Grumpy Beer Geek

From Hail The Ale:

Beer and cooking are two of my favorite things (I also like long walks on the beach and don’t like mean people). My cooking has been nonexistent lately but The Ultimate Beer Lover’s Cookbook by John Schlimm may fix that. I haven’t had a chance to pick this up, but I do have some info from the author himself:

More than ten years in the making, The Ultimate Beer Lover’s Cookbook is an unprecedented collection of more than 400 food and drink recipes containing beer as a main ingredient. From scrambled eggs made with beer at breakfast and a cheese steak sandwich with onion rings or a beer burger and Chocolate Beershake for lunch, to a surf ‘n’ turf beer-infused combo of lobster and steak for dinner (and a midnight snack of chocolate-dipped strawberries), beer lovers can feast on brewskis at any time of the day. Every genre of food is included: appetizers, breads, soups and chili, salads, fruits and vegetables, sandwiches, sauces, marinades, beef, poultry, pork, wild game, stews, fish and seafood, past, and desserts.

With an introduction chronicling beer’s history, as well as hilarious beer quotes by the world’s most illustrious beer fans peppered amidst the recipes, The Ultimate Beer Lover’s Cookbook is a rousing tribute to a tasty icon more than 7,000 years in the making

Dave at Tailgating Ideas obtained a review copy and was kind enough to share his review. There’s another review at urbandaddy.

Have you read this? If so, what did you think?

Looks like a great book.  But personally I’m waiting for the Homebrew Chef to release a book.

Syndicated from Brookston Beer Bulletin

The following action alert has been issued by the California Small Brewers Association through the Support Your Local Brewery consumer beer activist network, in the hopes of generating grassroots support from beer lovers in California. Please help if you can.

Dear Beer Activist,

The craft brewers of California need your help!

A bill sponsored by Anheuser-Busch, AB 1245 (Torrico) is being heard in committee this Tuesday, June 24th. This bill would significantly expand the limits on what a brewer can give away to a retailer. Currently, a brewer can only give away small items of minimal value to a retailer or consumer. The law in place now helps create an equal playing field for both small and large breweries. This law has helped the craft brewing industry flourish in California.

Anheuser-Busch wants to increase the limit 1,600% so they can use give-ways as an inducement to gain placements at stores, bars and restaurants. Craft brewers – because we are small, independent businesses which brew with passion and typically do not have large marketing budgets – cannot afford to compete with the big brewers on this level. Passing this bill will allow large corporate brewers to “buy” placements at craft beers expense.

You may thinking to yourself, but don’t I want breweries to give me free stuff? That’s a reasonable initial reaction, but think about it this way. Most of the craft breweries that make the beer you love can’t afford to give away anything and that hasn’t stopped you from buying their beer. You prefer their beer because it tastes good. You didn’t need a free keychain or some other bauble to convince you that their beer is good. So it begs the question, what sort of beer company does need to give away free crap, in effect buying market share instead of earning it? It’s probably the sort of beer that you don’t want to drink in the first place. But by allowing this bill to pass, those beer companies will be able to buy more and more customer loyalty, and that will be mean less and less good beer for you and your friends. So while it may seem counter-intuitive to tell your Senator not to allow you to potentially receive more free stuff, it’s that fact which will make your message that much more powerful. Tell your elected representative that you’d rather support and buy beer from small, local craft beer companies that make the beer you love, than be given free crap by companies whose products are in many cases not made locally and do not support California’s economy or small business community.

The action alert continues:

The craft brewers of California will be at a distinct disadvantage if this bill passes, therefore limiting the choice and availability of craft beers in the marketplace.

There are five Senators who have indicated they haven’t made up their minds and could end up voting against our local breweries. They are:

• Senator Wiggins (Mendocino, Humboldt parts of Sonoma County)
• Senator Harman (Huntington Beach area)
• Senator Denham (Central valley Modesto area)
• Senator Yee (parts of San Francisco County)
• Senator Wyland (parts of San Diego County)

If you are in one of these areas, we need your help. Please read on. If you are not sure who your Senator is, you can easily and quickly find out here.

If you are in the district of one of the five Senators above, please write a letter to fax or email; or call your Senators office no later than Monday, June 23rd.

Let your Senator know that you are opposed to AB 1245 and that this bill is anti-small business and against the best interests of the craft brewers in California.

• Senator Wiggins phone 916.651.4002 / fax 916.323.6958 / e-mail
• Senator Harman phone 916.651.4035 / fax 916.445.9263 / email
• Senator Denhamphone 916.651.4012 / fax 916.445.0773 / email
• Senator Yee phone 916.651.4008 / fax 916.327.2186 / email
• Senator Wyland phone 916.651.4038 / fax 916.446.7382 / email

Thanks for supporting your local brewery!

The California Small Brewers Association

Send questions to Tom McCormick.

YouTube – Front Fell Off

This damn thing has sat dormant for too long. Time to get this moving again.

I’m working on redesigning and getting some new stuff added. But after all, this is my personal blog — it’s going to be disorganized just like I am.

I’ll leave you with this thought — a new term for movies that is analogous to “Jumping the Shark” for TV — “Nuking the Fridge”. (Hat tip to Jeff L. for that one) If you haven’t seen the new Raiders of the Lost Ark movie that may not make sense.

Cheers!

Very sorry to hear of the passing of perhaps the greatest beer writer in history, Michael Jackson. Mr. Jackson, better known as The Beer Hunter passed away last night in his home in London. I was lucky enough to meet Mr. Jackson a few times while working for Real Beer. He was a good and very knowledgeable man. One of his methods of beer writing others could learn from still, never say anything bad about a beer, just don’t say anything at all. That points to how revered a mention by Mr. Jackson was by all brewers.

Some of his work is available online here: http://www.beerhunter.com

Update: His last column can be found here: http://www.allaboutbeer.com/

Some reaction around the web:

http://www.realbeer.com/blog/?p=632 (a great, quick obituary by Real Beer Editor, Stan Hieronymus)
http://www.brookstonbeerbulletin.com/michael-jackson-passes-away/
http://www.allaboutbeer.com/ (including his final published article)
http://appellationbeer.com/blog/more-than-a-moment-of-silence-for-michael-jackson/

Hop Talk has more links.

Take a look at pictures and the full recipe here.

The greatest bar in the country, hell the greatest bar in the world turns 20 years old this weekend.

Toronado 20th Anniversary Celebration
Come help us celebrate our 20th Anniversary, Saturday
August 11th at the Toronado at 5:00PM.

Some of the Beers:

1. The Toronado 20th Anniversary Beer, brewed by
Russian River Brewing Company, on draught and for sale
in cork finished 750ml bottles.
I approached Vinnie two years ago about making a
beer for the Toronado Anniversary, my guidelines were
wood aged, big, and barnyard. We toyed with the idea of
making six beers and blending them into one, but agreed
this was too time consuming as Vinnie has a lot on his
plate. I was surprised when it came to light that he had
come up with 5, 1 year old, wood aged beers to blend.
Vinnie mixed 5 different blends and we tasted them
together, all were fine beers , blend #1 was so good that
we filled 1 keg with it calling it 50-50. After removing this
quantity of beer from the over all blend ,we decided on a
new blend halfway between blend #4 and blend #5. The
result, Vinnie says, is a 10.43 percent alcohol by volume
beer that is smooth and soft with a faint sourness — a
beer that hides its alcohol well. “It drinks like a 6-percent
beer.” I say thank you Vinnie, for an outstanding beer,
beyond my expectations. Awesome! The bottles will be
available for $20 each at the Toronado and Russian River
Brewing Co only.

2. Anchor Cask Conditioned Porter
Anchor Steam was the first draught beer at the
Toronado,so I think it only fitting to have something from
them for our 20th, Fritz Maytag answered the call, with a
cask conditioned Porter, to be served on handpump.
Thanks to Mark Carpenter for crafting this special product
and to Fritz for taking the time to recognize our
anniversary.

3. Lost Abbey/Pizza Port Cable Car on draught and in
bottles.

Tomme Arthur scoured his wood casks and blended a
beer for our Anniversary, we have 1 keg and a limited
number of bottles. I have not sampled this beer yet, but
have it on the authority of John Hansel, of the Malt
Advocate, that it in his opinion it is the best beer he has
had from Lost Abbey and perhaps in the entire USA. Can’t
wait to try it.

At last count there were 13 other rare beers that brewers
have made or are releasing from their cellars for this
event. I will get a complete list together when possible,

Hope to see you there.
Big Daddy

And it’s pretty damn good. I reduced the spices by quite a bit in this batch. All the others, while on the right track, all seemed over-spiced. Some new additions this time (molasses, mace, onion, garlic) and some taken out (onion powder, vanilla, lemon juice, ginger).

You may ask yourself “what happened to batch 14?” — well it wasn’t very good. I chose to dump most of it actually.

Cincinnati Style Chili Batch 15

2.5 lbs lean ground beef (extra fine grind if possible) — 80% lean
2 14oz cans Swansen’s Beef Broth (less salt version) chilled
1 cup cold water

1 can tomato sauce – (16 oz)
1 large white onion minced fine

First spice addition (at beginning)
.5 oz bitter chocolate
1/8 tsp ground cloves
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground allspice
1 tbsp dark molasses
1 tsp ground cumin
3 tbsp chili powder (dark)
1 tsp (Morton) kosher salt
2 tbsp cider vinegar
1 tbsp worcestershire sauce
3 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
1 bay leaf
1/4 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1/4 tsp ground mustard
1/2 tsp dried oregano
1 tbsp sweet paprika
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper

Second spice addition (at end)
1 tbsp chili powder (dark)
1 tbsp dark brown sugar
2 tsp ground black pepper (to taste)
2 tsp (morton) kosher salt (to taste)
2 tbsp granulated garlic
1/16 tsp ground cloves
1/8 tsp nutmeg
1/8 tsp mace
2 tbsp active dry yeast

Gather all the spices, sauces, and etc. for the first spice addition In one container before starting — makes it easier.

If you use frozen ground beef, let sit in the COLD broth until it is matched the temp and it is no longer frozen. Failure to do this will result in lumpy chili.

Place broth over medium-low heat and add the ground beef. Stir the ground beef into the cold water. Continue to stir as the water is heated. The ground beef will nearly dissolve into the water developing into almost a paste. Once dissolved, increase heat to high.

Add the first spice addition and continue to stir until the chili comes to a strong boil. Turn down the heat to maintain a medium simmer. Let simmer for 2 hours covered.

For best results, let simmer for at least 2 hours. You can put it in a slow cooker and let go all day for better results.

When nearly done cooking, add the second spice addition, stir for 2-3 minutes to make sure that it is completely incorporated and remove from heat.

Refrigerate for 2-3 days before reheating and serving for best results.

Serve as traditionally served or as you wish. I prefer over spaghetti with shredded cheese (3-way).

PCWorld.com – Mac Skeptic: Aperture Takes Digital Photography Back to the Future – this looks so good it would almost make me switch to Mac. What am I saying? I must be going insane.

ThinkGeek :: Fundue – desktop USB Fondue Set — Just what you need to ease the tedious work day. Hot Cheese!