d spent a little while chatting with the owner of Fermentation Solutions about when to transfer to the secondary, great guy and great place (added benefit is it’s a lot closer to my house). I dry hopped the remaining .5 oz Amarillo and full 1 oz of Centennial per the recipe. Everything seemed to go well. I took a little sample of the beer and the taste & smell seem perfect! The specific gravity was 1.034 at 62 degrees and the remaining yeast seem to be working hard. Now the hard part. Gotta wait about 3 weeks before bottling and then another 2ish until they’re ready to go.
1February2007
Posted by Muddy under: Biking.
It’s February 1st and I finally got my act in gear to make the ride to work. Yay!
It’s 6 miles and pretty flat. I took it a easy since I’m getting over a cold and haven’t ridden in a few months. I was going to complain that it was a little chilly and that made my gasping for air a little painful … then my brother emailed me to say he’d been jogging in near-zero fahrenheit temps in Chicago.
So, strike that! Anyway - was a very good ride & hoping to get back to regular commuting via bike. Made the ride in 30 minutes, current odometer reading: 1056
