I brewed again yesterday, for the first time since last August. Unfortunately I couldn't find my notebook so I am going to type in my notes here so I have a good record of the brew. I'll put the details in the "More..." section of this post, so only serious homebrewing nuts need to continue.
This was a new recipe for me, from Carl's friend Calin. I tried it about a year ago when we spent the night at Carl's on our drive up from the ABL party. It's a pretty standard American IPA, exactly the kind of beer I like -- heavy on the hops and decently strong.
One last note of possibly general interest - I bought the supplies at the Southside Brew Crew here in Edmonton, which is open on Sundays. Usually I shop at Harvest Brewing Company, which isn't open on Sundays. I noticed that every Brew Crew item I bought was 50 cents to a dollar more expensive than Harvest. But they were open.
My stove is a 1960's GE Americana electric (there's a picture in this entry). It has only one large burner, and that burner has a feature called "Sensi-Temp" which is supposed to keep the pot at a particular temperature. There is a thermocouple built into the middle of the burner, and I assume there's some sort of PID control in the stove. It's a wonderful concept, but unfortunately the thermocouple has a thick layer of burned matter caked onto it which acts as insulation. So you have to set the Sensi-Temp to about 325 to boil a small pot of water; and to 475 or so to keep 3 gallons of wort boiling. I record the temperature setting as "325 ST" to indicate the setpoint on the Sensi-Temp dial.
Calin's IPA (grains/malt extract):
grains: 6 oz crystal, 7 oz victory, 4 oz wheat
Steep grains for 30 min at 150F.
4 lbs light malt extract
1 lb English dry malt
hops: 1.25 oz N Brewer, .5 oz Cascade at boil (bittering)
1 oz Cascade 30 min into boil (flavor)
1 oz Cascade last 10 min of boil (aroma)
Burton Ale yeast
9:51 measured grains, crack with rolling pin. In brewing tun, heat 4L of water on stove.
9:57 put grains in to soak. Turn up heat (325 ST)
10:21 measure hops and malt
Bittering: 1.25 Northern Brewer (7.1% alpha acid content), 0.5 oz Cascade (6.5% AA, 2001 crop)
Flavor: 1 oz Cascade (6.9% AA)
Aroma: 1 oz Cascade (6.9% AA)
4.4 lbs (actually 2kg) Munton's light dried malt extract (DME) (from Brew Crew)
10oz Harvest Brewing light DME (a bit darker than the Munton's)
(Combine all malt in mixing bowl)
10:27 remove soakers. Heat up water.
Add malt. v. successful to add malt w/ ladle to initial (1 gal) fluid, stirring to dissolve, adding fluid as needed, to 3 gal at end. (I had a stock pot with 2 gal of water near-boiling on one of the back burners)
10:51 difficulty getting boil even at 500 ST. Added bittering hops. Open kitchen window and front door for crossbreeze so kitchen won't steam up.
10:56 true boil started (!) at 500 ST. Turn down to 450. Keep moving pot so hot spots don't develop.
11:03 good boil at 475 ST uncovered.
11:20 still boiling steadily at 475 ST, occasionally moving pot. Added flavor hops.
11:41 add aroma hops
11:51 [baby in arms] tun off burner, cooling on stove
12:20 cooled with wire frame (to raise put) and partially stoppered sink, running cold water down side. Quite effective. Start racking.
Rack into primary. Add cold water to 5 gal mark. OG 1.050 @ 62 F. Pitch yeast (Wyeast 1028).
(next day) 9:05 AM still no evidence of fermentation, temp only 66 F. If no change by noon today will try warm water bath.
This has been weighing on my mind for a while, but I haven't seen it seriously addressed anywhere (this does not count). This is one of the sidebars of war that we're not supposed to talk about: those at home don't ask, those in the field don't tell, and thirty years later we make movies about it. But I think it's important, so I'll talk about it anyway.
I can only assume that there are brothels in Iraq which cater to the occupation forces. I believe their mere presence (whether they're staffed with Iraqi women or non-Muslim foreigners) will help radicalize susceptible young Iraqi men, leading them to join the insurgency.
On the other hand I can't really think of a better way to solve the problem of several hundred thousand coalition troops, mostly men, with lots of money and nothing to do. It would be impossible to achieve our stated goal -- to establish a free society in Iraq -- if in addition to fighting the insurgents, coalition forces had to spend their time raiding whorehouses like small town vice cops.
And one rape committed by a coalition soldier will do an enormous amount of damage, probably more than the brothels could.
I just hope that the coalition authority has some cultural experts who pay attention to this issue.
It's been a while since I've posted. There are a variety of reasons, most deeply general laziness, but my one legitimate excuse is that the baby is now big enough to want to play when I have her in the mornings (like now). And in her concept of "play" I'll include "banging on the keyboard". Also "whacking the optical mouse". Whoever came up with the idea of making a light come on when the mouse is moved is obviously childless.