Our visit to the Creation Museum!

It's got its own exit! YAY!!

Keep that hood on kid. It's gonna rain INSANITY!!!

Gazelle...check, cougar...check, lamb...check, penguin...CHECK!!

Hot, naked, Biblical coitus!!

She was made from his bone. Now she receives another one.

Washin' off that sex stink!

Uh oh. SATAN!!!

The forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge was in fact Skittles.

A toothsome theropod tells terrified tourists about God.

See what you get for sinning? PREGNANCY!!!

Robert learns some secrets from the Bible's oldest fart.

Rob's distant relative scoping out Noah's hot daughters...

A dark-skinned drunken naysayer taunts Noah!

Noah's hot daughter #1 makes a basket for wombat feed.

Hot daughter #2

Hot on the tails of the giraffes...diplodocus!!

Oviraptors snuggle in their ark pen.

_

A resounding YES!

And a little imagination doesn't hurt.

Dinosaurs & humans...together at last.

A baby tricerotops does my hideous bidding!

You have no idea how bad we need beer after that.

National Homebrewers Conference 2008

Acting completely professional on Pro Night

More Marylanders

Me & Randy Mosher

Mouthfulls

Eyefulls

Tom's updated packaging

Whatever that was was good

Non-stop pouring

Tom's updated credentials

My anti-Tom-smell nose-guard

Cincinnati bound!

Beer vacation!!

We're off to stay with our dear friend Thermos who lives as a recluse in uncharted northern Kentucky. When we're not making beer and/or bad smells at his country cottage, we'll be attending the 30th annual AHA Conference across the river in Cincinnati. The tentative agenda includes, but is not limited to: brewing, stewing, p.u.-ing, a visit to the Creation Museum, gorging ourselves on Goetta, a cheap beer taste-off, and completing the training of one insanely brutal one-eyed crippled pitbull for her return to the doggy octagon vs. the neighbor's elderly, gravy-soaked Pomeranian.

A full and tedious photo retrospective is pending our return home.

Secret Ingredients: Dragonfruit

This is the first of many short posts which shall document our secret brewing ingredients.

Enter the Dragonfruit.

Its debut was in Venom. 5 gallons from a DuClaw group brew were treated with Dragonfruit in the secondary.

The results: An amazingly fuchsia version of one of our favorite local beers.

New Brew: taIPAn

Taipans are large, venomous snakes endemic to Australia. The IPA is a style of beer endemic to our refrigerators. Plus, we're dangerously low on 71. As I am not yet brave enough to put vegemite into a brew, I settled on kiwi fruit. No Simcoe was spared for this one. It did all the work for bittering and flavor. At knockout, an ounce of Cascades went in to steep for twenty minutes along with sixteen kiwis which were brutally flayed alive and roughly chopped. A taste of the sweet wort set our anticipation levels to high. The current state of fermentation is one of most violent we've seen.

Okay, now let's get down to brass tacks. We've eaten a lot of weird things over the years, but sometimes the line of decency is crossed and all decorum vanishes. Yes, even I gave pause and nearly fell ill upon witnessing one of the most repulsive feats of gastronomic criminality to date.

SOMEONE PUT MAYONNAISE ON AN ITALIAN SAUSAGE

I can't even type it without gagging a little. And to make matters worse, a Janis Joplin song came on about mid-sausage. I contemplated getting down on all fours in the yard and eating grass in hopes of a cathartic vomit session. Sometimes great institutions arise from trauma, so check your mail for the first ever Porch Demerit.

OG=1.065 IBU=65 SRM=10

New Brew: Chico and the Mandarin

This time last year, we brewed Orangina Galena -- a hoppy pale ale with a goodly amount of Orangina added at bottling. Chicks dug it. This year's orange offering is Chico & The Mandarin. It's very pale (The Man) with a nod to witbier via some coriander and wheat, then finally fermented on some mandarin oranges. Chico, of course, makes his contribution as the tireless workhorse yeast of which we're so unabashedly fond. There are now unconfirmed reports of the mandarins actually turning the beer a very bright orange. Creepy!

I carried the theme over to a couple t-bone pork chops thinking we'd be the only two on the porch. They were marinated for hours in Mandarin Orange soda, soy sauce, Chinese 5-spice and Sriracha. As luck would have it...interlopers encroached! Fortunately, they made restitution with BBQ shrimp & mango skewers. And so it was. We gorged on grilled shellfish, turkey, chicken and pig. Someone who had slightly more pig than others coined the day's top phrase: "Oh my god. That pork is RETARDED!"

Warning: There was frank talk of pig tails, brains, tongue, feet and ears gracing future menus. Recipes are in the works.

OG=1.06 IBU=30 SRM=6?

New Brew: Leroy Brown

A lot of brewers make a brown ale early in their portfolio because it’s considered easy. Not too much can go wrong, it can take a neutral & fast-acting yeast, and it can span a wide flavor gamut of hops and malt.

My first ever brew was a brown ale I made back in high school on my parents’ stovetop. Gleaned from Charlie Papazian’s earlier editions, it was a straight-up by-the-book extract affair. My mom later accused me of ruining her kitchen curtains with that “disgusting hop smell.” All in all, it turned out ok. It was drinkable (especially if you were my friends in high school). I remember a slightly cidery note to it, but hey – homebrewing ingredients have come a long way.

Anyhoo. When your several most recent brews have featured oddities like dandelions, passion fruit, Dominican herbs, agave nectar and grapefruit peel…why not get back to basics? This new one will be an American Brown Ale. Dark enough to carry some caramel flavor, but light enough to drink with summer burgers & steaks. We upped the hop IBUs to the forties to hopefully add some bite to the malt base.

Man, who am I kidding? With a name like Leroy Brown, I have to be prudent and throw some rice from Uncle Ben and some syrup from Aunt Jemima in there!! Much better. Some Victory, Melanoidin, Crystal 120 and a little Chocolate malt meet some Frankenstein leftover hops of Newport, Galena, Cascade and Fuggle.

And this one goes out to beer judges everywhere!

OG=1.06 IBU=41 SRM=19

Providing Needles for your Balloons

It is with great remorse and humility that we divulge our paltry scores from the 2008 National Homebrew Competition. One year ago, we were giddily basking in the glow of a silver certificate, taking third place in the eastern region with our sole entry IPA, Simcoexistence (scoring 37/50).

This year, we tripled our efforts and entered our American IPA, Passion fruit Blonde and Belgian Farmhouse. I had very high hopes for both the IPA and the Belgian, but sadly, a few of the IPA bottles have since been developing off-flavors and some acrid fizziness. Methinks the judges got one. What follows is a brief summary of their score sheet comments...

71-Minute IPA (25/50)

Thumbs up: Aroma is a strong, citrusy hop aroma / hint of alcohol. Some caramel aromatics. No off aromas. Slight yeasty & bready notes. Appearance is deep copper & heavy persistent head. Head is almost Guinness-thick. An amber pour with a tight, white head. Flavor is decidedly bitter w/ hops in the finish. Malt is there, but bitter dominates. Sweetness emerges on the last warmer sips. Finish is slick but clean. Overall, a hop-forward beer. A good base beer for an IPA.

Thumbs down: Aroma has some grassy harshness. No malt detected. Cooked vegetal notes suggest infection. Slight butter aroma as it warms. Appearance is slightly hazy. Highly carbonated. Flavor-wise, the malt is overpowered by hops. Balance is off. Vegetal and diacetyl override the hop. Some buttery notes hard to get past. Little malt base to support hops. Overall, harsh, but may improve with age. The off tastes may be from an infection. Diacetyl is a problem and detracts from the overall drinkability.

Passion Fruit Blonde Ale (26.7/50)

Thumbs up: Strong passion fruit aroma carries. Fruity, but not overbearing. Light malt aroma detectable. No diacetyl. Appearance is golden, with well-formed head & retention. Steady and very fine carbonation. Pale straw yellow, good head. Falls with some lace. Flavor is tart and malt. Interesting combination that works somewhat well. Hops are subtle. Finish is medium to dry. Passion fruit flavor is subtle in the middle. Finishes with residual tartness. Edgy. Hops become more noticeable. Overall, a well-made beer. There is a stickiness at the finish that may be a character of the fruit. Strange, yet drinkable. No serious technical flaws. Malt, hops and bitterness are appropriate.

Thumbs down: Aroma is fruity, but not distinct. A touch of acetaldehyde? Minor DMS (slight off-vegetable note). Appearance is hazy & stays when warm. Head falls fast. Flavor is indistinct. Fruit is not identifiable. Some diacetyl. Passion fruit fades at the end. Overall, well-made but not well-knitted. The fruit aroma doesn’t carry through to the taste, and there are some edges that are slightly distracting. Retain more fruit flavor next time, perhaps in secondary.

Belgian Farmhouse Ale with herbs (31.5/50)

Thumbs up: Aroma of fruit and soft phenolic spice with a malt background that increases as beer warms. Farmhouse goaty, spice and possibly St. John’s Wort. Spice dominates with some peppery heat. Appearance is gold with large, long-lasting head & fairly clear. Dark, gold, clear. Tight white standing head. Spice dominates flavor. Malt and fruit support. Medium hop bitterness is noticeable in the middle. Spice lingers through the middle and prominent in the finish. Sweet malt with spice predominance. Pepper bite builds. Overall, a very flavorful beer in which spice dominates. Well brewed. Very interesting beer dominated by spices. Almost a liquid heat.

Thumbs down: [Go to hell. We’re enjoying the 31.5 points for now.]

New Brew: Israel Pale Ale

Having your ass over for Passover…

We see no better opportunity than to make beer on a day celebrating plagues, Charlton Heston, God's idiotic showboating, and sweet, sweet freedom. Having dated a Jewish girl once, I can attest that they are a wonderful people -- even if she did do meshugganah things to my wee-wee with her braces. But I digress yet again. This day we make Israel Pale Ale!

Being a couple of first-born gentiles, we thought it prudent to have some lamb on the grill just in case the angel of death drops by. And since most reputable rabbis are busy, we're enlisting the help of an alternate to bless the carboys. At least he looks Jewish, has David for a middle name and often complains of chronic diaspora. In actuality, he'll probably just stand around and drink beer while mumbling words like Deuteronomy, Schlemiel, and Sammy Davis Jr.

On to the beer.

Obviously, like the waters of the Nile transformed into blood (good one, Yahweh), it will need to be red. I don't like beets (Feh!), so we'll go with some Billy Crystal malt there. Add copious amounts of Land of Milk and Honey malt and a touch of rye… Then, all we have to do is wait for a Bob Dylan song to play before solemnly tossing some Matzoh bread into the mash tun! And, let's not forget those bitter herbs. Our usual bitter herb (Mr. Hopstein) will be joined by dandelion and endive -- two acceptable forms of Seder Maror (I checked with an expert). Finally, we need a way to sneak parsley in there somewhere --- possibly at finishing.

Hopefully, we'll have a Jew of a brew to take with us as we wander the desert in search of pastrami.

OG=1.06 IBU=59 SRM=12

New Brew: Rosemary Pale Ale

Well, not much to tell here...

_

A completely impromptu brew session gave rise to a completely impromptu batch. Yes, instead of brewing one of the thousands of recipes on our expansive to-do list, we decided to make use of overstock. Seems the Walrus had been hoarding Cascades in the freezer for months...so why not use a good 5 or 6 ounces? In addition, my rosemary bush in the back yard is nearly now my height. It would be pruned for our bidding! The prospect: a medium-bodied and bittered pale ale using British 2-row, Victory and nothing but Cascade hops.

_

A dozen or so generous rosemary sprigs were laid upon the manifold before the grain was poured. Most of them stayed put during stirs, but a few made their way to the top throughout the mash. Target temperature was spot on and all went smashingly. The aroma of the fresh rosemary was quite amazing when the cooler lid was opened the first two times. Thenceforth, it dissipated. Dry-hopping with rosemary would be discussed.

Le Menu:

Beer apéritif

Spicy beef dogs with caramelized onions

Grilled dijon turkey breast

Chesapeake Bay oysters on the half shell (FANTASTIC!!)*

Grilled oysters with bacon, cheddar & hot sauce

Various frozen potato things found next to the hops (optional)
Bière fait maison for dessert
* especially when chased with a Peruvian Black

Once again...horrible efficiency. This must be remedied. Oddly enough, I also had to remedy a very dire situation of my own...near mid-boil. Luckily, the hot liquor tun's fire was not lit at the time of my posterior's off-gassing, or surely I'd have killed us all. A great uncomfortableness manifested itself behind me, and I gingerly duck-walked to the nearest facilities for maintenance. Luckily, it felt and sounded a lot worse that it was. Next time, I just might bring a spare pair.

OG=1.055 IBU=36 SRM=10

New Brew: BLAU!

Ich bin blau, amigo.

It was Easter Sunday, and the basement was cold amidst clanging church bells. Previous ale batches had been begrudgingly bubbling away at nipple-riffic temperatures. So I figured why not do like the Krauts...lager! Well, since our lagering fridge is on the fritz, we did a pseudo-lager. You might even say this one is a dig at Corona. The two secret Mexican ingredients were blue corn and agave nectar ( a pound of each). The baby blue cornmeal was made into polenta the night before, which transformed it into a lavender mass of gelatinous Iron Chef-worthy weirdness once refrigerated. The amber agave nectar is an unrefined syrup extracted from that most famous cactus of Mexico. It tasted very sweet and corn syrupy, with a slight note of tequila. It would go in at knockout.

Now to Deutschland. The heart of the grist was German pils and a couple pounds of Munich malt. The hops of the day were German Saphir (sapphire) which weighed in at a measly 4.4% alpha acid content. With only four ounces to work with, they would require a 105-minute boil to achieve the projected 33 IBUs of total bitterness. They smelled like Hallertau to me with a little citrus. Nice.

The mash went off without incident, although the polenta remained mostly in small clumps of purple dumplings even with the most rigorous stirring. Sadly, our efficiency was quite low, and the long boil was fortified with a cup of light DME in the later minutes to bring it close to its 1.05 target. It was tenderly impregnated with a very potent but un-bohemian Chico yeast courtesy of DuClaw Brewing Co. My hopes are for a crisp, slightly stinky cream pilsner which will spend a long time in the fridge after fermentation. Lime wedges are optional, but a bikini is required.

OG=1.054 IBU=34 SRM=5

New Brew: Stations of the Bramling Cross

Christ! What's next?!

Bunny ears on Jesus, that's what! Yes, the furriest of Christian holidays is near (no, not St. Patrick's day). So instead of firing off a Beamish clone or an Irish Red, the Walrus decided on a blonde. And right after he finishes with her, we shall brew one. As the BJCP style guide states: it's an "easy-drinking, approachable, malt-oriented American craft beer." So, in the spirit of those myriad idiot douchebags who guzzle green-tinted swill in mid-March, our blonde ale will be slightly unnaproachable.

Yes, the Easter Bunny is coming to town, and half of this batch will be senselessly food-colored in bottles with the hues of spring! A suggestion was made to hide them in the back yard and have an Easter beer hunt. I certainly can't think of any better way to celebrate such a miraculous day than waking up and drinking pink and blue beers. "But what about Jesus?!" you mutter. We haven't forgotten his holy butt!

Get ready for Stations of the Bramling Cross! A heathenishly simple bill of American pale malt and a little bit of wheat, with hearts of palm in the mash and some passion fruit nectar in keg...

The late hop addition minutes (14) = the number of stations!
Hopefully, we'll end up with a light & tasty little affair that will offend both the eyes --- and the Sanhedrin. A lovely little quaffing beer to wash down that salty leftover ham, or just refresh your senses on your long walk to Golgotha.

OG=1.055 IBU=26 SRM=4