Happy Halloween, Everyone

"Boys and girls of every age
Wouldn't you like to see something strange?
Come with us and you will see
This, our town of Halloween

"This is Halloween, this is Halloween
Pumpkins scream in the dead of night

"This is Halloween, everybody make a scene
Trick or treat till the neighbors gonna die of fright
It's our town, everybody scream
In this town of Halloween"
From The Nightmare Before Christmas.

Have a happy and safe Halloween!

"For Everything Else..."

Conical fermenter: $450
Stainless-steel pots: $500
Grain mill: $160
Various books on beer and brewing: $350
Fermentation refrigerator: $160
Kegerator: $300
Corny kegs: $220
Keg lube: $4
CO2 regulator: $60
CO2 cylinder: $70
CO2 cylinder refill: $12
High pressure hoses: $6
Whirlfloc: $2
Plastic spoon: $3
Aeration equipment: $15
Wooden mash stir paddle: $10
Charcoal water filter: $30
Temperature controllers: $140
Capper: $30
Brass ball valves: $40
Stainless-steel ball valve: $40
Counter-pressure bottle filler: $50
Wort chiller: $60
Mash tun: $180
Cold liquor tank: $20
Star San: $14
PBW: $37
Vinyl hoses and siphoning equipment: $25
Wire brushes: $25
Tincture of iodine: $3
Plastic buckets: $30
Various bungs and airlocks: $20
Various thermometers: $130
Rubber Hoses: $50
Ball lock connectors: $70
Electronic scale: $70
Various Erlenmeyer flasks: $50
CO2 injectors: $30
CO2 cartridges: $30
pH Strips: $10
Picnic faucets: $12
Hydrometer: $9
Sparge arm: $18
Ingredients for a five gallon batch of beer: $25

Brewing your own beer at home: priceless!

Colonial Porter

Summertime is over. O.K., it has been over for a while for most of the rest of the country, but it is just cooled down here in the desert southwest a few weeks ago (Well, actually, it seems to cool off, heat back up, and then cool off again; we can't just seem to leave the 90+ degree temperature behind, but I digress). What I'm trying to say is that the summertime brewing drought is done; it is getting time to brew again.

I've been doing some research on colonial brewing, which I've been trying formulating a post about, though it is not ready for prime time, yet. As a result, I've decided to do a porter. Porters were the most common colonial beer. I looked over my brewing notes and realized that I'd never really done a porter. Stouts, yes; porters, no.

Looking over Jamil Zainasheff and John Palmer's book, Brewing Classic Styles, the thing that makes a porter is the brown malt. My recipe calls for just that. In fact, I've modeled my base recipe loosely on J.Z.'s recipe.

In order to make mine more authentic, however, I'm doing two things: First, I'm adding some oak chips to simulate aging in oak barrels. I'm also adding some smoked malt, to simulate the smokiness of floor malted grain over an open fire.

Speaking of my recipe, here it is:

8.0 lbs Pale Two-Row, Marris Otter
1.0 lb Brown Malt
0.75 lb Chocolate Malt
1.0 lb Crystal Malt, 40L
0.25 lb Rauch Malt
1.0 oz Glacier Hops, 60 min, 5.5 AA, 24.0 IBUs
2 oz Oak Chips, French
White Lab London Ale (WLP013)

1.055 OG, 1.016 FG, 32.6 SRM, 75% Efficiency, 11 lbs, 24.0 IBUs, 5.5 Gallons

I may tweak is a bit before brew day, however, as I'm always tweaking my recipes.

Now, I know that I just posted that I'm not drinking beer right now, because of my diet. However, that is not preventing me from doing one of my favorite pastimes, formulating recipes. I'll post when it is brew day for this one.

South Beach and Beer

After getting back from vacation, and looking at the pictures, I was shocked. Man, I looked a bit on the chubby side. As a result, I'm dieting. Of course, what diet do I do? South Beach. That means no beer. How can a homebrewer not drink beer? Well, as I see it, it is quite temporary. I've just got to shed a few pounds.

It is interesting, however, what the The South Beach Diet, by Arthur Agatston, says about beer:

And the beer, of course, is nobody's idea of a diet drink. Maltose, the sugar in beer, has a higher glycemic index than white bread. The insulin response to it leads to fat storage in the abdomen that we call, quite accurately, the beer belly.

When I read that I said, wait a minute! Maltose? Maltose is consumed by the yeast. That is a fermentable sugar. The only things left behind after the beer ferments are sugars that the yeast can't eat, like dextrins. Now, I'm not saying that beer is good for you. I'm just saying that the sugar we are concerned with is not maltose.

So, I did a little research, and this is what I found. An article I found at PR News Wire entitled
"'South Beach Diet' Contains Errors On Beer" said the following:

Dieting adults who love their beer, but have given it up based on the advice of "The South Beach Diet" author Dr. Arthur Agatston now have good news: His attacks on beer are based on errors, which his online nutritionists now admit.

It goes on to say the following, quoting a nutritional expert:

"The notion that beer contains large amounts of carbohydrates is simply untrue," said Dr. Sam Klein, director of the Center for Human Nutrition at Washington University School of Medicine. "Furthermore, the carbohydrates in beer are not sugar. Basically all of the sugar is converted to alcohol during fermentation."

The article cites other researchers with this gem:

Agatston wrongly targets beer carbs as being particularly bad, attributing the problem to maltose. Agatston says the high "glycemic index" of maltose in beer raises a person's blood sugar response, contributing to weight gain. But beer contains no maltose, and there is no published glycemic index for beer. In fact, the carbohydrate level of beer is too low to measure a glycemic index, say University of Sydney researchers.

The article is a fascinating read. I highly recommend reading the whole thing.

So, I was right. It is funny when you read something that is supposed to be a dieting bible, and can call it out on its shit.

Will that stop me from doing the diet? No. I've done it before, years ago, and lost like 30 lbs. So, I will do it again, and cut out beer, but only for a while!

Cabo Cruise Photo-journal, Part II

Part 2 of our trip brings us to Cabo.

We arrived early in the morning, anchoring off shore. After breakfast, we went straight to deck four for the tender to Cabo. We were in a little bit of a hurry, because we knew that as soon as we got off the tender, we had to trek on foot to the other side of the harbor, to catch the boat for our shore excursion.

This picture looks back to the ship from our tender, as we head for shore.

Me, on the tender, with the famous Cabo rock formations in the background.

When we got to shore, looking at our watch, we had fifteen minutes to get to the shore excursion desk, so we hoofed it...and fast.

Damn it was hot. I mean, we are from the desert, so we are used to heat. However, this was heat like we had never experienced before. By the time we reached the shore excursion desk we were soaked in sweat.

Upon finding the desk, it was empty. Nobody was there. Julie looked at her watch: 9:45 am, right on time, so we waited.

We waited and waited, to no avail. Finally, a Mexican gentleman working next door at an outdoor bar, came over to us.

"Can I help you?" he asked.

"We have a shore excursion at 9:45, but nobody is here," Julie responded, pointing to her watch. It was now close to 10:00 am.

He opened his cell phone to look at the time and said, "It is almost 11 am, ma'am, not 10."

Crap. A time change? We did not know the the time was an hour different than the time in California, where we had set our watch. Who would have thought that? I mean, it is basically the same coast as California, just further south. We'd missed our shore excursion.

Julie, flipping off the shore excursion brochure.

Regrouping, we decided that if we were not going to the beach, which is where our shore excursion was to take us, then we might as well go to Cabo Wabo, Sammy Hagar's famous bar in Cabo, and drown our sorrows. And that is exactly what we did. Nothing like drinking margaritas before noon.

This picture shows both of us at Cabo Wabo, drinking their crazy colored margaritas.

It was really too hot to do anything else, so we headed back to the ship, took a nap, and went out on deck to watch us leave Cabo. Oh well, we are coming back in December. Maybe we can see the beaches then.

Julie, out on deck as we leave Cabo.

That night, on board, we went to the Drama Bar to watch the on board blues band. The thoughts about our missed shore excursion earlier in the day were soon forgotten.

Julie and I at the Drama Bar, listening to the blues. Notice that I am drinking Pilsener Urquell, one of several of the drinkable beers on board.

The next morning, the beginning of another sea day, we got up early to do On Deck for the Cure, a breast cancer awareness walk. For a small donation, we got wrist bands and t-shirts. Proceeds went to breast cancer research. There were quite a few people there. I guess that they do it every cruise, and have raised over $100,000.00 on the Elation alone since they have been doing it.

Julie, up on deck, at the track, doing the walk.

Julie and I posing at the track after the walk. It was quite windy out, which kept blowing my hat off.

After another day by the pool, we had our last dinner on board. Dinner is kind of a crap shoot of who you sit with. Early in the cruise, we did not like our dinner companions. I'm not a prude or anything, and a cruise is all about having a good time, but they were extremely drunk assholes, and downright rude. As a result, we requested to be moved. After the move, we found people we could get along with.

Julie and I at dinner the last night. The wine in my hand is a Cuvaison Cabernet, which I was pleasantly surprised to find on board. Cuvaison is one of the many wineries we've visited when we went to Napa a few years ago.

The next morning, we got off the ship and drove home. All-in-all it was a wonderful trip, despite the fact we did not get to do what we wanted to do in Cabo. We will be back the same way in December on Holland America's Oosterdam.

Cabo Cruise Photo-journal, Part I

Julie and I took a four day cruise from San Diego to Cabo San Lucas and back. Here are pictures and comments from the trip.

Before we got on the ship, we spent some time visiting some of the historic ships docked nearby, including the Star of India, the worlds oldest ship still sailing, and the HMS Surprise, a replica of a 18th century Royal Navy frigate, featured in the Russell Crowe movie, Master and Commander.

Me, next to the Star of India.

When we got the the cruise terminal, we were surprised at the size of the ship we were getting on, the Carnival Elation. In fact, it looked bigger than the Holland America ship also in port.

Here is a mosaic of two pictures showing the size of the ship. I could not get it all in one shot.

When we got on board, we had already eaten lunch, so we went straight to our cabin. When we got there, our first impression was that the cabins were painted a sort of an odd mix of colors, sort of peach and gray, with red highlights.

Julie, in our cabin.

After unpacking, we poured ourselves some champagne and went out on deck for the sail away.

Julie and I, with San Diego behind us, as we sailed out of the harbor.

One of the main features of the ship is a six story atrium, with glass elevators. At the bottom was a bar with a piano next to it. In fact, that was something common throughout the ship: there was music most places we went.

Me, in the six story atrium, near the glass elevators.

The next day was a sea day. That day we played miniature golf out on deck, and spent some time at the pool bar, occasionally taking a dip in to the pool to go down the water slide.

Julie and I, playing miniature golf, out on deck.

Julie, making a putt. A jogging track surrounds the putt-putt course.

Next time: Cabo, and the trip home.

San Diego Brewing Company

As I mentioned last week, we went on a cruise to Cabo San Lucas. Before we went to Cabo, however, we spent a day in San Diego visiting friends. They took us to a local brewery near their house called San Diego Brewing Company.

Julie and Suzanne, standing outside the brew pub.

While there, I did a taster round of beers. The stand out best, in my humble opinion, was their porter. When I tasted it, I swore that I tasted wood on it, like maybe it had been oak aged. As a result, I started bugging our server about it. The server told me that he did not know, but the brewer was in the restaurant, and I could ask him.

I found the brewer with two other gentlemen, also brewers from other brew pubs in San Diego. I sat down with them and had a lengthy conversation. We covered everything from the hop crisis, to the size of his brewery (which is 7 barrels, by the way).

Finally, I asked him about his porter. He told me that it was not wood aged after all, but he used a fair amount of Black Patent Malt, which we decided must account for the woody char I was tasting.

We all had a good time, and it was a great way to start our vacation.

Me, doing a taster round of beers.