premium schmemium

I’ve been sampling the premium kits from Mr. Beer that I’ve made (and blogged on) several weeks back. I have a habit of blogging whilst things are “cooking” and still fresh in my mind (and exciting, no?), and from time to time become a little neglectful on the follow up. (and neglectful to avoid run-on sentences that run on and on and on…)

Anywho… After making a couple of the standard kits – West Coast Pale Ale, Irish Stout, as well as a few recipes involving other standard kits – coffee bock, porter, and apple pie ale, I thought I’d give the “premium” kits a shot.

To date, I’ve made, bottled, waited (and waited) for The American Devil IPA, and Sticky Wicket Stout to be drinkable, and have tried them at various times over the past couple weeks. These kits have been the easiest by far to make (I had a heck of a time getting the ingredients to dissolve on my first go (granted the kit was a couple years past it’s expiration date), and The American Devil was the first to actually smell like beer from the get go.

My first sip of said IPA was heavenly. Surely the premium kits are the way to go! But as some of the other beers have evolved, matured, changed over the weeks these did as well, and now I’m not so sure. I wonder if these homebrews are like wine, and are best with certain foods?

In the instance of the coffee beer, it went from tannic and cold black coffee in nature to quite drinkable (though not worth re-making… cooking with may prove to be another story.) as for the most recent IPA it went from great on its own, to best enjoyed with food… The jury is still out on the Sticky Wicket… but I think I liked their standard Stout better. I definately liked the basic (included with every kit) West Coast Pale Ale best of all to date. (I wonder if waiting a couple years before I made it had something to do with it?)

Well… time’s over for the winter brews… time to make some great beers for summer… just enough time to “cook” something up for the annual family picnics.

 

sugar sugar,..

you are my poison girl, you’ve got me hooked on you.

One more time with feeling!…

Yeah, I’m at it again… not so much trying to lose weight, but rather to get in better shape. It’s been a long time since my running days, and the knees are forevermore just not up to reliving my glory days on the track – and I couldn’t stomach the less than gourmand fare I was able to burn when I could run 6 minute miles forever. How exactly did I make Varsity on grape soda and ring dings? Oh yes, sixteen.

So now, I turn to trying to remain somewhat active in my daily routine, and eating well. Alas, it’s been a long time since my stricter vegetarian days, my vegan days, and my stint at macrobiotic days. I’ve forgotten most of my recipies from that time, and mindset. A couple of favorites do remain from those days… but it’s been a long time since I’ve bought or consumed umeboshi plums, sea vegetables (outside of a sushi joint), diakon, lotus root, and various coffee “substitutes”.

I still consider myself vegetarian, or at least “vegetarian minded”. Red meat is still off the table, though my body will now tolerate small amounts of cheese again. The real problems at my table aren’t really so much “what’s for dinner” so much as what’s there to snack on, what’s for dessert, second dessert, late night snacking, and so on…

Just because one is eating organically, vegetarian or otherwise, doesn’t mean one is eating healthily. There can still be too much sugar, and overprocessed foods in our daily diet. Fortunately I’ve learned what sorts of foods I really like, and as long as I’m eating seasonally, locally, and as diversely as possible, we’ll be fine.

Unfortunately the siren’s song of, well, mostly carbs in thier most delightful forms, can be too hard a temptation to resist.
But I’m going to give it another go… and the first step is to wean myself off sugar (and all those empty calories).

I’m currently on day four without coffee. I wasn’t drinking it as much as I used to. In and after college I lived on it. Lately, it’s been simply the a.m. (OK and evening) beverage of choice, in the form of a mocha. Hot or iced. I had making them down to a science. But between the sugar, chocolate syrup and artificial creamer, that’s just too much sugar – I’m making the transition to stevia…. but coffee still needs a little sugary sweetness. I can take my coffee black (with sugar) but not straight up. If I can’t make it right, best not to try to make less than desirable substitutions. And believe me, between fake coffee powders, roasted teas, rice and soymilks, goat milk, splenda and other articicial sweetenters, it just isn’t worth it. Stevia works in tea just fine, however, I’m still searching to find a tea I can get behind.

A few years ago I fell in love with Yerba Mate – the orange blossom variety to be specific. This was fanstastic, hot or cold. Full of nutrients and so on like green tea, but that hint of orange flavor, without the tannic quality of unsweetened black tea, or the dryness of green tea. Alas, my source dried up, and I had to order online – massive quantities (and other flavors too!), however I think there was something in there that I became allergic to, and lo, I was back to coffee…

I’ve been tying other tea’s, herbal or otherwise, trying to find something else with a hint of orange that will fit the bill. Something that’ll help keep my daily sugar intake within or below weight watchers acceptable level. A couple contenders, but no true winners just yet.

Are carbs off the table too? Banished? No way! Whole grains form the basis of several of the food pyramids, and diet philosophies. They’ll remain, if not homemade, then as whole, as close to nature as possible. I’ve got an oatmeal bread recipe I’m working on that I like much more than any storebought loaf, and my Christmas cookies are made with organic wholegrain flours. (So I can feel a little less guilty about eating too many of them). Hopefully by that time, I’ll be fit and trim, and a couple cookies will make me no worse for the wear.

Until then, lots of vegetables, keep moving, no sugar, and fingers crossed that this headache will go away! At least it’s not January, and I can skip the implied guilt of trying to keep a resolution.

 

I need a (new) drink

Having polished off 2 Bottles of Barritt’s Ginger Beer that I brought back from Bermuda (along with a Taste for one of their national drinks, the Dark and Stormy – ginger beer, dark rum and lime) I have been looking around for a surrogate (while trying to source some more of the real deal.)

I’ve figured out the proper portions of ingredients, and the proper mixing method, (see previous posts on the subject) but I haven’t figured out what makes ginger beer, ginger beer.

Barritt’s is not like ginger ale, but only seems to differ in having quillaia extract (a type of bark, methinks) and uses sugar cane rather than corn syrup (much better to do it old-school with the sugar cane in my book). That, and it’s made in Bermuda by Bermudians. Which is something any “local” rum cannot claim.

When I asked around on the cruise ship what to use, they all said to use root beer (presumably, they already knew how hard a time I would have, and knew that Schweppes or Canada Dry just wouldn’t cut it… so after milking those 2 precious liters for as long as I could… off to the natural food store I went.

First attempt – Boylans Ginger Ale (yes an ale is not a beer)… but this was made with sugar rather than HFSC, so worthy of consideration… just not worthy of the drink. Kinda bland. Neither dark, nor stormy.

Second attempt – Stewarts Ginger Beer, has the precious quillaia, but unf. has the non-beloved HFCS. Closer to what I’d hoped for… and spicyier. Nice, but a little too much with the spice. My wife tried (and liked) this one, It didn’t leave me wanting another – perhaps I should try this again with food, alone it was too spicy.

I tried a third with the Polar Old Fashioned Ginger Ale – which follows an old Irish recipe. (remembering that ginger beers are reported to only come from Bermuda, New England (somebody please tell me where) and the UK, this might be a good option…. nope.

The Stewarts was the best, but not close enough for my taste, even tried tempering the spiciness by combining the old fashined gingerale…

If I can’t get anymore Barritt’s, maybe rootbeer wasn’t such a bad suggestion afterall?

 

a second look at the coffee bock

If I’m not blogging about bread, then it’s beer… (or so it would seem) have I found a niche, or just an obsession of late, with bread in liquid and solid form????

I brought a sixpack of my coffee bock to a family get together today. My uncle was in town, (I hoped with some of his own wine in tow) and I thought my bro-in law (a coffee junkie in his own right) would be able to get behind this one. Alas he wasn’t there (whole family is sick, sick, sick) so I’ll have to set a few more aside. But Dad, my uncle and I each gave it a shot.

My second impression was that the coffee flavor had mellowed somewhat. Last time I had it for “dessert” and it was essentially black iced coffee in an otherwise smooth (and non-beer flavored) higher than standard alcohol content bock. While it didn’t pair very well with my dinner (lasagne, salad, garlic bread) it was fabulous with a brownie – better than the real coffee I had.

My uncle gave it the thumbs up – and became the proud owner of the remaining three in the fridge – Dad drank it, but declined comment. Mom – not so much a fan… (but as a non-beer drinking, milk and sugar in her coffee type, I didn’t expect that she would.)

This was my first attempt at bottling in glass bottles – until now I’d used plastic 1 liter bottles (as recommended by the kit manufacturer for beginners, as you could tell by feel if the carbonation was ready or not. (by how hard the bottle had become). All but a couple of the glass 12 oz bottles I’d used were screw top bottles, but I used the bottle capper anyway (and crossed my fingers that there wouldn’t be an explosion in the kitchen. All was well, until Dad went to open the third bottle. He barely even touched the cap, when we heard the pop of a champagne cork (and the cap bounced off the dining room ceiling, and landed on the far side of the kitchen. Ok for this pass, but I suspect I shouldn’t be recycling those, if only for safety’s sake.

Dad recently worked on a house where the owner grew his own hops, so I’ve been thinking about trying my hand at that in the coming years, and will be able to sample an even more “homemade” brew. Was great to bake a cake with my own handcrafted stout, but to have more of the ingredients come off my land… so much the better! Also learned today that my uncle (started roasting his own coffee… seems you can re-purpose an older model popcorn machine to do the job.) I’m almost inspired enough to try that myself as well.

Oh, that first bit about my uncle being a wine-maker (Yep – Forget about all these celebrities releasing their own wines, I came home with a beautiful bottle of Pinot)… but more on that next time.

 

on the house

Daddy… where are you?

Yes, I’ve been out of the kitchen as of late. A little busy getting some projects wrapped up. Hopefully, (but not likely) before I start some new ones.

While I may have been away from food, it has been following me around. Last weekend, after replacing our bedroom windows, I painted the room “Chocolate Pudding.” (Only took 4 coats, to the Cranberry Zing’s 7+). Now that the walls are nice and rich (and chocolatey!) we picked up the trim paint today, and “Sugarcane” will be going up tomorrow!

A couple highlights involving actual food this week (that didn’t come out of the freezer). Sushi for lunch on Thursday – salmon tempura maki, as well as a “tropical” maki with pineapple and crab (I think?) with a mango sauce. (Did I mention this combo before? We’ll it’s a good one. Almost like a meal and dessert in one, kinda. As an aside, I surprised the chef/owner by switching things up from my typical order of “Veggie Dynamite” – asparagus tempura, avo, cu…). I’ll usually stick to the cooked or veg menu, but I have tried a range of offerings, the raw and the cooked. My ultimate favorite (at another local spot) is a spicy salmon roll. It’s a meal in itself, and a little too hot for my liking… but oh, it is so worth it anyway.

Our grocery stop at TJ’s had us sampling some really good, freshly-baked, choc-chip cookies. I will be making a batch this weekend! Regrettably the dough is pre-made, but at least it’s an all-natural brand with only ingredients I’d have used anyway, not all those “extras” in the slice and bake stuff.

And finally, thanks to Blog Day 2006, I’ve found several new rss feeds. One of the more interesting, takes us back to cooking in the colonial times. 18th Century French Colonies to be precise. Virtual historical reenactment, with food!

 

No-cal chocolate pudding

(3 gallons worth)

Never go shopping on an empty stomach – good advice for groceries or for paint. read more.

 

mystery meal

How do you get your little girl to eat dinner, when, despite containing everything she likes, she won’t give it a chance? Make mealtime funtime!

She would have nothing to do with the shrimp, carrots, broccoli, noodles or waterchestnuts in the stirfry we had for dinner. Except for the latter, these are all things she loves.

Was she being difficult for difficult’s sake? Perhaps – she is three, after all. To her credit, though, she couldn’t eat her corn on the cob fast enough (or more thoroughly) this past weekend.

After several minutes of defiance, her dinner getting cold, my wife hit upon a brilliant idea – make her guess what she was eating! She likes playing a guessing game where she reaches into a bag and tried to guess what she was holding. So why not guess the food in her bowl? What fun!

Sweetie obviously agreed, as her mood lightened instantly. She was eager to play.

She ended up doing quite well, and she looked forward to each bite.

“Is that a shrimp?”

“Yes.”

“A carrot!”

“Yes.”

“Another shrimp?” (while making a face)

“No, that’s a waterchestnut.. it’s kind of like a raw potato… we won’t give that to you again.”

And so on….

She did start peeking after that, but kept eating anyway. Peace and fun were restored to the dinner table at last!

 

and the envelope please

I didn't win, but… heard lots of raves, and I didn't have any leftovers to take home either. The picnic (catered!) was great, A couple of the guys brought out their guitars, and there were a couple dozen squirt guns!

 

what happened to ‘dinner?’

We watched the finale of “The Next food Network Star” tonight. One thing that resonated with me (apart from being happy that Guy won, was his mention of the fact that people don’t seem to cook anymore, and Food Network is actually giving people the nudge to get back in the kitchen.

When I was a kid, mom would come home from work and whip up a tuna noodle casserole, baked chicken, shepards pie, baked fish, creamed salmon, or any number of meals that I don’t think I’ve had in about 15-20 years. (except for the fish)
Sure there were ‘TV dinners’ but we knew that wasn’t the healthiest option. Unfortunately (and somewhat surprisingly) my wife and I have succumbed to the bad habit of only eating out of the freezer – after our daughter was born. I did a heck of a lot of cooking the few years prior, and I’m only now just getting back into the swing of things.

Case in point, once every week or so we’ll have fish sticks and fries (or popcorn shrimp) for variety. This is a surefire hit, easy to make, eat and clean up from, but certainly lacking as far as actually cooking goes. We do shop at a Trader Joes and Whole Foods (when we can make a day trip and stock up on things) so we are eating a bit healthier than our options suggest (with everything being as organic as possible is a great plus). Another night would be frozen pizza, or ravioli. No side dishes, no salad course (except when I get on a salad kick and make those everynight until we’re sick of em), and regrettably no dessert course.

My sister and I didn’t really help out too much in the kitchen as kids – sure we could whip up a tuna fish sandwich, or prep some veggies, but cooking just didn’t have the sirens call. Interestingly, as soon as we both left the nest we began to explore our culinary horizons (independent of each other) and began to experiment with all sorts of new recipes. We hung on to some family classics, and created several of our own.

My regular dinner repetoire used to include such diverse (vegetarian) creations as Spinach and Portabello mushrooms with soba noodles, Steamed/Sauteed vegetable medly over udon noodles with a miso/tahini sauce (my wife’s favorite), salad with toasted pine nuts (or pecans) pears and raisins, homemade soups a plenty, a vegan chocolate silk pie you’d almost kill for, homemade breads and more (that seems to slip my mind at the moment).

Bring a baby into the mix, and everything went out the window in favor of the convenience of frozen…

Perhaps thankfully? we had a busy week at work and didn’t get to hit the store to replenish our frozen fare. I was going to actually have to put some thought into dinner and cook something. Somehow intuned to the situation this morning my little girl said she “wanted to make something with her apron on.”

We started off with some raspberry jello – with rasperry lime seltzer to make it interesting. Dinner was a simple – but delicious pasta dish, lemon pepper shrimp and tofu over angel hair. I had to put 2 pots/pans on the stove, and actually used the juice from a real lemon.

The best part was when my daughter finally gave everthing a chance and liked it. She didn’t recognize the shrimp without the breading, but when she finally tasted it she couldn’t get enough – the tofu was a tough sell. We asked her to at least try it. She likes soy milk, so we played up the fact that tofu wasn’t toes (wiggling mine for emphasis) but rather ’soy milk cheese’. That news she was happy to hear. How great is it to see a 3 year old actually eat such a diverse set of ingredients that most grown ups will actually shun.

There’s a small unadorned wallspace over the counter between the stove and the fridge. I think I’m going to hang a blackboard there so I can write out the weeks menu – restaurant style. If not only for the “creative ambiance”, but to also make the foodshopping a little easier, and break me out of the frozen rut.

Thanks for hitting the nail on the head Guy!