I tried to like this one, I really did...

But the SA "version of a Belgian lambic [is] brewed with the juice of native American cranberries..." is simply repulsive. SA's Cranberry Lambic was described by other members of the HBT forum as gross, and I tend to agree, but I also shared the strange phenomenon that fellow HBT'ers had; their wives/girlfriends loved this brew. I had my wife try some, while disguising my little kid like giggles of delight at the unsuspecting victim's reaction to this vile potable, but I was the one giggled at when she smiled and expressed surprise in the fact that this smelled like beer but tasted good! I got outright laughter when I asked if she wanted to finish the bottle, because I couldn't simply pour out an almost full beer. She didn't believe my threats, and because I wanted to make her feel like she actually knew me well I forced myself to consume the entire contents of the pint glass while grimacing like I imagine I did the first time my parents forced me to eat all the brussel sprouts on my plate.

Lambic, which I mistakenly told my father was iambic, beer is unique in the fermentation process which is began with wild airborne yeasts, and not by the "pitching" of carefully isolated strains, selected over years of cultivation. I doubt SA is actually leaving great vats of boiled wheat and barley malt wort open to the environment of the greater Boston area, lest they infect their brew with pigeon poop and "big dig" dust, but by the flavor of this beer one might be persuaded without much difficulty to believe just that.

This beer is sour. Not good sour, like bread, but bad sour, like 3 days on the counter yogurt, with the cap left off, during summer.

I've got 3 bottles of this left, and it's either going to be relabled as Boston Lager just to perpetrate a most heinous April Fool's joke, or for my wife to enjoy.

Brewmaster's Collection Cream Stout

The first one from the Samuel Adams Winter Variety Collection that I pulled from my fridge was this Cream Stout. This is what the Samuel Adams website says about this beer: "Samuel Adams® Cream Stout is a true cream stout, balancing body and sweetness with the natural spiciness of grain and hand selected English hops." This was pretty accurate, and I can basically sum up my opinion with this: SA Cream Stout tastes like a sweet version of a Guinness Stout. I also have to add that I had a surprisingly fortunate and pleasing food pairing occur with this beer. Shortly after I cracked the bottle open the delivery guy from our excellent local pizzeria, Antonio's, showed up with the dinner I ordered. It was a Pizza alla Margherita that I ordered with simply prosciutto, and the salty cured ham on the pizza was absolutely perfect as a contrast to the sweet and rich Cream Stout. I don't know if the stout made the ham better, or vice-versa, but the taste bud tennis being played on my tongue was just the way to wrap up the day. Now that I'm reflecting on it, I'm saddened by the pitiful fact that somewhere, probably not even 5 doors down from my very home, some unenlightened poor soul is eating a Dominoes with an aluminum can of Coors Light, or worse yet Poppa John's and a Bud, yech 8-P !

WooHoo, payday!

Today was payday, and along with picking up some new brewing supplies at the local home brew shop I also stopped by the Costco and picked up some new bottles. While these new bottles will soon be containing a creation of mine I have the ardous task of emptying the ones I bought of their contents, supplied by Samuel Adams. I bought the SA Winter Classics Variety Pack of assorted bottles and they came with free beer!

Recently I did a mixed sixxer of different beer styles from Cape Fear Beer and Wine Store, located in downtown Wilmington, NC. I did this to expand my beer horizons and see if I could get a better idea of beers I'd like to try to make in the future. I did a pretty lengthy write up about each of the beers I purchased, and I believe it was very well received.

I've decided to do a similar review here, although this is a little more mainstream, being that I'm writing up my opinion of a pretty mainstream collection of brews.

So, without further ado....

Did you get Miro yet?

As a continuation to a previous entry, have you downloaded Miro yet?

So you may be asking at this point, if you've downloaded it, "OK, Matt, there's a couple cool feeds in here, but what are you all excited about?" Well, while there's some great original content, there's much more to be had with the Miro player. There's this really cool torrent client, that when paired with the RSS subscriptions you can configure, allows you to get up to date shows on your computer that you may have been missing because you're too much of a cheapskate to buy a whole HD setup with a DVR, or you simply can't afford all that sweet Tivo like capability because you've got an expensive wife and kids. Find the shows you like, setup the RSS, and wait for the downloads to run while you sleep. Watch the shows at your leisure. It's even better if you've got a dual monitor setup, so you can watch and surf the web at the same time!

I don't think your cable provider, or the networks would condone this, but why should you be paying for basic cable with paid for advertising included? Wasn't the original business plan for cable TV to be that the customer paid for the content so that they would have a choice? Where's the a la carte pricing that was promised by the FCC? And while I'm ranting, where's the outrage about PBS now running more ads then CBS?

While I don't currently have an HDTV set, I would like to soon. I also don't have a USB tuner for any of the computers in my house, but eventually I intend to get my HD over the air. If I am going to be required to sit through a bunch of ads to watch programming I am sure as heck not going to pay the cable company for access to the same content I can get for free with an antenna.

Oh yeah, Comcast sucks.

Shameless plug/ Product testimony

I've had stomach "issues" for years, probably all my life now that I think about it, and I've had acid reflux since I don't know when. Now when I was younger I really just accepted that sour stomach is just something you live with, but around 1996 I had something happen that really exacerbated the problem. I was prescribed Erithromyacin for a sinus infection, and I had really adverse digestive effects from the stuff. I had chronic stomach pain for months after taking that stuff. My acid reflux also seemed to happen even more frequently, and I couldn't get to sleep many nights, or I had to sleep sitting up to lessen the discomfort. Then a friend introduced me to Ranitidine, commonly sold as Zantac®, and suddenly I found my stomach pain was gone, and I was sleeping better than I had in a long time. I've been on the non-prescription strength Ranitidine for years now. It works well, but the stuff adds up in costs over time, even the generic brands. I would shop for the best prices in town, and I would buy large amounts to save costs. I've only had to take about 4 of the 75mg pills over the last 7 days. Normally I'd be taking at least 2 a day.

I've started drinking Bio Salud daily. It's a pro-biotic drink, containing the same active cultures found in yogurt. This stuff is marketed by El Viajero brand, which is actually out of Wisconsin. It's clearly aimed at the Latin American customer, but it's sold in Wal Mart right alongside the Dannon yogurt drinks. The biggest difference is that 8 of the Danactives yogurt drinks cost over $3.75, while 5 of the Bio Salud drinks go for ¢88. You do the math. Anyways, since I've been drinking one of these fruity little tasty drinks every morning I've been taking less and less Ranitidine.

Trina Puma

While probably not the ideal time to do this,

I'm trying to make a Bubble Tea right now. Well, actually I'm cooking tapioca pearls for bubble tea at the moment. I'm planning on having these with an iced coffee. The little black balls in the bottom of those cups above are tapioca pearls. The ones I'm making are white when they start cooking, but they end up clear. I also bought a pack of rainbow colored ones. If I can get the knack of making this stuff I'll get a bag of the black ones too. There's a pretty good description of this drink here: http://www.bobasmoothie.com/html/boba.html .

This stuff takes a while to cook, and it's just about 1:00 am. I worked 14 hours today. I worked 14 hours yesterday. I got about 4 1/2 hours sleep.

Maybe I should have thought this through a little more...

Christmas wish list item alert!

That, my friends, is a wall mounted bottle opener that would go great with my homebrew hobby! On the off chance that a family member is reading, here's the link to the opener on Coca Cola's website, but it's also available on Amazon.
Hint Hint ;-)

My friends can attest, I'm not a snob...

I'll eat at Taco Bell, if it's a clean one, and the staff is courteous. I actually think McDonalds is great, and there's a reason that it's business model is so often copied.

I also love some of the fancier things on the table, like foie gras, escargot, Toro (fatty tuna belly- sushi, and damned good!), along with a nice bottle of wine.

I can enjoy a hand-shaped burger topped with bacon, onions, cheddar and a smoky BBQ sauce. Or like tonight, a wonderful little Filet Mignon, courtesy of Omaha Steaks. I don't care what the beef purists might say about a frozen steak, them Omaha Steaks are fantastic. Sprinkle a little Tony Chachre's on that little gem of a steak and toss it under a hot broiler for 6 minutes on the first side, 4 minutes on the other. Let it rest for a couple minutes, and then dig in; which can be done with about a butter knife. It should be red in the middle. If it squirts juice all over the plate then you didn't allow it to rest long enough.
It should eat just about as well as good tuna:
















(That's not my dinner picture, I just borrowed it from someone on Seasoned.com)

There's beer in them there bottles!

Up early, before the crack of dawn this morning. One of the kids wasn't feeling especially well following all the food from the day before. Apparently a 15 month old's stomach takes some conditioning before gorging on turkey and trimmings. Who knew?

Following a bit of pacing and rocking, I got the little guy back to sleep, but I was up for good at that point. I had planned on spending the day off from work bottling my first EVAR batch of beer, and since I was up I decided to do just that very thing. I got everything needed together and found I had taken up all the counter space in kitchen. I guess it was a good thing to be doing this while the rest of the house was asleep and I had the run of the place!

Things went fine and here's the proof:


And here's a closer, flatter, look at the final label:


It was a great morning. I could use more days that begin this well, minus the screaming kid, on a regular basis.

Dang, busy night I guess. Recipe alert!

OK, just got done with an excellent dinner, which was well received by my wife too. I got a craving while at my desk this afternoon and I knew I needed a quiche. It's one of those foods I just have to have from time to time. Second time that happened this week, with the first one going undocumented online. I made crepes on Sunday morning. The big electric griddle was awesome for that food adventure. Thanks Ree!

So, on to this evening's fare...

Ingredients for my quick quiche (this filled 2 frozen Pillsbury crusts):

• 8 eggs
• 1 cup heavy or whipping cream
• 8 oz of cheese, grated, it was Monterey Jack tonight
• 1 package frozen leaf spinach, thawed and wrung out
  
• 8 oz mushrooms, sliced
  
• 8-10 oz bacon, chopped and cooked. I did mine in a pan, you can nuke it if you like
• 1 cup nonfat milk
• salt and pepper to taste

Combine all the above and pour into one large and deep homemade crust, or in tonight's case 2 ready-made frozen Pillsbury crusts. I put both pies into a 360º oven until the edge of the crust was browned nicely, and the filling was set but not hard. I don't know about you, but I prefer my quiche to be light and fluffier, not hard like an overcooked omelet from a greasy diner.

Now for pics:












It was great. You're welcome to borrow the recipe, but I'd appreciate credit for inspiration at least...

The lack of an exhaust note...

Really makes this video stand out for me:


I'm all for "green" if it means fun, and doesn't hinder one's good time. This looks like a blast and potentially opens up previously closed areas to cycling. I'd ride an electric dirtbike if I could do all those tricks on one.

Wanna see more, don't bother with the U.S. site, go right Worldwide Quantya site.

(Thanks to The Kneeslider for the link to the US site!)

NFL fans read no further...

I find it ridiculous that I am constantly defending my position on football for my sons. They aren't playing it. Not under my roof, not on my dime, and not even with a scholarship. I will not contribute to a "sport" that's about on par with pro wrestling at this point. I've already read about a couple deaths this year by younger than college age kids dying playing football. I am regularly talking to someone or other who has an old football injury that lingers on far beyond their high school career did. The game rewards most of the players for mindless routine, and instills poor values. You can say all you want about delusions of grandeur that the one time greats have for their team spirit, the truth is that the league is made up of individual self-centered, selfish, disrespectful, derogatory, uneducated, and disloyal people. It's not about playing a game of honor, it's become playing a game of deception and how much can be gotten away with. It's about the paycheck. It's about getting on MTV's Cribs.

Nope, I'd sooner let my sons get tattoos than play football. Ever.

Oh, and don't get me started on the NBA.

One of the big drags about homebrew...

Is washing everything so diligently. As most of my close friends would tell, I'm not the tidiest guy in the world. My desk, car, office, and garage are all in a constant state of disarray. I'm not talking lab experiment/mold culture gross kind of messy, but just really cluttered.

Today I undertook the laborious task of washing a couple cases of freebie beer bottles for my new favorite hobby. Surprisingly, bottles can be pretty damned expensive, and I now think that the whole "You don't buy beer..." bit actually refers to the big beer companies selling you the bottles. After sampling a number of really great brews from around the world recently I can only say that BMC (I'll let you figure out the initials for yourself) have to give the beer away free, 'cause it sucks.

For a domestic brew I have to say that the Southampton Double White I tried really stood out as an excellent brew, and I'm going to have to be making my own copy pretty soon. I'll also have to give some of Southampton's other stuff a try, but that'll have to wait until payday.

Scraping labels off of longneck Bud bottles sucks bad, but it's not like I had to drink the contents;-)

New logo posted below

Scroll all the way down...

Suzuki rider...

Are kids ruining your TV schedule?

Do you know the names of every major character in Thomas and Friends, Sesame Street, The Wiggles, and a number of other children's programs?
One link: www.getmiro.com.

Want to know how to get your favorite shows using Miro? You'll have to wait... I'll post better instuctions soon. If you have to know now go to Cnet and search on Miro there.

I'm doing a taste test...

And I just found a brew I love.

Weather Channel founder: "Global warming a scam"

Incredible! Is anyone recording the names of all the people preaching this fallacy as truth?

Someone is going to have to call out all the alarmists, and Gore's zealots, and Earth Day'ers. I doubt it will actually happen, but somewhere I hope that these folks are going to be held accountable. For some reason it always seems to be the people that attack religious faith out of one side of their head, while spewing this unfounded belief out of the other. I don't get it, but I certainly hope that the people are watching and taking notes.

Just had to put up a screenshot...

That cracked me up:

Placeholder, if needed

I'm posting this first entry as a placeholder. I've currently got a blog going on another site, but sadly it appears that they are doing away with the current system and moving to another format that may or may not be user friendly for me.

I'll just have to wait and see...

Don't ask about Fat Duc just yet.