Cherry Schwarzbock

I know it has been a few months since I've posted anything.  Things have been a bit hectic.

Here's what I've been up to lately -> brewing a cherry schwarzbock for my sister-in-law.  Think about a schwarzbier but in a bock profile.  When doing this, its important not to use too much roasted malt.  Otherwise, it carries too much coffee/espresso flavor and ends up tasting stoutish.  Its also important not to use too much wheat, like a dunkleweizen.  It ends up tasting too wheat-stoutish.

To try to avoid these problems in this attempt, I decided to use de-bittered Carafa II and Carafa III malts.  My sister-in-law also wanted something fruity.  Cherrybock beers have been around for a while, so that's what I went with.

I made this beer back on March 10, 2013.  Its been fermenting at about 45F for four weeks now.  I have just added the cherry puree.

Epic Brewing - 825 State Stout Release #23

Epic always makes a good beer. The 825 Stout is no exception. My only complaint: the 825 Stout strikes me more as a black Porter and the Galloway Porter strikes me more as a brown Stout.

What is the difference between a Stout and a Porter? Not a whole lot really. Primarily it's marketing and shades of color and shades of roastiness.

If you blind taste test beers marketed as porters vs. those marketed as stouts, you'll be hard pressed to find a clear commercial distinction between the two.

My personal bias comes down to the level of roastiness. If more chocolate-coffee flavors come through -> porter. If more coffee-espresso flavors come through -> stout.

The 825 Stout always hits me as a chocolate-coffee beer. The Galloway Porter hits me as a coffee-espresso beer.

Deschutes Brewery Mirror Pond Pale Ale

I'm in serious danger of getting to know the bartender at Iggy's Sports Grill. My daughter has Cheer-Tumbling practice for two hours, so I make a run for dinner & a beer.

Tonight I'm having a pastrami sandwich & Deschutes' Mirror Pond Pale Ale.

What a delightfully refreshing beer. PAs aren't my favorite style but this is very nice.

Light body. Short head. Light citrusy (cascade?) hops - not over powering. Dry & crisp on the pallet. This is the kind of beer I'd like to drink after working in the yard. Orange color. Excellent lacing on the glass.

If all cascade hopped beers tasted like this, I'd be a bigger fan of APAs.

Banana – Lavender Honey Mead: An Arranged Marriage

Bananas and Lavender Honey

It isn’t often that I make something that wasn’t riotously planned out with an exact flavor in mind for the outcome.  This is one of the exceptions.

My wife and I had a couple pastele making days this winter. If you don’t know what pastels are, think of tamales but made with plantains and green bananas instead of corn.  When my wife went into the grocery store to buy the bananas, she said to the produce clerk, “I need ____ pounds of green bananas.”  The clerk told her that if she purchased a whole box of bananas, that she would get a much lower cost per pound on the bananas.

So she bought awhole box.

Pasteles are awesome.  I could eat them until I puke and then eat some more.

On New Year’sDay, we made 100 pastales.

We had 35 green bananas left over.

What do you do with 35 bananas?

Zion Canyon - Jamaican Style Lager

There is a lot going on here for a light lager. And I'm not sure what make a lager "Jamaican" besides being highly carbonated.

There is a lot going on with the flavor of this beer. It's malty and sweet. A lot of residual sweetness is not uncommon in Caribbean beers. Caribbean stouts are usually sweet stouts.

There is a light, but noticeable amount of hop flavor. IBUs = 22, but really don't seem like it. I'm getting a light fruity citrus from the hops. I'm guessing Cascade.

Uinta Brewing - Hazel Amber Wheat Ale

I'm surprised I haven't reviewed this beer before. I drink it a lot because I like to buy Uinta's variety 12-pack.

I'm a proponent of Ambers as a nice balance between hoppy and malty beers. I'm also a proponent of mixing styles. however, I find that an amber wheat ale is a odd duck.

Instead of being a strong "I am different" statement, it seems to be a beer that is unsure of what it wants to be.

The maltiness is slightly negated by the creaminess of the wheat.

The hops are there, but appropriate to the style, are not strong. I'm guessing a mild c-hop.

Epic Brewing - Mid Mountian Mild #23

Mild Ales are not a style that I have a whole lot of experience with. There just aren't too many of them around here. Originally, the term "Mild" meant the beer was served young as opposed to other beers that were served aged, or "stale.". Generally speaking, these days the term is used to mean a beer that is lower in alcohol and lighter hopped than their Brown Ale and Bitter cousins.

This beer pours with an inch of white head and maintains between 1/4 and 1/2 inch. The carbonation sounds a lot like Rice Crispies.

The alcohol comes in at 5.1%, which is on the high side for a Mild, but is not distracting from the beer.

Base malts include: Muntons Maris Otter and Briess 2-Row Brewers. Specialty malts include: Weyermann Cara Munich 1, Weyermann Munich Malt Type 1 and Roasted Barley.

New Belgium Ranger IPA

I was not terribly impressed with this beer at first. Oh, another pine-grapefruity IPA. But over time, this beer has grown on me.

Guess its a good thing I picked up a 6-pack.

Here's a quick rundown of New Belgium's Ranger IPA statistics:  ABV = 6.5%.  IBUs = 70.  Hops consist of Chinook, Simcoe, and Cascade.  Malts are pale malt and Caramalt 120L.

Here's what I've come to enjoy about this beer:

Thanksgiving 2012 Results

Turkey Post-Brine

I'm a bit slow getting it up, but i wanted to post the results of my 2012 Thanksgiving Turkey Fry.

My wife and I had a bit of a miscommunication.  I mentioned to her that we could put some oranges and lemons in the brine if she wanted to.  She thought I said that she could stuff oranges or lemons in the cavity of the turkey for the frying. It was an understandable mistake. We've stuffed onions and garlic heads in the cavity of the bird before with great success.

When two sliced lemons hit the 350F oil, the oil started bubbling and frothing like crazy.

I was very thankful for two things: 1) the burner was off on the fryer, and 2) I was standing at the end of a long rope instead of holding an 18lb turkey with my hand.

Epic Brewing - Smoked Porter Release #14

Smoked beers are among the most interesting beers.  Before the invention of electric kilning, all beers would carried this flavor from the wood fires used to roast the malt.  Some of these beers are aggressive and weigh heavy on the palette.  Others are light and refreshing.

Epic's Smoked Porter pours with an inch-or-so of head. It maintains about 1/4 inch of head as it laces down the glass.

This beer, perhaps, is midrange on the smokey scale. Many smoked beers need to be pared with food. But this beer goes down nicely on the palette without becoming overtaxing. Although, I'm not sure I could drink two in one sitting without a major palette cleansing in between.  By the time I finished the 22oz bottle, my mouth was holding onto a serious ashy aftertaste.

Thanksgiving Turkey Fry Homebrew Brining Wort

Crushed Grains for Wort and Grain Bag

It will have been two years this Christmas since I received my turkey fryer.  The ostensible reason for asking for it as a gift was to make the move to all-grain brewing and to move my homebrewing out of the kitchen and into the garage.

It was just before Thanksgiving last year, when my wife and I were planning to host both our families at our house for the first time, that I realized I could use my turkey fryer to actually fry a turkey.  We ended up frying three turkeys last year:  thanksgiving, christmas, and another one for fun sometime in March.

Turkey Frying - Safety

What time is it?  TURKEY FRYING TIME!!!

The most juicy turkey I have ever ate is deep fried turkey.  Frying the turkey really doesn't add much in the way of calories to the turkey either.  Because it isn't breaded, when the turkey is lowered into the pot, the hot oil instantly sears the surface of the meat closed.  All the moisture that was in the turkey before it went in, stays in.

They purpose of this blog post is to detail safety tips you will want to keep in mind if you decide to fry your own turkey.  In subsequent posts, I will chronicle this Thanksgiving's turkey fry.

It is awesome.

I know they show scary videos of fryer fires every year.

Don't be afraid.

Buoyancy Test

I don't want to minimize the danger, because what you are doing is using an open flame to heat up a flammable liquid (cooking oil) that you are going to use to cook the turkey in.  The trick is to keep the flammable liquid away from the open flame.  You accomplish this and there will be no fryer fire.

There are three main reasons turkey frys can turn into turkey fryer fires.


Fire Cause #1:  Too Much Oil
How do you avoid putting too much oil in the turkey fryer?  Its simple:  do a buoyancy test.  Days before the turkey fry, take the frozen turkey and put it in your fryer pot.  Fill the pot with water until the level reaches the top of the turkey.  The first thing this does is give you an idea how full your pot will be when you are frying your turkey.  If you have very little freeboard on the sides of the pot above the water level, you will probably want to get a bigger pot or a smaller turkey.

Fruit Smoothies

Another thing I've been working on over the past few weeks has been fruit smoothies.

Between work & home-life stress and some weight gain over the past couple of years, my blood pressure has risen into 140/90. So I'm trying to exercise more and eat better.

Part of eating better has been cutting back on the beer intake. Calories are calories and alcohol raises blood pressure.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not replacing craft beer and homebrew with smoothies. I'm using the smoothies to ensure I'm getting proper nutrition. This is the basic recipe I've been working with:

1/4 cup vanilla yogurt
1/4 cup 2% milk
1 - 1.5 cup fruit (preferably frozen)
3 or 4 ice cubes if the fruit is not frozen

Place all in a blender and purée.

Fruit combos I have tried:
Strawberry - banana
Blackberry - banana
Raspberry - banana
Pineapple - banana
Apple - banana
Raspberry - apple
Mango - banana

I know there is a lot of banana on that list. Banana is blood pressure reducing. Also, when frozen, it gives a milkshake quality to the smoothie.

The yogurt is to give it a little more sweetness. Choose the flavor you like.

If it ends up more chunky than smooth, add more milk.

Finally, you will want to have a blender that can blend ice. I purchased a Ninja for about $50.

Squatters - Big Cottonwood Amber Ale

I was wrong. I found one more Squatters bottle lurking in my cellar. I totally did not know what to expect with this beer. I didn't even check to see the style before opening it.

This dry hopped American Amber manages to maintain an off-white half inch head. The alcohol comes in at a nice 5.75% ABV. The dry hop is a nice citrusy and floral Cascade. Color is a darkish tan to faint red.

Except for the color and maltiness, this beer sort of presents itself as a pale ale. And it does have a nice maltiness. I've written before how that doesn't seem achievable in a 4.0% ABV beer.

If you really get your nose in the glass and take a deep whiff, you can smell brown sugar and caramel.

Moose Drool Brown Ale by Big Sky Brewing Company

An update: first I came down sick for a couple weeks. After that, I decided to enjoy some of my homebrew. I mean, I could literally sing "100 bottles of beer on the wall" in my cellar. Mostly, I've been enjoying the double hefe.

Tonight I dug out a bottle of Moose Drool. This is a seriously enjoyable beer if you are a dark beer drinker.

The Brown Ale is an under appreciated style. If you like Stouts and Porters, you should really give Brown Ales a try. Mild Ales too for that matter.

Seriously, broaden your beer horizons any chance you get. Even if you try a beer and you didn't like it, give it a couple more chances. Make sure you don't like it and try to figure out why.

Moose Drool is as dark as many porters but it not completely opaque if held up to a light. It's a little roasty but tastes primarily of chocolate and caramel malts.

Hops consist of Kent Goldings, Liberty, and Willamette. The hops are just strong enough to be noticeable and balance the sweetness of the malt. From the hops, I mostly get a little spice and flowers. Kent Goldings, and Willamette are two of my favorite hops.

Wasatch Evolution Amber

If there is one thing that hoppy and malty beer drinkers can almost always agree upon, it's that Amber Ales are an acceptable alternative. When I think of a perfectly balanced beer, it's Ambers that I think of.  And when someone isn't sure exactly what to drink, Ambers are what I advise.

This beer uses Tennanger hops.  It has a reddish brass color and maintains a slight head.  The flavor comes across as lightly toasty, slightly spicy, and has some estery/fruity and floral notes in the background.

My overall conclusion: its a lawn mower beer -> light bodied, thirst quenching, and sessionable.

The main fault of this beer comes back to the Utah Beer 4.0% ABV requirement to be sold on draft or in grocery stores. It's tough to make a beer malty at 4.0% ABV. It ends up a little hollow or watery on the mouthfeel.

Undecided Voters 2012 Election

As I sit here drinking a beer and thinking about the 2012 election coming, I became inspired to write something about the so called "undecided voters". What these people should be called is "low information voters."

I had the misfortune of knowing an undecided - low information voter 8 years ago. I want to relay this story not because of the politics involved, I have very political opinions but I don't want to use this space for that. I want to relay this story in an election year to help people understand that these people are not logical.

We will call this former friend 'C'.

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In 2004 my wife and I when over to C's house for dinner. After dinner the discussion moved to politics. C announced that she just decided she was going to vote to reelect Bush.

I thought this was a bit weird. She is socially liberal, supported gay marriage, supported abortion rights, she wasn't wealthy, and she wasn't anti-tax or anti-government.

I said, "Really? Why?"

She said, "The war in Iraq is really screwed up. I think Bush deserves the chance to fix his mistakes."

I stared at her for a few seconds then said, "You think the war in Iraq is screwed up?"

She said, "Yes."

I said, "You think if Bush is reelected, he will take that was a sign that he needs to do something different in Iraq?"

She thought about it and said, "Yeah, I think he will fix it."

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Undecided - Low Information voters are people who feel voting is part of their civic responsibility but don't care enough about news or politics to follow them closely. And most importantly: they are not logical.

Logical people will think "If A and B, then C." Undecided - low information voters think, "I want X. I want Candidate Y to give it to me, even if they say they are against it."

When a politician is reelected, they take it as a sign of voter approval, not disapproval. They take it as a sign that voters want more of the same, not something different.

But that was a concept that C didn't grasp.

Another example is a twitter exchange I had with someone complaining that the health care industry was "too regulated." His solution to rising health care costs included banning DTC advertising of drugs and regulating pharmaceutical company's profit margins.

I asked him, "Isn't that more regulation?"

No reply.

The good news, I suppose, is there are fewer of these people in this election cycle. The bad news is billions of dollars are being spent trying to alter the gut-feelings and fantasies these people have when that money could be put to a more productive and beneficial use

Homemade salsa

I've been a little busy & a little sick over the last couple weeks. I think I'm finally in full control of my sinuses. One of the things I've been up to has been bottling homemade salsa from farmer's market vegetables.  I didn't get much in the way from the peppers or tomatoes I planted this year.

Here's this is based on my mother's recipe she used for decades:

Chop, dice, or blend (your choice of consistency) the following vegetables:
40 tomatoes (I used 20 Romas & 20 regular)
6 Serrano peppers
2 Poblano peppers
3 Anaheim peppers
3 Jalapeño peppers
1 large onion (2 cups)
5 cloves garlic
* my mom adds 2 cups bell peppers, my wife is allergic to them.
** this yields a mild-medium salsa. More peppers = hotter. Fewer peppers = milder. I personally prefer salsa much hotter than this, but I wanted it to be enjoyable for younger taste buds. My mom recommends 9 - 12 Jalapeños for hot salsa. I'm guessing that would translate to "pleasantly medium-hot" level.  (My mom has less robust tastebuds than I do)

Put vegetables in a very large stockpot. Add:
1/4 cup sugar (I'm investigating the potential to use less))
1 Tbsp non-iodized salt (I use kosher salt)
1 Tbsp oregano
1 Tbsp cilantro
Juice 4 limes
1 cup vinegar


Slowly heat to a boil. Almost all the liquid for the salsa is coming from the tomatoes. If you heat it too fast, it will scotch.

I turned the knob to simmer and let it sit for 5 minutes. Then I turned it up 1/2 of a number on the dial every 5 minutes until it boiled. Then I turned it down 1/2 a number every 5 minutes until I found a nice simmer.

Boil/simmer for 60 minutes.

Ladle from stock pot to bottling jars. Leave about a 1/2 inch space in the jar. Jars need to be clean but not sterile. Lids should be sterile. Put lids on.

Bottle per your bottling device instructions. I have an old steamer they no longer recommend using because its impossible to know the internal temperature of what is in the bottle and thusly if all pathogens are destroyed. However, since salsa cooks an hour, I'm pretty sure it's sterile after.

This recipe yielded 16 pints.

Imperial / Double Hefeweizen Homebrew

This beer is a good example of the iterations I go through when formulating a new recipe.  Originally, the plan was to make a California Common out of a Pilsner grain bill.  I quickly came to the decision that my brew areas were too warm.

So I thought, "maybe an estery Hefeweizen?"   So I took half Pilsen malt and half wheat malt started fooling around.  So I thought "make it big, use weird hops, and dry hop."   In short: everything you're not supposed to do.   I debated for a while on whether to call it an Imperial or a Double.  Eventually, I decided on "Double" because my goal was "twice what you typically find in a hefeweizen."

Here's what I came up with for my Double Hefeweizen:

Chimay - White Label Cinq Cents

I discovered in my cellar today that I had purchased a bottle of Chimay White and forgot about it.

One of the things I like about drinking Trappist beers is the history.  The monastery started brewing in 1862.  When you open a Trappist beer, you are opening up history.

You may have noticed in all my beer pictures, I use the same pint glass but tonight I'm using a snifter glass. There are very few beers and wines that I believe the shape of the glass actually has an effect on the beer drinking experience.   Belgian and Trappist beers are among the few exceptions.   This is because so much of the experience of these bees takes place in the smell.

Chimay corks all of their bottles.  Again, I don't much like corked beer because cork is susceptible to cork-rot.  I did not have that in this beer but I did once on a Chimay Blue.  The cork on this beer was amazingly easy to remove by hand.