Cooking with beer: Odell IPA ???Hop On??? Chicken
September 6, 2011
All in all, it was a decent Labor Day weekend. I had kind of meant to go to the Minnesota State Fair. The weather was perfect with highs barely reaching 70°F/20°C, but I ended up doing a lot of cooking instead. My favorite vegetables have come into season at the Nicollet Mall farmers market—zucchini, tomatoes, eggplant, red bell peppers–and for each of the last two weeks, I’ve bought far too much. So I must cook it all up into tasty dishes. Today’s tofu zucchini stroganoff was okay at best, but last night’s dinner rated an A+.
For most of the week I had been trying to finish the Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix audiobook so that I could watch the movie at the weekend. Didn’t quite make it after falling asleep on it twice, but I got to the last chapter and I’ve come to learn that the main action is usually concluded by the second or third to last chapter so I decided not to worry about it.
Also for most of the week, I had been chomping at the bit to make the Odell IPA “Hop On” Chicken recipe that they posted. As you may recall, I tried making the Double Pilsner bread substituting whole wheat flour (with baking powder and salt) for white self-rising flour. The flavor if not the density was good, so I was excited to try another beer recipe.
To make use of a lot of the vegetables, I found a recipe for Italian Stuffed Eggplant from one of my favorite cookbooks, The Low-Fat Way to Cook (Oxmoor House, 1993, p. 126). I adapted it to use lentils instead of brown rice, and feta cheese instead of mozzarella.
The eggplants went into the oven to heat through and I set to work on the chicken.
I assembled those ingredients. This was the first chance I had to practice what I would like to be my new meat-buying philosophy after seeing the Wikipedia article about that horrible Smithfield pork producer. I don’t mind eating animals but I decided that I’d at least go to the co-op for more humanely raised meat. The chicken breasts were about three times more expensive but I think it was worth it.
I had gotten the chicken marinating the afternoon before, so they ended up marinating for 24 hours. I only got three breasts (or breast halves, I guess) because they were giant, and cut each of those in half.
I used my grill pan. I wanted to sear both sides before I left the chicken cooking. The pieces were thick, I think it ended up being about 20 minutes.
The eggplant halves came out of the oven looking perfect.
The chicken grilled up in the pan and came out looking perfect.
But more importantly, this was one of the most delicious meals I’ve ever made for myself! I put in the Harry Potter movie, poured one of the remaining Odell IPAs and had a very enjoyable date night for one. Who needs a restaurant?
Cooking with beer: Odell Double Pils beer bread
August 29, 2011
As I await an official Odell Brewing beer dinner in the Twin Cities (I am told I missed one last year and if I think about it, I perhaps vaguely remember its announcement), I decided to do my own mini-dinner at home centering around the baking of a loaf of Odell Double Pilsner beer bread, to serve with the vegetables I grilled and roasted last night.
Odell Todd gave me the recipe when I went to a beer and cheese pairing Wednesday night. Turns out he had made the three loaves of the bread that they served. I only had a taste because I got there a little later, compared to the whole slices that were served earlier. Todd assured me it was easy, and indeed, it only has three ingredients:
3 cups self-rising flour
1/2 cup sugar
12 ounces Odell Double Pilsner
Combine ingredients in a large bowl. Spoon into buttered pan. Bake at 350°F for 50 minutes, brush with butter, bake for 5 minutes more.
I decided to make it with whole wheat flour, because I try to avoid the processed, white versions of things if at all possible. So I did:
3 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup sugar
4-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
12 ounces Odell Double Pilsner
I baked at 375°F for 50 minutes, brushed with butter, baked for 5 minutes more.
If I made it again with whole wheat flour, I would use 6 teaspoons of baking soda and less sugar, maybe only 1/4 cup, as well as use my smaller loaf pan. Or just use white, self-rising flour. It tasted good but I was disappointed that it didn’t rise up higher than the sides of the pan. I do realize that “whole wheat quick bread” is probably an oxymoron.
I cut a couple of slices, topped them with thin slices of feta cheese, and baked for 10 or 15 minutes and broiled to brown. I served with my leftover vegetables and had a nice meal.
Then and now (this is my life)
August 17, 2011
These two photos are the earliest and latest ones I have of myself. What has happened in between? Funny you should ask. Let’s take a look.
Ages ½–10
I’d swear I remember when the baby picture was taken. I have other toddler memories, such as what the kitchen in our first house in Manteno, Illinois, looked like. Yellow and floral.
We spent many summers in Bloomington, Indiana, while my dad worked on his PhD at Indiana University. He finished the work but his committee denied him of the degree.
To this day I have dreams that involve the house on Main Street in Ada, Ohio, where I grew up. I’d love to get back inside that house for a look. I remember listening to Winnie-the-Pooh and Peter and the Wolf records in the living room on our big, console stereo. It was a big deal when I got to operate it myself. We moved to a different house when I was eight.
Ages 11–20
Our new house was a block inside city limits. Most of the time I’d walk or bike to school, but if I wanted to ride the schoolbus, I walked over to Grandview Boulevard.
I spent countless hours in the city swimming pool. I spent countless hours playing Kick the Can with the neighborhood kids. I crashed my friend’s brand new bike that I rode around while she was inside eating supper. There was a horse at the end of the block, where the town suddenly turned into the country. There was a woods at the end of the block that seemed very big at the time. In it there was a treehouse.
We moved to Wisconsin two days before I turned fifteen. During the first year, my sophomore year in high school, it was novel and fun and not completely awful because it was to the small city where my grandparents lived and I already had a couple of friends. Then in my junior year, I grew to resent having been plucked from where I had grown up. I became a troubled teen. I stayed out all night one time without communicating with my parents. I broke up with my boyfriend which upset my parents who liked him a lot. Their reaction was very formative. I considered dropping out of high school.
I worked as a professional radio deejay.
I graduated high school. I started college. I dropped out of college.
I moved out of the house. I moved into the house.
I went back to college. I dropped out of college.
I moved out of the house. I moved into the house. I still have nightmares that for one reason or the other, I have been forced to move back in with my parents at my current age with my youth issues, such as no boys in my bedroom.
Ages 21–30
I started technical college. I transferred technical colleges. I dropped out of technical college.
I moved out of the house. I went back to college. I dropped out of college. Rinse and repeat.
I moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota, to go back to college. I finished college! My mom proudly told a friend that I was graduating at age twenty-six. Her friend asked what my PhD was in. Sadly, it was just my bachelor’s degree, in English, after eight years.
I went to Europe for the first time on a trip with my parents that was a graduation present.
I worked for a year at a job that was pretty dead-end but which got me lots of promotional copies of albums on cassette. I decided to go to graduate school.
I moved to Madison, Wisconsin, to go to the University of Wisconsin for meteorology. I learned that a boy who had been one of my best friends growing up and who also went to Wisconsin for meteorology was, in fact, gay and that we’d never have that chance to get together that I had been denied when my parents ripped me away at age fifteen.
I flunked out of graduate school when I failed calculus for the second time. I began to get serious about bowling.
I went to the local technical college, Madison Area Technical College, and met Chris Gargan. I graduated with my commercial art degree and have been a graphic designer ever since.
Ages 31–40
I moved back to Minneapolis. I worked through a temp agency and met my two best friends, Jim and California Rob. I became employed at my current position which I’ve held for over sixteen years. Oh my goodness, I began to grow up!
I became a published author, though not in the way I imagined as a kid. But my name now appears in the Library of Congress, so that’s something.
I went to the United Kingdom for the first time and fell in love with it. I realized that London is my soulmate. I will live there someday.
I got more serious about my bowling.
Age 41–present
Along with other spending, all of my trips to England contributed to my declaring personal bankruptcy. I learned that it’s not actually that difficult, in the big scheme of things, to live without credit. Except for being deprived of more trips to England.
I kept getting more serious about my bowling. People think I’m joking when I say I take three balls with my to league. The people who are really serious take six or eight.
California Rob moved to California. Jim got married. Possibly in the opposite order. I began my descent into curmudgeonhood.
Oddly, still in my bankruptcy, I was able to procure a mortgage and buy my first home, a condominiumized apartment. Gotta start somewhere. The housing market tanked. I am stuck unless I want to take a significant loss in my selling price.
I began to develop my love of craft beer. I hate saying “craft beer” because it’s such a buzz-term right how. But if more people like it, more will be made and that’s not a bad thing. My gateway beers were Bell’s Oberon and the local Summit Extra Pale Ale.
I have slowly and surely been gaining weight.
Last night, I picked up a twelve-pack of Summit’s Silver Anniversary Ale. Then I went to the preseason meeting for my Monday bowling league. Then I stopped at a bar that had a firkin of a special, grapefruit-infused version of Odell Brewing St. Lupulin Extra Pale Ale, a current favorite of mine. I was chit-chatting with the young patrons on either side of me about beers in general and India Pale Ales (my preferred variety) in particular. My bartender asked me—almost accusingly, as though I were a spy for a distributor—who I worked for. When I said a small graphic design company, he blinked and said, “You know a lot about beer.”
That made me feel really good.
Tonight, I enjoyed some of that Summit Silver Anniversary Ale.
The day in fanboy: pilgrimage to Bell???s Brewery
August 11, 2011
You’re going to have to live with a few goofy pictures of me. BECAUSE I WENT TO BELL’S!!! When I think back on it, my enlightenment via Oberon might have been my entry into my current beer obsession.
Unfortunately, my sojourn to Michigan was due to my visiting my cousin in the hospital. I knew I-94 would be taking me right past the mothership, but because of the timing regardless of the direction, it wouldn’t work out for me to experience much enjoyment. I’d have either 100 or 550 miles still to drive after having been there. The impetus of the trip was not pleasure so I didn’t feel like I could take an extra night to pause in Kalamazoo.
But I couldn’t not at least drive past the place. So on my way back to Minneapolis from Ann Arbor, I made it work as best I could. I had consulted the Bell’s website and thought I had learned that about all I’d be able to do would be to drive up to the place, take my picture, and drive off.
The brewery (the existing brewery in Kalamazoo, versus the new facility under construction just out of town in Galesburg) is conveniently located right on Business 94, minimizing the effort required to find it. It’s a very unassuming group of small buildings and, in fact, I almost drove right by.
I was delighted to discover that the General Store was open. I dutifully dropped a couple bucks on Oberon and Two Hearted t-shirts, as well as this bottle of Wedding Ale which is only available at the brewery.
I was excited when the guy in the store told me that the Eccentric Café, the brewery’s bar, opened at 11:00 rather than noon as I had been under the impression. That meant I only had twenty minutes to wait. As I had eaten breakfast at 7:00, I was ready for lunch.
In the meantime, I walked back to the brewery and saw a load of fresh barrels waiting to go somewhere. Kalamazoo seems to be pretty old and railroady; I wish I could have taken time to drive around and explore a little. I bet there’s a lot of neat architecture. Bell’s is situated where three tracks intersect.
At long last, the twenty minutes had passed and Carly opened the door to the café. She probably rolled her eyes behind my back when she saw me sitting on the steps, having slipped the Oberon t-shirt on over my other shirt. Oh well. It’s people like me who make her establishment a destination.
When I saw the beer board, I was supremely sad that I couldn’t partake. In addition to all the varieties that have made it to Minnesota, there were a bunch of others that are only available on draught at the brewery, the ones with the yellow tags by their names. I couldn’t stand it. Carly gave me a taste of the Le Batteur farmhouse ale. IT WAS SO GOOD!
I made do with my turkey croissant sandwich. Before I left, I discovered the gallery of Bell’s- and beer-related license plates in the restroom hallway. Ha! Then I realized that I hadn’t thought to look for a Hopslam t-shirt and promptly forgot about it because I walked around and looked at the rest of the space.
Up in the balcony, there was a variety of custom wrought iron work, including the wonderful Oberon sun. Out the back door, there was a garden for hanging out and enjoying a lovely Midwestern summer’s evening.
Then I realized that there were several installations of hop vines. HOP VINES! Squeeeeee! Hops! Alas, none of them had developed flowers yet, but oh well. Now I know what I’d be in for as I consider planting some decoratively at home.
It was a ninety-minute stop during a 650-mile drive that ultimately took me sixteen hours to complete (I make a lot of pit stops). But hey, that was better than the seventeen that it took me to get to Ann Arbor. I knew I’d have regrets if I hadn’t spent the time that I did.
The next beer pilgrimage will be to Odell in Fort Collns, Colorado, next summer.
Stepping
July 13, 2011
Everybody has a favorite place in their home, right? Whether you rent or own, house or apartment, there’s some place where you like to spend time. An obvious answer for me would be in my bed. I love sleeping. I love fading in and out on a weekend morning. But when I’m asleep, I’m not awake actually enjoying it. For the awake experience, I choose my front steps.
As you can see, beer once again is usually involved. That’s because a couple of years ago, two things came into play. First, I had been working out regularly since March and it was then summer and warm. After working out after work, I would then walk or bike home. Second, at some point I accidentally discovered that Sorella Wine & Spirits was a not inconvenient one block detour on that walk or bike home. I’d pop over for some tasty supplies for what I started calling Home Happy Hour. Because it was summer, I’d enjoy sitting on my front steps when the air was still warm from the day, but the sun had sunk behind the god-awful ugly high-rises and wasn’t directly cooking me. It became a favorite thing to do.
Last summer, I bought two cheap, low lawn chairs—I guess they’re known as “beach chairs”—and that transformed the experience for the better. The steps were good, but now I had a more comfortable seat with a chairback and which was low to the ground to facilitate stretching my legs out. Heaven. Then I discovered that the chair tucks nicely into my front door alcove and combines with the protection of the second level deck overhead to make for a wonderful storm-enjoying setup. It’s usually after dark when I sit outside for that, with or without tasty beverage.
It’s not always Home Happy Hour when I sit on the steps, but most of the time it is (oh, and a couple of gratuitous rabbits from the yard). What’s your favorite place at home?
I interrupt my intended topic for this evening (which was to have been a report on my recent side-by-side comparison of my four favorite India Pale Ales) for a different, though still beer-related, narrative—the in-depth explanation of today’s freaky (in a good way) events which came to light due to the purchasing by two involved parties of Odell Brewing’s new special edition Woodcut No. 5 Belgian-Style Quad Ale.
The story begins innocently enough. I realized that I could follow my favorite businesses on social media to get inside scoops. I followed one of my local booze huts, Zipp’s Liquors, on Twitter. At some point, I must have gotten an @ reply to a comment or question about whether they carried something. My beer friendship with Tyler was born, because he’s very responsive with the tweets.
My California friends (you know, Rob and his circle; Rob, who used to go to Saint Sabrina’s to get pierced with Lauren; Lauren who instigated my actual getting of my rabbit tattoo) turned me on to Instagram. This is the part I really don’t remember—who betweeen Tyler and me found the other on Instagram, but we did.
Instagram plays faster and looser with your associations, because you see what your contacts have liked, and then it’s real easy for you to get carried away and start liking some of the same photos, and the next thing you know you’re following people you’ve never heard of. That’s how I connected with Jason. I began to notice that Tyler frequently liked Jason’s photos and that they usually involved beer. As you know, I love beer. So I began liking Jason’s beer photos and the next thing you know, Jason and I were following each other. And Tyler followed Rob, so I guess we’re even!
Then I got bold and followed Jason on Twitter, keeping my remarks by and large beer-related (though he is a creative like me, and I wish I had the time to start the morning with sketching). Today it transpired that Jason asked Odell Brewing when the Woodcut No. 5 was coming to Minnesota. Odell Todd replied that it should be here, then Tyler said he got it in at Zipp’s today. I said I’d be over after work. Jason said he’d be by after work. I was hoping we’d end up there at the same time so that we could introduce ourselves. No such luck.
I got home with my Woodcut and snapped the requisite self-portrait for proudly posting online—artfully posed in front of my wall of woodcut art that I’ve made myself, but not gotten all framed—though I never got around to uploading it to Facebook because I got distracted by being outside for an hour and a half yardening. At exactly the same time that I tweeted my photo, Jason tweeted that he had arrived home to find that his awesome wife Lisa had a Woodcut waiting for him. I was overcome with excitement for both myself and him, so I tweeted kudos directly to Lisa, who at that point was not a Twitter contact with me in either direction.
That’s when the Beerlight Zone revved up.
Lisa immediately followed me which tickled me because Jason hasn’t yet, which I thought he might by now but which doesn’t bother me that he doesn’t, because I can be stingy about accepting new contacts myself and I totally get it. Nevetheless, it pleased me to reciprocate with Lisa. And then the darnedest thing happened.
When you follow someone new, Twitter helpfully suggests a couple other people who it thinks you might like. Well, damned if one of those people wasn’t Katherine, my former co-worker! I freaked out, in a good way. Katherine left us to move to San Francisco, but we still adore her, and she’s still doing some work for us long-distance.
I immediately got the feeling that I had met Jason and Lisa at a happy hour last summer, in particular, the one that happened after we had an office outing to a Twins game and stopped off afterwards, and Katherine, Karl, and two couples friends of theirs had joined in. But you know what? Anticlimax. In re-envisioning the events just now, I realize that it wasn’t Katherine’s friends but my other co-worker Colleen’s friends and it had nothing to do with a Twins game.
But the freakiness stands. Me -> Tyler -> Jason -> we love beer & Odell -> Lisa -> Katherine -> me.
My parents don’t quite comprehend why I love what they see as impersonally interacting with my online peeps as much as I do. Other people who have rich in-person circles (not all of them, but some of them) don’t quite understand how 92/8 online/IRL (that’s just an estimate) can be just fine by me. Tonight’s occurrence shows part of the reason why. Well, at least it does to me.
Incidentally, I did not pop the cork on my Woodcut No. 5 tonight because it was not chilled when I bought it and also because, after yardening in 85F/30C temperatures, the nice, light Southern Tier Hop Sun was just what the doctor ordered. I’ll probably have the Woodcut on a Saturday night when I can make a nice meal to go with it (though not tomorrow because I’m making a curry and I don’t think it would pair well with that, and not next Saturday because I’ll be at the Twins game). Jason said it’s good. It’s Odell, so I assume that much on faith!
The day in yard project: Garden pathway
May 30, 2011
So for five years I’ve had these round pavers, languishing in stacks in front of my place, waiting for the whim to overtake me to make them into a path. My new upstairs neighbor bugged me all last summer to do it and I coyly demured. The last thing I want is to be told when to do something, or for it to seem like I’m doing something because somebody suggested it. Today, I finally got in the mood naturally and, thankfully, without any helpers.
Our section of yard was the only one without some sort of little path. Five summers ago I lugged home nine round stones from Home Depot. I wasn’t ready to actually labor that day so I set them aside and there they stayed. I originally measured taking into account having space in between each one. Soon after I decided I didn’t want space between them. I never went back to buy the two or three extra stones. But in the intervening years, I’ve found two flat, square pieces of concrete or something that will do.
Yesterday, the bug nudged its way into my pants and I laid the stones out. At work I’m doing a book about gardening and one of the tips for making pathways is to lay the stones down and let them kill whatever’s underneath so you’ll know how much space to clear. I put them down, pretty sure that I was just going to dig everything up. I don’t want grass in between.
Today, I grabbed the hoe and went to it. I was quite pleased indeed that it didn’t take long at all to dig up the grass, less than an hour. However, a little while later, my thumbs of all things got tired from the impact of all the hoeing. Even now, they’re feeling pretty weak. Nevertheless, the speed with which I cleared the grass kept me enthusiastic about the project.
I had a supervisor (Dasie).
After I started embedding the stones in the dirt and it became apparent that the rest of the job would not go as quickly, I broke out the beer.
After about three hours, the stones were fairly snugly set with dirt repacked around them. The trouble with the project that you can’t see is that the stones kind of rise and fall due to unhackable large roots of the maple tree in the yard. There were two. I straddled one, but a stone had to sit on the other one to maintain the spacing. Oh well.
Then I decide that another phase of the project needed to be moving the little rock border forward. So I did that. Then I decided, after four hours, that I was done for the day. Or rather, my body decided for me. I think I’ll get some impatiens to put in the newly-vacated space.
I had planned to wait to grill until tomorrow, but it suddenly seemed like a good idea. I had package of pork country style ribs thawed and ready to go.
It was a good decision. It was a delicious meal with which to reward all my hard work. I was, however, a little concerned that I wouldn’t be able to move again once I sat down.
I took some ibuprofen eventually and that really helped. But then I got the best comfort (CJ)!
Liquid love: now a 3-way
May 25, 2011
Over the course of various posts, you have learned how much how much I love Bell’s Oberon beer. I’ve extolled its virtues and touted it as a favorite sign of spring. Well, as of a year ago, Oberon has had to share the spotlight. It’s like Cate Blanchett’s character in the movie “Bandits” said—”What if I don’t want to choose? What if, together, you make the perfect man?” Well, Oberon and, now, Odell Brewing’s St. Lupulin extra pale ale make it impossible for me to choose my favorite spring seasonal and both have me anxiously awaiting spring.
I was first introduced to St. Lupulin a year ago during an enjoyable outing to a Minnesota Twins game with a good friend. We stopped at another of my favorites, Pizza Lucé (downtown), for solid and liquid refreshments before the game. Pizza Lucé has a decent beer list and they have a couple of spots that they rotate with seasonals and limited/special editions. I chose the Odell St. Lupulin because theretofore I had never had an EPA other than Summit’s completely delicious one.
Well, one sip in and I was in love.
I learned that Odell was new in town a year ago, and as new varieties appeared in various places, I made sure I tried every one of them. And as with the other five of my favorite breweries*, I have yet to meet one I didn’t like even if, generally, I don’t like that variety. I love all Odell beers, it seems.
As such, I’ve made it a point to follow their happenings around town. And in doing so, I’ve been getting to know the people associated with bringing this fine product to me, including Doug Odell himself.
Okay, so it was more a brush with fame with Mr. Odell than “getting to know.” In the last couple of years, I have made it my mission to get a photo of myself with the owners of each of my favorite breweries. Thus far, I have four and a half out of six. I am missing Sierra Nevada, and for Surly, I have Mr. Ansari, Omar’s dad. Guilt by association.
A week or two prior to my meeting Mr. Odell, I had attended the release party for another of their seasonals, Red Ale. Coincidentally and very happily, that event was held at the very same Pizza Lucé.
That was the same evening that I got to meet a local online friend, Holly, in person for the first time. Holly is an online acquaintance of my friend Rob’s friend Sara. Rob is my best friend from here who moved to California. Sara is one of his best friends there. Keeping up?
Holly took off and I stayed for one more. As the Odell people were winding things up, I introduced myself to two fellows, Hanszee from Odell’s distributor Capitol Beverage, and Todd the local Odell rep. It was the end of the evening and maybe they were looking to get rid of the rest of their stuff, or maybe they just appreciated my enthusiasm for their product. Hanszee gave me an Odell bottle opener key ring and a Red Ale t-shirt.
That was the start of my beer t-shirt collection.
A couple of weeks later I was excited because Doug Odell was coming to town and his meet-and-greet was being held at another of my favorite establishments, Brit’s Pub. I dorkily showed up in my Red Ale t-shirt, and it was about an hour before anybody came over to talk to me. Happily, it was Hanszee, and I explained to him my desire to get a photo with Mr. Odell, but that I was having a shy attack. Hanzee took charge and marched me over to Mr. Odell and my mission was accomplished.
There was no contact between me and the Odells for months after that. But then, spring drew nearer and I had a concrete date for the release of St. Lupulin. In quite the anticlimax, it turned out to be a week later than I had been led to believe but when it happened, the release party was thankfully at an establishment downtown and I was able to attend, barely. My parents were arriving for a visit at about the same time. I ignored that fact to go get a taste of springtime nectar.
Hanszee and Todd were there, as well as some other Odell associate who physically resembles Todd, and oddly, Nate the local Stone Brewing guy. Huh?
I was recognized and greeted, and though I would have loved to stay for two or three, I had to get going. On my way out, Hanszee offered me my snazzy St. Lupulin t-shirt. I was very excited!
A few days later one of my local stores, Zipp’s Liquors, had an Odell tasting. Turns out, Todd was there to pour. Then the following week, after a Zipp’s-sponsored major beer tasting, I got to hang out with Todd for a while, as well as a few other beer suspects including Hanszee and Tyler from Zipp’s, during a Double-Double mini-event. Double #1: Myrcenary double IPA. Double #2: Double Pils. A month earlier I had tried Myrcenary for the first time. Instant favorite!
One of the things about Odell Brewing is that the label artwork and hand-lettering is just beautiful. Such are the Myrcenary label and the St. Lupulin. I happened to notice that Todd had given a Myrcenary t-shirt to another patron. It didn’t take long before I was in possession of one myself. Heh.
So suddenly, I have five beer t-shirts, three of which are Odell**. Wokka! It’s a little bit silly how thrilled I am to have them, unless you consider how much I love what they promote!
*Bell’s, Lagunitas, Sierra Nevada, Summit, Surly (alphabetical order, because I couldn’t be expected to actually rate them)
**The other two are Surly, which I bought after a brewery tour, and Great Lakes Brewing, which was given to me at the above-mentioned Zipp’s tasting. I like the Great Lakes Commodore Perry IPA.
Odell brews I have brought home.
Odell brews I have tasted.
Salad: a love affair
May 9, 2011
I didn’t always love beer, and I didn’t always love salad. But now I love both. My love of beer developed gradually and I couldn’t really say when. However, I think I can’t pinpoint my first salad-loving incident to Vancouver, British Columbia, in November 2004.
My parents and I were about to embark on a group holiday tour across western Canada aboard the Rocky Mountaineer train. Sort of like the Orient Express—every bit as romantic (because when isn’t overnight train travel not romantic, even if you’re only with your parents) but quite a bit less famous.
The evening before we were to begin riding the rails, the group dined out at Canada Place on the Vancouver waterfront (pictured below). It was a fine dinner and I ate mine up. It was also the first time I can remember truly enjoying eating a salad. Maybe it’s because it was (perhaps) the first one I had that consisted of darkly colored “greens” rather than pale wedges of iceberg.
At any rate, I ate mine up, and dinner, and then noticed that a couple of my dinner neighbors had left theirs untouched. So I asked if they’d mind passing them over because it would be too bad if they went to waste. They were quite happy to. And I was in my first salad rapture.
Now that I think about it, it was roughly (give or take a couple of years) around the time of my beer awakening as well. I hadn’t gone hoppy yet but I had gone dark, and regularly enjoyed Newcastle with my buddies Jim and Rob whilst we shot pool at City Billiards and they flirted with Liz, our frequent server. At the first dinner for the tour group in Winnipeg, Manitoba, we ate a place with (as I recall) “grape” in the name and Fort Garry Dark Ale on the menu. At the time it sent me into my first beer rapture.
Now I realize I’m merging Canada group tours. The Winnipeg stop was prior to boarding the train up to Churchill to commune with polar bears. Salad in Vancouver was prior to the train heading back east across the Canadian Rockies.
But the point I was going to make was, I had discovered my enjoyment of getting tipsy by the time we were dining in Vancouver, and I know I was at least mediumly tipsy that night. The salad was really delicious and, due to my tipsiness, I was emboldening to beg more off my dining neighbors.
As with the beer, I don’t know when the absolute love took over. But I do know that it has and that if you give me a choice between a large salad and most other things, I will choose the salad. If it were between salad and pizza, I’d have a tough decision, but my current favorite meal is a rare steak and a giant salad. Nothing else (except the adult beverage), just the steak and the salad.
This past week I’ve been enjoying particularly delicious salads. My grocery store changed the way they make their deli roasted chickens for the better (saltier). One of the best ways to do the salad is to get the chicken for dinner one night, then use the leftovers for really tasty big salads that are a meal in themselves from then on. Finished with olive oil and either balsamic or raspberry vinegar, and you’ve got a winner.
Salad, salad, salad!
May 4, 2011
I believe in IPA
May 3, 2011
Of all the beer out there, India Pale Ale is my favorite variety. That said, I could really just stop writing now. At the very least, you could stop reading now, because this will be one of those miscellaneous, rambling entries.
Several months ago, I came across the iPhone app Untappd. I was (relatively) thrilled to find a check-in service that is actually relevant to me. I’m not a complete loser—I have accounts on Gowalla and FourSquare. Is that how FourSquare spells it? Capital F, Capital S, no space? I don’t even know. That’s how much it means to me. But I don’t really have friends in town who I do things with often enough to embrace what those apps are all about. And of those few friends, even fewer use Gowalla or FourSquare. So they basically mean nothing to me. But I’ll still check in on Gowalla, because you find and trade virtual items, and to keep myself interested (because, even though I don’t have a lot of friends, I’m still hip to the intertubes and want to be able to say that I do these things) I’ve made it my goal to find ones that are numbered under 10,000.
But I digress.
I like Untapped because I like beer, and it’s a beer check-in app. Just like any other check-in app, you have your circle of friends and you can earn badges for particular accomplishments, though on Untappd some of them are not ones you’d necessarily want to aspire to perhaps, such as the “Drinking Your Paycheck” badge. Though it has social elements, it’s main focus is not and that works for me.
So back to IPAs. I didn’t used to love them so much, or at all, but in the last four or five years (I might even be able to pinpoint it to when I drank Lagunitas IPA in the Red Jack Saloon in San Francisco Thanksgiving weekend 2007) I’ve jumped on the hopwagon with gusto. For example, my ex-beer guru (sorry, Chris, I think you’ve been superseded by Tyler, who has the advantage of being the beer-loving manager of my neighborhood liquor store) has loved Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale since I’ve known him. I remember tasting it, say, ten years ago and giving it a firm “ewwwwwww.” Now? It’s my very favorite beer.
What happened? Based on anecdotal evidence, I can pinpoint that, too. I turned forty. And then some. And how did I learn this anecdotal evidence? From Larry Bell, brewer of Bell’s Two Hearted Ale, the extra hoppy IPA that we Minnesotans are his best market for. In conversation the evening I had the opportunity to meet him, he let loose the information that (apparently) hops—the driving force behind IPAs—contain some amount of estrogen. Ergo the transitive property, I, a woman over forty, love IPA because it is a form of estrogen replacement therapy. I know I’m overblowing this, but work with me.
So back to Untappd. They struck a deal with Hoptopia, the ultimate lover of IPAs, to have a monthly IPA badge if you drink three of the beers on the latest list during the current month.
The first month, January, it was easy for me to earn the level 1 badge. I drank the aforementioned Bell’s Two Hearted, Sierra Nevada Torpedo, and New Belgium Ranger IPA, all known favorites and readily available in this market. Then, it kind of didn’t make it back into my radar until yesterday, when the new list was published. My, how far we’ve come since that first month, when there were only five IPAs on the list. This month there are, oh I don’t know, a billion.
I could have taken the easy way out and repurchased ones I know I like because I‘ve already had them—Boulevard Single Wide, Great Lakes Commodore Perry, Lagunitas, Odell, Southern Tier, Surly Furious.
But when visiting Tyler’s store after work tonight, I chose to embrace the spirit of the badge and purchased the four pictured above that are unknown to me. I don’t know if the Avery Maharaja counts as the Avery IPA, but the other three will count. With beer, as with food, I endeavor to expand my horizons.
Tonight I consumed the Rogue Brutal (I could take it or leave it) and the Alaskan IPA (very tasty indeed). And that’s as good a conclusion as I have.
Kelly’s Unnecessary Blog 