This is a great article on how to clean off your yeast to reuse in your next batch of homebrew.

This is one of several ways to drop your costs for making your delicious homebrew.

We recently brewed a maibock using Rogue’s Pacman yeast as distributed by wYeast that we picked up from the nice folks at Homebrewer’s Outpost.

Today when we checked our gravity after about 5 days of fermenting we were a bit below our goal of 1.016, coming in at about 1.023. Knowing that PacMan yeast is supposed to attenuate quite well I was curious as to what caused the yeasts to be so bashful at the dinner table. Our temperature was decent at about 68*, I made a good sized starter, so what was the problem?

I checked out the wiki at homebrewtalk.com and read over their page on attenuation. Using a formula I got from that page

Attenuation = 100 % * (starting gravity – current gravity) / (starting gravity – 1)

I realized that our attenuation was about 62% as opposed to the 74% we were shooting for. Further down the page I came across the following:

water to grist ratio: the enzymatic activity of the amylases is affected by the thickness of the mash. Thinner mashes enhance the maltose production and therefore increase the fermentability. See The Theory of Mashing.

We had indeed gone short on this. When we did our first few brews we followed Papazian’s recommendation of 1qt/lb of grain. After a few brews we started noticing that 1.5qt/lb was actually giving us a better brew. But, as is sometimes the case, we flaked on our math and wound up reverting to the 1qt/lb. We noticed this and took note, but had little idea how this would effect our beer. Now it’s clear that a higher water to grain ratio is preferred in order to increase the fermentability of your beer.

Duly noted.

Go here to read the whole comic by the Oatmeal.

My wife and I went over to Bluebird last night for a few beers to celebrate – I’m not sure – the ever grinding wheels of time as they continue to where down on the thinning teeth of our souls’ cogs, forcing us to move slow and want to move even slower? Yes, that’s probably a good approximation of what we were celebrating.

We started with a bottle of Saison D’Epeautre that was served at the perfect temperature. This was a tasty, dry, mildly-spicy beer with just the right amount of a fleeting sweetness to keep it interesting.

But where the evening really came into it’s own was with the ordering of a 750ml bottle of Jolly Pumpkin’s “La Roja”. Brewed in the “flemish style” this beer hit every note presently getting my fairly large panties in a bunch. Funky with a little sour and fruit on the nose the beer drinks creamy, full, and with the perfect balance of sour and spice on the tongue. My eyes grew wide with amazement every taste I took of this well-crafted brew. I bowed in reverence and saw, perhaps, just a shimmer of light from the future radiating back onto my present self, beckoning me down a road of better living and finer brews cobble-paved by a deeper exploration of the flemish reds.

I was pleasently surprised to find that the unfortunately named Jolly Pumpkin brewery is not far from home, just over a couple borders in Dexter, Michigan. I will definitely be paying them a visit this summer. Too bad the motorcycle riding between here and there is pretty crummy.

On our way home the wifey-poo ducked into Hot Chocolate and picked up a baker’s dozen of Mindy’s cookies. All the cookies were insanely delicious though the molasses seemed to actually defy certain laws of physics.

Tim Webb, probably the most prolific writer on Belgium Beers and author of Good Beer Guide Belgium
, has a new TV series that is hopefully going to make it to a market near me (and you) sometime next year.

Belgium Beer Boner… Engaged!

Snowboarding is not a cheap hobby, especially for an aspiring degenerate living in the flatlands of Illinois. For that and a myriad of other equally limp excuses I managed a 15 year hiatus between our daily hill bombings after school at 4 Lakes in Lisle and when my wife finally inspired me enough to get back into boarding in 2005. A lot changes happen in a guy’s body between the ages of 16 and 31 – especially in the areas above the balls and below the neck – but what didn’t change in that time was the resounding pitch my neurons hit as I shuttle down a mountainside with a piece of plied fiberglass bound around my hooves.

Getting back into riding at an age just on the ripe side of young I wanted a board that was competant without getting ahead of me, reasonably priced, but well built and had some grounding in my roots as a rider having learned what passed as my skill on an 1988 Burton Air. After some research and demos I picked up a 2005 Burton Triumph.

Burton’s answer to an all mountain board fit the bill, but also came with some of the drawbacks lower priced Burton’s are known for: it was a bit stiff, a little too heavy, and didn’t have a whole lot of pop to it. This was fine for the first season or two as I was getting my sea legs back, but by last year my skills had progressed well beyond where I left them in the early ’90s and I was longing for a board that had better action and response, something that felt like an extension of me and not simply an addition.

After some research I settled on the 2009 Ride Prophet 164. I wasn’t doing any park riding and prefer mostly nice long runs hitting walls and kickers so I wanted something a little bit longer than the 160 I was riding on the Burton. I also wanted something that was going to edge a bit better as I was getting more comfortable at higher speeds. The Prophet and most of Ride’s boards are known for their great edging due to the high angle steeps on the edge as well as the material used – the same as is used in skateboard wheels – that help dampen vibrations on rougher, tighter snow. This has proved pretty beneficial in this year’s pretty underwhelming snow accumulation. What further put the Ride Prophet as my top contender was that it’s lines were a bit more severe than the very conservative Burton Triumph with a more spooned out nose and thinner mid-body, this combination would help it perform better in powder as well as packed stuff on groomers.

I picked the deck up for dirt cheap from The House Board Shop last spring when they had a 50% off sale. At $250 there was literally no better board that could come even close to suiting my specific needs for the mountain and then when you add in the wicked, magic dork graphics that bespeckled the board with wizardy sigils and all-seeing eyes laid in a gorgeous multi-layer transparency with a minimal color scheme, you had a snowboard cocktail that wooed all my little buttons into a seriously focused spending frenzy.

So she looked pretty and was hyped appropriately, but how did she ride?

Pretty good, I must say. I’ve tried her on the crummy packed shit at Devil’s Head, the crummy packed shit at the Canyons, the fluffier shit at the Canyons, some pretty decent stuff in Reno, Tahoe and also at Solitude and in every condition the response has been fantastic; the action is super live, the edging has been like a race car, and the weight distributes very well across the board making the board seem almost invisible or at least not in need of any conscious negotiating.

The one downside I’ve come up against so far is that it doesn’t seem to take a beating quite as well as the admittedly more brutish Burton Triumph. I’ve had my Prophet out for about 8 outtings this season and I’ve already pierced through every layer of my base and have begun chipping down through multiple layers on the top of my board. I do have a tendancey to go harder on my stuff than most, though I still can’t figure out how the hell I tore up the bottom the way I did as I haven’t been doing too much crazy stuff on rocks that I can remember. But the damages aren only disconcerting in relation to the time spent on the board, they are nothing some epoxy and TLC won’t fix.

All in all the Ride Prophet 164 is head and shoulders above the also very competant though clumsier 2005 Burton Triumph. It was the perfect progression for me with more aggressive handling and more taught action, the Ride Prophet certainly stands up as one of the more enjoyable all mountain boards available.

Anat Baron’s “Beer Wars” is finally available to stream on Netflix.

“Beer Wars” attempts to give the general consumer an insider’s look into the politics and pitfalls of the beer industry. With a couple of case studies, the most interesting being Sam Calagione and Dogfish Head, Baron shows the sysophisian struggle of the passionate craft brew industry against the monolithic big 3.

While not always successful “Beer Wars” does manage to illustrate many of the economic sleeper holds multi-national corporations have on America’s present interpretation of capitalism using the craft beer underdogs to help define and defend the more satisfying role in this battle of good versus evil. The film is at it’s best while exploring the passionate craft beer enthusiasts drafting them as the high-minded Robespierre’s pursuing great beer as both the finest weapon and the ultimate prize of this heated and holy war.

Baron has taken some annoyingly unsurprising criticism from beer geeks posturing as arm chair film critics, though typically these critics can’t seem to get beyond editorializing on the beer and brewers as people and recipes and miss the forest for the ultimately, in the context of what the film is exploring, not-very-important trees. In that way, “Beer Wars” works also as a successful mirror for craft beer enthusiasts to stare at themselves, smug and contemptuous, for a little while longer.

Maybe these will help me deal with the day side of my fucking insomnia.

We invented the Maple Bacon Lollipop, and now we’ve improved it: we’ve made it the bacon-y equivalent of an energy drink, adding two cups worth of caffeine to the already time-tested wonder of organic, sustainably farmed bacon and delicious Vermont maple syrup.

We stand in awe, heady with the thrill of maple bacon discovery, and cold munchin’ on a lollipop.

An even more perfect gift for the sweet-toothed pork aficionado in your life.

Get your Caffeinated Maple-Bacon Lollipops here.

So we bottled what may be our best (3rd) batch of an IPA yesterday. The whole process went incredibly smooth from sparge to bottling. We were so happy with ourselves that we felt a celebratory beer was in order. We put the beer in the back of Matt’s car and headed over to the Small Bar.

They had some great pulls yesterday: Surly Furious, Bockor Cuvee Sour Ale, Victory Prima Pils, Half Acre’s Baume, Tyranena’s Dirty Ol’ Man. It was a fine, fine celebration indeed, well armed and strategically executed. We even tried some of Rogue’s Whiskey, which, like Stranahan’s Flying Dog, they make from left over mash from their Dead Guy Ale. Rogue’s Whiskey was remarkably smooth with a touch of sweetness and a salty back end that is probably from them aging it in oak barrels by the Ocean. Though they only age the stuff for a week, so it’s also possible that salty flavor is from their talented marketing department as well.

But I digress. It was a monumental celebration. And goddamn, the Victory Pils and Dirty Ol’ Man were fantastic. Of course, all the beers were great, especially the sour from Bockor, a pitch-perfect modestly bodied sour that makes instantly weak any devotee of the flemish sours. But I hadn’t had the Victory Prima Pils until yesterday, so it really stood out for me.

Victory refers to it’s Prima Pils as a German Pilsner and though it may come off sounding initially a bit derisive, I would call Victory’s Prima Pils an American Pilsner, or maybe a New American Pilsner as I feel this is the first beer that actually deserves it’s name. It’s hop heaviness serves as a refreshing compliment to the crispness of the beer, the stuff practically snaps off and crunches in your mouth. There is some discussion amongst the beer geeks as to whether Victory is stretching the truth claiming they only use German malts in the Prima Pils. Some brewers are convinced the slight sour apple taste – the often undesirable acetyldehyde – on the front end is derived from wheat. There’s also some discussion as to whether this is an all Saaz brew or if there is some Northern Brewer at the bittering point. Wherever the flavors are coming from they are well proportioned. This beer is crisp, bright and hoppy enough to keep my filthy fingers digging back in for more. And I will.

This may be one of only, oh, three or four times I will say this in my life, but… that Dirty Ol’ Man, he was very good to me last night. Strong chocolate notes in a creamy body with just enough roasted character and hopiness to keep the stout from going past it’s surprisingly sessionable self.

And, as always, the food at the Small Bar was great, too. The pork nachos are incredible, the poutine is fucking trascendental, but yesterday we started with their Buffalo Chicken Spring Rolls:

chopped chicken sautéed in our house buffalo
sauce then wrapped with crumbled blue cheese
and fried in a traditional spring roll. served
with carrots, celery, green onion and blue
cheese for dippin

They’ve somehow managed to achieve the impossible and improve upon buffalo wings, making them easier to eat, and crunchier with a deep fried shell to safely transfer them from plate to face.

And as always the staff at Small Bar are some of my favorite people in the world, they always take good care of us.

But, OH SHIT! I forgot! The whole reason we came into the Small Bar to celebrate in the first was because of our beer. That we left in the car. In 20* weather. For now almost 24 hours.

Shit.

I woke up this morning, and while sharing a lovely breakfast with my equally lovely wife she off-handedly reminded me of my orphaned babies in the truck. This is, perhaps, as good as any argument for why I shouldn’t father children as well. It would be a shame to go out and properly celebrate my kid’s learning to ride a bike, or learning to read, or using the toilet only to come to the stark realization the next day that I would up leaving him in the car for 24 hours while I proudly drank in his honor.

But, in my defense, children and yeast are pretty resilient. After moping for a few minutes I hit the Beer Advocate forum and queried the geeks. And in under ten minutes I had 2 responses that put my mind at ease. Essentially, all I needed to do was give the beers a god swirl or two, put them back in the crate and expect full carbonation as if nothing had happened. My fear was, leaving the beer at around 35* for about 10 hours (20 hours in the car in 15-25* weather) that the yeast had gone dormant and wouldn’t get back up anytime soon to eat. But apparently, I have more than one thing in common with yeast, not the least of which is the will to perservere through a decent night’s rest with more than a little bit of snacking.

So, our team of crackhead brewers here at OA have found a new and interesting way to try and ruin our beer. Fortunately, this attempt was a bit easier to recover from than some mistakes of the past have been. I now wait patiently for the next manner in which we can subjugate ourselves on the road to delicious and plentiful beers.