offering up the pies of thanks

To me nothing says Thanksgiving like Turkey stuffing and pumpkin pie. Each one eaten in quantity will bring about heartburn not seen any other time of year. We will be on the road Wednesday to Minneapolis to celebrate Thanksgiving with Ann and Steve. My pies are in the oven, the dressing is in prep mode...can you feel the burn?

Brown and bottled

The brown ale was bottled today, and 44 bottles of the stuff is in the cellar. A little taste test confirms a success. Two weeks and the fun begins.

Waiter, there's a sack in my soup.

Saturday I racked my Brown Ale into the secondary without incident. One week than it's bottle time. Dipped into the Red Ale Sunday...Pretty damn good if I say so myself. I must have done it right cause it has fizz and it doesn't taste like an old band-aid. Speaking of unappetizing....Saturday Nancy and I had lunch at the local Applebee's where I ordered a six dollar cheeseburger, and Nancy ordered a nacho dip appetizer thingy. Nancy got a few chips into her dip when she noticed what appeared to be a hard clump of cheese in the middle of the dish. She picked it up with a fork and as the cheese ran off we could see it was the plastic bag the cheese came in. It looked like the cook just threw the bag in the bowl and microwaved it. Yuch! Needless to say, we left there without paying for our meals. The most disturbing part of the whole incident was how the server and manager didn't seem to be too concerned about it all. They just came up and said sorry and don't worry about the bill. Kind of makes you nervous about eating out these days.

I cracked a Red Ale today, boy did it look and taste good!

Brown Ale's sweet aroma

As promised, here is a pic of the
Nut Brown Ale
in the fermentor. Day three


Here's what I want for Christmas
Click here

Nut Brown Ale, day two

I tried to get a starter going on the yeast that came with the kit, but it just sat there without any action so I popped down to the Backyard and picked up some yeast. The brew has a sweet, nutty smell. I can't wait. I hope I have enough bottles to cover having two batches at once I get a picture posted when Nancy gets back with the camera from New York The brew supply here is a good source for materials needed in brewing but they carry no decent ingredients. Mailorder is still the only option.
Just want to mention that the spell check found no errors in this post. I love it when that happens.

Sweet Gods of beer!

Here I am cleaning up the kitchen when I find tucked away in the back of a cupboard a beer kit! It seems I'd forgotten this little Brown Ale kit that Annie and Steve had given me for Christmas. At the time our basement was in remodel mode and there was neither time or clean space to brew. Alhough this kit has been sitting around for awhile and not in the freshest condition I'm giving it a try... I've got it boiling right now! I think I'll pop down to the Backyard Brewing Co. in the mall for a fresh yeast packet, just in case. Updates to follow.

Red Ale update:
A week in the primary, a week in the secondary, and now one week in the bottles, it should take just a couple more weeks before it's time to pop 'em. Click here to view it in the fermentor