Archive for the 'Beer' Category

Weather Changing

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DT
on April 13, 2007
in Beer, Bikes, Dirt and Life
. 2 Comments

We’ve had a turn in the weather here. Cold 40’s, windy, and just enough rain to keep us (well the “us” that have some respect) off the trails. I was able to get a nice ride in with big Gary the night before the storms rolled in. Good ride, conditions were super nice and the trail was running pretty fast. I even managed to goat Gary into taking the loop portion off the W&OD even when he thought he was done, ha. I also managed to clear a log that has plagued me for some time now. It’s not that the log is very big, but it sits up kind of high off the ground. Colt’s Neck is a pretty popular trail, so it’s not uncommon to end up riding with people you don’t know. Well not riding with, but more that whole back and forth thing. Some guys left the parking lot before us, but we ended up passing them, then them passing us, etc. Anyway, kind of near the end they were back on our tail and probably going to pass again. This time I just sucked it up, pulled hard and gave it what I could and cleared the log. I looked back to see everyone come to halt and climb over the log, ha. A little competition can be healthy for the skills I guess. Felt good to know I still got some skills left…even if in my own head, ha. But lately it’s been no biking and even no brewing.

In fact, I haven’t brewed since before we left for the UK! The IPA and the Strawberry Belgian Wit are in their kegs though and in the fridge. Don’t have enough spots on the CO2 manifold or enough picnic taps to dispense all the beer I have right now. Currently sitting at 6 kegs, but probably close to kicking 3 of those. I haven’t tasted the Strawberry yet, but the IPA is pretty kick ass. I actually can’t get it to drop clear, something I can usually do by sticking it in the fridge for a bit of time. But this beer used enough hops that I think it’s going to remain cloudy. It’s just your run of the mill 6.5% IPA, with a little of the kitchen sink method of choosing some steeping grains. I call it Hoptimus Prime, except it’s more evil than the Decepticons. With the full 7.5 ounces of hoppy goodness in it, I should have called it Energon. The bitterness is only mildly covered up by the punch in the face from the flavor and aroma. This is the first IPA of the year and if this is any indication…it’s going to be a good year for IPAs!

Oh yea, it looks like Fat Boy HQ is moving to New England…

DT

Cantillon

Published
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DT
on March 14, 2007
in Beer
. 1 Comment

My favorite part of our trip to the UK was taking a weekend trip to Brussels, Belgium and visiting the Cantillon brewery. If you’re ever in the area, it’s a must visit in my book. We spent half a day there, taking a self guided tour and tasting their brews. They are one of the very few breweries that practice spontaneous fermentation, meaning they don’t add yeast to their wort to make beer. They simply let it cool overnight under a roof with holes, then put it in barrels…amazing! My favorite was the Cantillon Iris. It’s a Belgian Pale ale, just as sour as their lambic, yet it’s been dry hopped. Seriously, one of the best beers I’ve ever tasted. I’m going to try and brew a few things like this once the mixed lambic/brett/who knows yeast comes out in April from Wyeast. In the meantime, you can check out the photos of our tour by clicking on the photo below.

Cantillon Brewery gallery

DT

Slow Start

Published
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DT
on January 30, 2007
in Beer, Bikes, Dirt, Life, Road and Tech
. 2 Comments

Well it’s been a slow start to the new year on the blog. Some people blog religiously, several times a day, and well, I’m just not one of those people. There’s enough fluffy crap out there that you don’t need to read mine on top of it all…

The weather finally turned cold here. We still get the occasional 65 degree day, but for the most part we are sitting in the 20-30’s lately. We got our first snow a couple of weeks ago. There was about 1.5 inches of snow with 0.5 inches of ice on top. Virgin tracks were laid at Colt’s Neck with Gary, no pictures were taken…we had too much fun riding. The same weekend, our household survived the norovirus and put on a little wine tasting featuring VA wines.

I’ve been hitting the path again with Spearmint. We made a Wednesday night ride with Hatley out to the Brickskeller. There we listened to Rob Tod of Allagash Brewing in Portland, ME and Vinnie Cilurzo of Russian River Brewing in Sonoma, CA, talk about Belgian beers, professional brewing, and their travels together. We had the opportunity to taste 10 great Belgians, with a surprise tasting of J.W. Lees on cask at the end, not that anybody needed that by the end, ha. A good time was had by all. It really drove home how much I like the sour Brett character in Belgian beers. Let’s see…if I brew one now I could probably be drinking it by Fall.

I’m enjoying our new Subaru Outback that we bought just before the new year. It’s nice being able to put the whole bike right into the back without having to figure out how I’m going to fit it in. Need to get a hitch mount so I can have the bikes outside and have a little more room inside when traveling, but other than that the wagon is pretty much ready to go from stock. I always though I needed something a little bigger than the Passat, considering how much I do outside, but a big boxy SUV and it’s poor gas mileage and high price of ownership never sounded appealing. The wagon has all the room of an SUV, easily as much clearance as half of the SUVs out there, and still manages about 24-26 mpg - that’s what I’m actually getting, not what comes on the sticker… I’m probably getting about 40 miles or so less per tank than I did with the Passat, so I’m happy about that. Oh, and the dog freakin loves the thing. The wagon is also the first car my wife and I have had that came with leather and all the fancy pants climate control/heat seaters and whatnot…pretty cool. It performed flawlessly in the snow/ice, which is a lot more than I can say for half of the crackheads who were driving. Just a little tip…while your 18 ton 4 wheel drive behemoth will do just fine in the snow, it doesn’t matter how many wheel drive you have when you’re sliding down the ice. In other words, if you’re a crappy driver without 4 wheel drive, don’t think it’s going to make you any better…as evident by the 14 SUV pile ups off the Toll Road.

In the tech dept. we got some fun new stuff. Check out Portable Apps and grab the Firefox portable. They’ve tweaked Firefox to fit on a memory stick. I’m using it on a 128 MB stick and Firefox with all the extensions is only about 30 MB…java on the other hand was almost 60 MB and isn’t exactly portable. The nice thing about portable Firefox is that nothing gets written to the computer…at all. So no logs, cache, cookies, etc. When you pull the stick out of the computer, there’s pretty much zero trace. Not to mention it also makes keeping track of your newsreading super easy, since it can always be with you, no matter what computer you’re on.

Aight, back to paying the bills and dreaming of a brewery with singletrack out the back door…

DT

007…2

Published
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DT
on January 5, 2007
in Beer, Bikes, Life and Road
. 0 Comments

So it’s a new year, not real exciting.  Life is still busy, work is still work, and the weather around here is still completely wack.  I haven’t managed to get on the bike too much lately with the holidays and all.  We spent Christmas up in Maine and the following weekend down at Ocean City, MD.   But this weekend I’ll be able to get out for a ride, a road ride due to the weather, but a ride all the same.  Kristin is up in NYC this weekend (Happy Birthday Kim!) and I have a rare nothing planned weekend.  So a bike ride is in order, as well as brewing up my first attempt at a Belgian Dark Strong Ale.  I made a yeast starter Thursday night, stepped it up again tonight, and if all goes well it should more than double the amount of yeast cells I pitch.

Finished off the Damn Devil Double IPA already.  That was the highest alcohol beer I’ve ever brewed (13%), yet it was the fastest keg to blow.  My Centennial IPA will probably be next to kick, but I don’t expect the Bourbon Vanilla Imperial Porter to last much longer either.  Fortunately, I have a few things that are ready to be kegged.  A second rendition of my Imperial Stout, this time I added a little more hops in the boil, twice the amount of dry hops, and it’s sitting in the secondary right now on oak chips!  Can’t wait to see what an Old Rasputin would taste like if it were oaked.  I’ve also got a Milk Stout that’s done fermenting, also known as a sweet stout.  It’s kind of like Guinness, only you add lactose, which is an unfermentable sugar to sweeten it up a little.

The only other beer I have in mind, other than the Belgian Dark Strong, is a little joint IPA project with some of the local hopheads.  Right now the plan is to do a Pliny the Elder clone, which I just have a feeling is going to turn out great.

In other news, tomorrow I’m meeting with some people from MORE.  I’ll be stepping down from the Trail Boss position to let somebody with a little more fire and passion have a go.  Liz Notter will be taking over the position, the same Liz Notter that got the Ride Like A Girl rides underway in addition to taking over the Cabin John trail liaison position…yea she is one busy woman.  Good luck Liz!

DT

Like a Phoenix rising from the ashes

Published
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DT
on December 13, 2006
in Beer, Bikes and Road
. 1 Comment

This is about two weeks late, but we started up the TNS rides again. To kick it off, Steve and I headed out from the spot to meet up with Butch at Dremos. Then a quick ride over to the Arlington Cinema Draft House to see the movie Six Day Bicycle Race. Good thing Steve saw that this movie was playing, because it was great! It was by far the most interesting cycling film I’ve ever seen.

Six Day Bicycle Race Gallery

After the film, in true TNS fashion we headed right over to Cap City in Shirlington for a final beer before making the ride back home. I’m guessing roundtrip mileage was around 18 miles. The ride was a lot of fun, but I think the pictures tell a better story…

12/05/2006 TNS Gallery

DT

Bliss is Done

Published
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DT
on November 7, 2006
in Beer, Bikes and Dirt
. 4 Comments
Artwork by Spearman

The 1st ever Bootleggers Bliss is in the history books. Thanks to the 25 or so people who came out and braved the cool weather and rocky trails at Greenbrier Park. Due to the advance nature of the trails, a slightly late start and the varying degree of rider skill, we did a modified loop and headed back to a pavilion after an hour or so of riding. Once at the pavilion, more people showed up and the smell of chili, sloppy joes, and brats surrounded the lake area. Homebrew came in the form of kegs, bottles, and growlers and varied from Abbey Style Ale to IPA to Lingonberry Fruit Beer to Porters and Stouts. There were even a few bottles of mead and wine. The quality was top notch! There was no official tasting contest, but the Outlaw’s highly sought after Robust Porter was easily one of the top performers and gets the unofficial win. Still wating on photos from the crowd, but Butch has posted a few up already for those who want to check out the action here. Everybody seemed to have a good time, guess we’ll have to do this again, ha.

DT

One More To Go…

Published
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DT
on October 23, 2006
in Beer, Bikes, Brewing, Dirt and Life
. 0 Comments

So this has been a long wedding season this year.  We have one more to go this coming weekend and thankfully this one is local.  We’ll be playing host to much of the wedding party and it will be nice to see everyone again.  Got the house ready this past weekend to house everyone, just gotta cut the grass and we’re all set to go.  Fully expecting this coming weekend to go by at a furious pace.  I’m hoping we’ll be able to find the time to fit in a game of Drinking Kart on the N64, but it’s not looking good.  We actually decided to board the B-Man for the weekend since it’s just not fair to him to be alone for that much time.  Hopefully they give him a bath, ha.

Kristin spent most of the weekend just playing catch up as she just finished her first week at her new job.  A start-up being run by Steve Case…talk about stressful!  They have her already doing things outside her comfort zone, so there should be a nice learning curve in her position.  She’s going to have one hell of a skills toolbox when she’s done though…

Sunday morning I managed to rack the Damn Devil Double IPA into secondary.  Way too smooth for a 12-13% beer.  I used something like 8 ounces of hops in this batch and racked it onto another ounce of Crystal hops.  The hoppy flavor and aroma is going to kick some ass on this one!  After lunchtime I headed out to MD for October BURP homebrew club meeting.  This month was the Dark Beers competition, basically any beer over 20 SRM qualified.  This is different in that usually the competition is limited to a specific BJCP style, whereas there were multiple styles to compete against.  I entered my Russian Imperial Stout that I brewed back in April.  It’s had time to mature and mellow a bit since I last had it.  Ended up pulling a 2nd place, not bad out of 17 entries.  It was really good about 2 months after I brewed it, but I think some of the mellowing has actually made it more one dimensional and I wish it was a little more complex.  As one judge said, it’s doesn’t quite live up to the aroma…  After the meeting I racked my Imperial Porter into secondary on top of two vanilla beans…this beer smells amazing!  Hope it’s ready for the Bliss.

Speaking of the Bootleggers Bliss, check out Spearmint’s art…not quite enough time to come up with a brand new logo, but hey, Big MEATS…Bootleggers Bliss…it all works out!

Bootleggers Bliss by Spearmint

So we’re pretty much all set to go for the event.  Just finishing up a few last details.  Still time to get in touch and enter, but only a few spots left.

Been trying out a new experiment on the IF, took it 96er style.  Big 29″ wheel up front, with a nice meaty 26″ in the rear.  Rode some Frederick, MD trails and it handled really well.  Didn’t seem as weird as the first time I jumped on a Karate Monkey.  I’m much more comfortable doing logs and getting air with this setup than I was on the KM.  Also gave it a shot out at Wakefield for a quick ride the other day.  Managed to get in all of Wakefields trails in about 45 minutes.  No issues with the bike, so I think I’ll keep this setup for a while.  Might try and find a bigger 29″ meat for the front, but shy of that I think I’m set.  Have to get some pics of the setup soon.

DT

Bootleggers Bliss

Published
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DT
on September 21, 2006
in Beer, Bikes, Brewing, Dirt and Races
. 2 Comments
Bootleggers Bliss

Here it is, the official announcement:

What: Bootleggers Bliss
When: Sunday, November 5, 2006
Where: Time and Place TBA

So here’s the deal, you might have seen the post on Steve’s blog, but here’s a little more detail. There’s a concept called “potlatch”, which Steve elegantly explains in his post. This comes down to a festival and an exchange of gifts (non-monetary) and that’s what this is, a festival celebrating bikes and beer in all their glory. In a sense, this is a lot like SSO’s Punk Bike Enduro, but with a couple of exceptions - the biggest being this is not a singlespeed only event. This is a celebration of all bikes, whether you like 30 gears or 1, whether you prefer big wheels or little wheels, whether you insist on coasting or pedaling the entire time…as long as it’s a bike and your legs are the power plant you can participate. The other big exception is there will be no prizes, no swag, and no monetary entry fees. Each participant however is required to bring something to the gift exchange and that should be a 6 pack (or growler) of your very own homebrewed beer.

The idea here is to celebrate bikes and bring more people into the homebrewing fold.

If you brew beer and don’t have a batch ready, well get to brewing! If you have never brewed before, but are interested, you’ve got three options:

  1. Get yourself to a local homebrew shop, get yourself setup for beggining brewing ($65 or so), pick a beer and brew it. Local shops: myLHBS in Falls Church, VA operated by Derek.  Out in the Fair Oaks area, you’ve got Jay’s Brewing (both Derek and Jay are mountain bikers) - as with most homebrew shops, be sure to check their websites for hours of operation. In MD, I’ve been to MDHB in Columbia, MD and there’s also The Flying Barrel in Frederick, MD…something to think about after you hit up the Watershed.
  2. Get yourself to a fellow homebrewers house to brew a batch. We have strategically placed homebrewers all over the area. If you want to give brewing a shot before purchasing any equipment, then this is your best bet.
  3. Get yourself to a Brew On Premise (BOP). This is a place where you brew a batch at an offsite location and when it’s all done you go back and pick it up. Shenandoah Brewing is a BOP. The good thing about a BOP is you are brewing under a watchful experienced eye and there is no need to purchase equipment, but the bad part is for the price you pay you could easily purchase all the equipment to do it yourself.
  4. Get yourself on the good side of a fellow homebrewer who is participating. This rare option of participating without brewing is available because each participating homebrewer is allowed one non-homebrewing guest.

If you take option 1 and either of those shops is out of your general vacinity, let me know and we’ll track down a homebrew shop for you. Also, let me know if you’d like to take advantage of option 2 and I’ll put you in touch with a fellow homebrewer. Option 4, well you’re on your own with that one…

So quick recap, Bootleggers Bliss is going down on Sunday, November 5, 2006, with a rain date of November 11. You can ride any bike you want, but a 6 pack (or growler) of your finest homebrew is required. Each homebrewing participant is allowed and encouraged to bring one non-homebrewing participant. We are trying to spread the love here folks, help us out!

For exact details (time and place) and any questions/information, contact me.

DT

Allergies Suck

Published
by
DT
on April 14, 2006
in Beer, Bikes, Brewing, Dirt, Food and Life
. 1 Comment

It’s been probably more than 12 years since I last had allergies. Well that all came to an end this past weekend and has lasted this entire week. Talk about miserable, we’re talking about it all - more snot than God ever intended man to have (gross I know), try to get rid of it and you get a bloody nose. Sinus all flaired up and itchy throat, which causes your ears to freak out…tough life, I know. I still managed to get out and lead the Wednesday night ride at Colt’s Neck, which turned out to be a really great ride. Not as much stopping as usual and we took a new option that Lee pointed out last week, only this time I took them up into the technical singletrack off the beaten doubletrack CCT. It’s off camber with a whole bunch of steep ups and downs. It only adds about 0.4 miles, but the real advantage is you get to ride on the dirt and not the pavement. The loop took about an hour, which turned out to be great timing. Turns out this Wednesday was when another one of the local homebrew clubs was having their meeting.

The WortHogs meet at the Hard Times Cafe in Herndon. We got there just in time after the ride for me to enter my beer into the extract brewing competition. Unlike the BURP meeting, everyone who attends the meeting is a judge. This is nice, because everyone gets to try the beers instead of only the certified judges getting to taste the competition beers. I had two things working against me from the start - we had just finished mountain biking, so the beer I was entering wasn’t chilled. Also there was no style guide for an American IPA (a style guide usually lists what to look for in that particular style of beer, like aroma, appearance, taste, etc.), which can probably be good and bad, ha. Anyway, I entered my beer and a group of us sat down, ordered our chili and a pitcher of the Racer 5 IPA. The homebrews we had a chance to judge varied from exceptional to beers I didn’t really want to finish the sample. The expresso Stout was truely wonderful, and at the same time, the Vanilla Stout seemed to taste a lot more like a Belgian Saison. Our table didn’t get to judge my beer…cause that might be a little unfair, ha. At the end of the night, they announced the competition winners. I walked away with a 3rd place for Hop Dog IPA (Steve get’s credit as soon as he makes me a label logo that incorpates the Busterman, ha). So I guess that makes it a blue ribbon and a bronze medal. Pretty exciting and a great end to great all around night.

Yesterday I went ahead and packaged up a couple of bottles and sent them in for the AHA NHC 2006…thats the American Homebrew Association National Homebrew Competition. Damn hobbies! Nothing left to do now, but wait to see how I do…or don’t do. Oh, and of course keep on brewing.

Anyway, with the exception of being sick and having all the pollen in the air, it’s been a pretty good week. Kristin and I have been grilling out on the barbecue a lot. There’s just something that grilling veggies on the bbq that really makes them outstanding. Instead of getting mushy, they stay crisp and yet take on the distinct smokey flavor of the bbq. Paired with some dry rubbed cod and you’re ready to go!

It’s Friday and I’m so ready for the weekend. Possibility of racing down in Charlottesville tomorrow, then Easter dinner with the extended family. If you’ve never met my family, just realize it’s a complete show. It’s usually something like 30 of us, ranging from kids to adults, throwing the smackdown on huge portions of food, catching up with each other, and taking the time to remind each that you’re still family and I can still make fun of you…

DT

Not Slacking

Published
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DT
on April 6, 2006
in Beer, Bikes and Dirt
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Well it might look like I’ve been slacking lately, but it’s quite the opposite. My companies contract got extended, so the 80 mile roundtrip commutes continue. At least the money they *hopefully* will be giving me to cover some of the gas will end up just about covering all the money I spent fixing the car, with possibly an extra $200 to put into the rear brakes that have 5% life left…

Last week I did some riding, I want to say I rode Colt’s Neck and Wakefield, but I can’t remember. I know I got in one quick lap of the race course at Wakefield before the MORE Board of Directors meeting. 3 hours later, out of the meeting, had to put the tools back in the Wakefield tool cache and take all the new tools off of Scud’s hands and into the back of my car. Wise words from a previous Trail Boss…“You’re the Trail Boss, not Trail Bitch…make sure everyone knows that or else you’ll be burned out before the end of the first trail maitenance season.” Thanks for the advice Big L.

Saturday had me getting up super early. John-O and Spearmint dropped by the house and we all loaded up in Spearmint’s truck to make the trip up to the Frederick Watershed for SingleSpeedOutlaws Punk Bike Enduro.  I’ll be sure to get my pics and write-up sooner rather than later.

This week saw the first weekly Wednesday Night Ride at Colt’s Neck…soon to be the hottest ticket in town, ha.  Hopefully I can actually lead this thing week in, week out.  It’s dubbed as a MORE/City Bikes ride, of which I’m a member of both.  The ride went great, 6 people, no mechanicals, and Lee even taught me a new section of singletrack.  I knew it up to a point, but I never knew where it came out.  The section will now definitely be a part of our usual loop.  Ok, time to head home and see if I can crank out some PBE reportage…

DT