48 Bottles of Beer on the Wall...

Last Sunday morning was bottling day here at Castle Turling for our very first brew, a brown ale.  I spent quite some time getting through two cases in order to have enough bottles.  Then, the day before bottling day while I was washing all of the bottles I realized twelve of them were twist offs!  This will never do!  So, I had a choice, buy 12 bottles or drink all 12 of the Sierra Nevada Celebration's I had in the refrigerator.  Mrs. Turling gave me the raised eyebrows when I told her of my predicament that could only mean one thing.  I was buying 12 bottles.

The one thing I am noticing about this whole brewing process is the dedication to cleanliness.  Now, I garden and build furniture, neither of which would be considered clean pastimes, so this takes a little work for me.  I washed down all of the bottles and then needed to sanitize them.  Our dishwasher has a sanitize function!  Saved!  Into the dishwasher they went.

See?  It says it right there.  Sanitized.

If my brew goes bad due to unsanitarinous (I'm pretty sure that's a word), then Kenmore owes me a few bucks!

After sanitizing the bottles, I set in to sanitizing everything else.  Including me.  Ok, I just washed my hands, but that's better then usual.  After transferring the brew out of the fermenting bucket and into the bottling bucket that contained my priming sugar, it was a hop, skip and a jump to get it into the bottles.  The kit worked like a charm containing everything I needed to make two cases.

I did taste the beer prior to going into the bottles, though, and I'm a little concerned.  The beer carbonates while in the bottles, so it's flat coming out of the fermenting bucket.  But, this brew had a sweetness to it I just didn't like.  Hopefully, it was caused by it being flat, but we'll find out in two weeks.  In the meantime, I'm thinking a pale ale might be my next target...

An Update on the Olives

The olives have been curring for six weeks, now since we harvested them.  We tested the ones being cured in water and the result was "bitter and watery."  The salt cured olives were just "bitter".  We dumped the water cured olives since I figure adding more water to something that is watery was a loss cause.  I put the salt cured back into cure for another week and we'll try them again.

I still am not sure what type of olives these are.  They were completely black on the tree and have now turned a more pinkish purple after curing.  And, both the water and salt cured looked identical, so I don't think it was the method that affected the color.  I'm thinking it's either Mission, Lucaca or Santa Caterina.  It's now safe to say, since I've typed that, it will end up being none of them.  Onward!

More Daylillies

I'm starting to think I have some type of daylilly crush.  I picked up a couple of more.

Ok, the main reason I picked these up is a) we have no plants and this is a gardening blog and b) the red one on the right is called Red Rum.  Redrum!!!!  Really, how was I going to let that one pass.

All axes will be kept far away from the far side of the yard...for obvious reasons.

Now, I took a picture of them in the pots to point something out.

Each pack came with two plants and, honestly, I don't remember which is which, so we'll say the one's in the back are the Red Rum's.  Yes, there are five, that's for later, stick with me.  I have previously planted some day lillies, but as you can see if you care to look back, there is no green sticking out the top.  The previous daylillies (yes, I've spelled it differently 4 times now, get over it, as I'll probably spell it differently going forward) did not have green stuff sticking out.  They were on sale for $1, I think, and there was no green as it was late in the season.  So, I just shoved the whole thing in the pot, thinking it was like a bulb.  It's not like a bulb.  It's like a day LiLLy (now, I'm just messin' with you).  The fifth plant in the picture above is the lone survivor from the one's I planted previously.  I know it's small, that's because we have f-ing rabbits who continuously eat it to the ground.

I've now put all five up on a table until they get large enough to where the rabbits won't seem to want to eat them.  I've found they tend to stay away from the larger plants.  Then, into the garden they'll go.  Look at me go...gardening.

Brew Day!!!!

The New Year's weekend provided too many commitments to allow our first brewing with the new brew kit I got for Christmas.  So, we had to wait a week.  I think it actually turned out for the better, as I could spend a week gathering what I needed nearly all of which I ended up not even needing.  But, better to have it and not need it, then to need it and not have it.  So, off we go.

I brewed a Brown Ale, which is the kit my wife got me along with the brewing kit itself.  It contained all of the above, with the exception of the Widmer Bros. Halo India Pale Ale.  I added that, as I felt some liquid encouragement may be required.  And, I was thirsty.

The kit contained dark liquid malt (in the can up top), dried malt, dextrose and First Gold hops.  I decided to stick to the recipe rather then deviate as I had been contemplating, since more than anything, I just want this first batch to be drinkable.

I set everything out above, along with all of my equipment to make sure everything would go smoothly.  Or, as smoothly as I could.  For anyone that has seen me cook, it's normally an exercise in panic as I inevitably forget to chop, smash, saute' or obtain some key ingredient until the moment it's needed.  I didn't want that here, and it worked out pretty well.

First thing required was boiling a couple gallons of water.  I bought six gallons of bottled water, rather then stand by the filtered water in the fridge for two hours waiting for six gallons to come out.  We're making the nectar of the Gods here, I'll save the planet from plastic bottles next week.  Stay with me.  The little pot to the left is to heat the malt, so it would come out of the can easier.  And, believe me, from what was stuck to the lid, there was no coming out without heating.  It was like caramel.  Except in taste.  Not caramel.  Don't taste.  Trust me.

Then I added the malts (liquid and dry), dextrose and hops.  Looked like split pea soup.

Smelled like pizza dough, so anyone worried it will stink up the house, unless you don't like bread, it won't stink.  Luckily, my pot, which we use to steam tamale's, could easily hold about six or seven gallons of liquid.  I stood by the wort (that's what the brew in the pot is called, look at me, I'm practically an expert with the lingo and all) in case of boil overs.  But, that would have been one hell of a boil over to get out of that pot, so we were safe.  After it stopped foaming, it looked like this.

Boiled that for 30 minutes, then into the sink it went.  No, not that way.  Per Palmer's How to Brew, you should cool the wort as quickly as possible, called the "cold break" in order to keep the beer from clouding.  So, I filled the sink with water and ice and in the pot went.

Yes, yes, yes, I haven't finished tiling the backsplash, so shut it.  I know.  To the left, you can see that I set aside a jar to pitch the yeast.  All of you brewers out there can see the temperature is too low.  I know, I heated the water too soon, so I needed to reheat it to between 95 and 105 F later.  I would like to point out the one purchase I made that I found indispensable for my first time out, and that's an electronic thermometer.  I put it in everything, from the yeast jar to the wort as it was cooling.  I kept a separate jar of sanitizer on the counter and dropped the thermometer into that after each use.  Cleanliness is the name of the day in this process.

So, the wort took about 25 minutes to chill down.  I got it down to about 80 degrees, then I filled the fermenting bucket with three gallons of the bottled drinking water.  We're looking for 5 gallons of beer here.  I figured once I poured the wort in, it would get it down to about 70 from the new water, and I was right.

After preparing the yeast, I poured it into the fermenting bucket, popped on the top and the airlock and then took it to its home for the next two weeks.

Luckily, we have an interior closet that is under the staircase.  It is smack dab in the middle of the house and none of its walls touch the outside of the house.  It is a constant 70-72 degrees, regardless of the time of year.  Now, we wait for two weeks, and then bottle.

I checked on it this morning (I made it yesterday), and the airlock is bubbling away, meaning the yeast are doing their thing.  Hopefully, by Super Bowl Sunday, or read: the Big Game if you're from the National Football League (I have no money, so don't sue me for saying Super Bowl), we'll have two cases of drinkable beer.

Somebody Was a VERY Good Boy This Year!!

I'm not sure who that was, but I'm sure somebody was.  There are 6 billion people in the world, 49% of them boys, so I'm using some basic statistical analysis, I figure three were good.  Therefore, my title is not misleading.  Oh, of course it is while referring to me.

Needless to say...here are the goods...

Not the air hockey table.  That's for the other good boy in the family.  No, ladies and gentlepersons, the Beer Equipment Kit!!!  Five gallons of true bliss will be mine in four weeks following the day I gather the courage to actually brew something.  I give it until Saturday.  Damn the courage, this is beer people!!

Now, IG recommended How to Brew by John Palmer, which my lovely wife also obtained for me and I have since read nearly cover to cover.  Los Angeles to Phoenix, Arizona and back is a long drive, so I've had some time on my hands over the last few days.  This book is literally the bible he described.  That IG described, of course, for all I know John Palmer is a member of a satanic cult, so his bible would be completely different.  The books contains all sorts of charts and graphs and math and big, long words and other things I didn't understand.  It pretty much reads after chapter four as "blah, blah, blah, beer, blah, blah, blah, better beer" etc.  Not to knock the book, as I'm sure as I move along things will become more clear and I will refer to it consistently.  Thanks, IG.

I also got this:

Now, Big John Palmer (really, we're practically cousins now) doesn't recommend kits that say to add pounds of sugar, rather use a kit that contains multiple types of malt, or at least malt in place of sugar, which this does.  It contains both liquid and dry malt in addition to hops, which if you read my last post isn't going to be NEARLY enough, along with a bunch of bottle caps, dextrose (which has me concerned) and yeast.  Per Palmer's recommendation, I'm going to toss the yeast and go buy fresh yeast tomorrow.  Otherwise, I'm going to use everything else in the kit.

The other thing that shocked me was that a kit makes five gallons which is roughly 48 12 oz bottles.  That's a lot.  That's all of breakfast and part of lunch.  So, I decided to get started collecting bottles this morning.

Not bad for a light brunch, I say.  In the meantime I'll be sure to take lots and lots (read: 1) of pictures of our first batch this weekend.  IG can tell me everything I'm doing wrong.  Oh, and Kyna's Canadian so, she should know what to do simply through osmosis.

P.S.  I almost forgot, I haven't updated both of you on YOUR football team.  Tottenham has been spectacular recently.  Won our group in Champion's League and drew AC Milan in the knockout round starting February.  Also, we beat Aston Villa and Newcastle on Boxing Day and 48 hours later to be sitting fifth in the table, only two points behind the Evil Empire (aka Chelsea).  Now, if we can hold on to Bale and Modric through the January transfer window and find a central defender capable of playing more often then once a month we'll be in business!

Bless His Heart

Our fence blew down during some Santa Ana winds several weeks back.  Our neighbor, God love him, went out there to repair it.  The other day, after six solid days of rain (unheard of in Southern California), I came home and it had fallen over again.  Apparently, this is how he repaired it:

Yes, that's a door latch nailed to the piece of wood that split off from the post.  I just had to stand and stare for a moment.  It's an inch and a half long.  To hold up 100 pounds of fence.  Yea, didn't work.

I took two pieces of 18 long walnut I had left over and propped it back up.  Looks like Turling Castle gets a new fence come spring.

I. Love. This. Beer.

Stone Double Bastard Ale.  Go buy some.  Now.  I'll wait.....

This is the most bitter, hoppiest beer I have ever had, and it's delicious.  Feel free to use it as a meal substitute.  Let me put it this way, when my wife took a sip she said, "holy shit, how do you drink that?!?" I consider that to be 9 out of 10 stars.

Stone Brewing is a San Diego, California based brewer.  I consider that local.  They are 83.4 miles from my house, so thank all that is good and holy should I ever do the 100 mile challenge (only eating things within 100 miles of our home), this would still qualify.  Whew!  Even if it didn't, I would ask for an exemption.  They have been around since 1996 and are still growing.  They are still considered a craft brewer, though.  Meaning, you may not be able to get their stuff in other parts of the US, and if that's the case let's go with other parts of the world being less likely.  I have read that they are planning on opening a European operation, so I'll be sure to keep everyone posted on that.

Now, some sites will go through this whole process of saying "it has citrus overtones with a little honey and some milkweed thrown in for good measure."  I smell it and smell beer.  So, you won't be getting smell from me.  I don't know who smells that type of stuff, but it's not me.

A friend of mine whom I, unfortunately, have not seen in quite a while because he moved back to Denmark is from, well, Denmark.  Now, I decided next to the English (this is a compliment so stick with me), the Danes are nearly as big a bunch of drunks.  In a good way.  I would consider Americans drunks, but we seem to get drunk on flavorless beer.  Anyway, I have no idea where that was going, so I'm coming back to my buddy L.  When he was here, we would head out to the local brewhouse after work and the man always insisted that the head of a beer needs to be two fingers high.  Of course, I started in with "Natalie Portman fingers or Andre' the Giant fingers", because, yes, I'm that prick.  Anyway, he usually responded with some Yankee comment which ended my portion of the discussion.  Now, I have had several of these and, honestly, they have given nearly two fingers of head if poured properly.  So, on the "L" scale, I give this 8 out of 10.  As I'm typing, I'm coming up with some type of scale which will hopefully all come together at the end.

Ok, so we have taste...sight...smell we disregard, because it's overrated...let's have an all encompassing type one.  Ready??  The "how many more would I drink RIGHT NOW scale".  We'll call that the HMMWIDRN scale.  Ok, we'll come up with a different name later.  I was hoping that would spell something.

This scale needs to be realistic, as the normal answer would be "until I pass out."  So, how about this?  When I'm at a restaurant and order a beer, I would normally order a second beer at some point.  I have kids.  In a restaurant.  Parents understand.  So, I think this scale should be if I'm in a restaurant would I order this again or would I switch to something different, which happens more often then not.  This scale will then be the likelihood I would order a second of the same beer.  10 out of 10.  Hands down, no "if's", "and's" or "but's", that's the answer.  Now, let's add this up.  Christ, this is fun, I may have to do more of these.

Wife scale:  9 out of 10
L Scale:  8 out of 10
HMMWIDRN scale:  10 out of 10

Now...math.  I think that's 9 out of 10 overall, which I think is fair.  We can't start this with a perfect score, that wouldn't be sporting.  And, no, I don't think ALL beer is fantastic...ok, yes I do, but I don't think ALL beer is a 9 out of 10.  Give me a fruit beer and you'll be lucky to get above a 2.

Alright, we're done here.  Now, go plant something.  Might I recommend some hops?