Sorry

Just haven't been into it.

Precision Creep

Beer brewing is an odd hobby.

Oh, don't get me wrong, brewing beer is one of the finest activities that a man can partake of.  The final product is a good thing, liquid bread and a balm for the soul.

But here in the USA, the cult of the material has taken the simple and time-honored process some pretty strange places.  I am not speaking of the cult of stainless steel and gizmo's that cause inadvertent erections in a sizable sub-population of the brewing world.  No, I am speaking instead of the quest for precision in a biological system that is passed off as "essential for good beer".

I am brewing up a batch of Imperial Stout while I am writing this screed.  I have a four-gallon pot.  I put three gallons of water in it, turned the burner onto medium low and sat down and folded clothes and did some laundry while the temp went up.  Obviously, I keep an eye peeled on the temp, and when it hit 130, I dumped in eight pounds of grain.  I upped the burner to a quarter of the way between medium low and medium and set a timer for ten minutes.  Watched the temp rise.  Kept resetting the timer until the temp hit 150 F. and then turned the burner back down to between low and medium low.  Checked the temp every ten minutes and it is now fifty minutes later and the temp is still 148 F.

Sparging is just heating some water up and using it to suck the last of the sugars out.  This can easily be done with a teapot and pouring.

Now, the beer brewing enthusiasts will sneer at a decidedly low tech operation like this.  Not enough control they will posit.  But the truth of the matter is that if you are in the range of 145 F. to 150 F. when you convert, you will make a dandy beer that you can be proud of.

Approaches and other such basic thoughts

"Mine eye, mine eye runneth down with water."

Being married to a particular outcome to me seems an odd approach.  

The one thing that everyone agrees on is that, for the most part, shit ain't working right.  That a change of plans and a change of the guard will produce the change needed for us to point in the right direction and get moving.

But what is the right direction?  Trump won by taking into account and pushing to the fore the plight of the dispossessed internal proletariat of the US.  Folks whose town, jobs and live have been slowly dying for the past thirty years.  Trump also says that he will return these jobs to our shores, that he will keep the jobs that are here from leaving.

Do we really want to go there?

I spent far too much time on a plane winging my way to Beijing in the day.  Setting up factories to receive the jobs that left Alameda and Rockville and Vancouver.   This experience left me with a firm view that the price that China pays for taking over the dirty and polluting industries of America is pretty damned high.

Beijing, from the Kerry Center, circa 2004

I would post my pictures from Xi'an or Huairou, but y'all get the idea.  

So, is the Donald proposing to bring back heavy industry? Can heavy industry survive under a rational set of environmental regulations?  If we partially gut the environmental regulations to allow for the return of heavy industry, will the proletariat that demanded the return of their jobs understand the price that needs be paid for that return?

Is Donald planning on just doing assembly work, with the highly polluting heavy industry farmed out to other countries? That seems to make us more dependent than ever on the vagaries of self-interest wielded by the hosting countries.

History Continues

Pein Forte et Dur

No, really, it isn't a dialectic.

For a long while, I was into the thesis-antithesis-synthesis model.  It was hard to do think any other way if you were raised here in the US in the latter part of the twentieth century and the first part of the twenty-first century.  Marxism was present and constantly molding the conversation to the Hegelian.  Truth be told, a lot of the teachers and profs and politicians jumped in willingly because a simple competition between two ideas allowed them a simple enough model to teach from.

But watching the world for the past fifty-some-odd years has convinced me that it is not a clean dialectic, with two competing ideas and a clean compromise/victory of one thought over the other.

But the sports ideal was then getting real traction in the US, the idea of a gentlemanly tiff with the best man winning and moving on.  Hire the best players from the other team and stay on top of the pile.  Winners keep winning.

No, the game is akin to the pastime of the sixth grade boys being schooled by Mr. Mayberry in the basement of Clearfield High School back in 1965.

Pig Pile (or smear the queer, as it was named when the teachers were out of earshot) had a very simple set of rules.  The dominant male 12-year-old would shout out the name of a mid-range social status member of the pack.  As soon as one heard his name called, that lucky individual would haul ass in the direction where the pack was the thinnest.  He would keep running like hell, because there were 15-20 other boys tearing after him to pull him down and all pile on top of him.

Now, being on the bottom of a pile of 15-20 boys is not a pleasant experience.  Personal hygiene habits at that age are, at best, suspect, and since each of the assailants weighs between 80 and 120 pounds, the "pig" usually has around seven-hundred to eight-hundred pounds weighing down on him.  Breathing becomes problematic (pein forte and dur).

After a bit, depending on the perceived manliness and ability to "Take It" had been established, the pile would unwind and everyone takes a bit of a rest.  Remember, being the person pulling down the prey is at the bottom of the pile as well, his reward for a job well done is quite similar to the reward offered the pig.

After an appropriate rest, the pig would then become the person singing out the name of his successor (Caller of Names).  Now there was some subtlety to this portion of the "game".  It was usually not done to sing out the name of the previous caller of names.  There is usually a brief inventory of slights and calumnies received, then an individual is selected, a name called out, and the whole process is repeated.

One could probably write a Masters thesis on the interactions leading up to the initiation of the game.  If one thinks that boys of this age are oblivious to social slights, wealth dynamics, and dominance rituals, one would do well to think again.

Back to the original thesis, the nature of history.  The multivariate, complex nature of "Pig-Pile" is a much better model for the study of history than the simplistic Hegelian model.  I come to this conclusion despite numerous attempts to get the dialectic to describe the real world without suffering near-fatal suspension of disbelief.

No, climate change and peak oil, Marxist dialectic and efficient market theories, trade routes and the rise and fall of trading countries, radical Islam and Crusaders all are a part of the fabric of the Norns.

Best that a man can hope to do is to have a reasonably balanced "rough-guess" available and then hope for the best. 

 

Not Quite a Resolution

I am not going to buy any groceries until I go through the pantry and clear it out.

I would posit that demi-preppers such as myself tend toward this issue.  But the best of good intentions get out of hand and one is stuck with a stuffed cupboard of whatever. 

So, since it is winter, there will be soups made.  Easy to make and can hide a bunch of different odd ingredients.  And will still be quite tasty.

Got some ham, putting beans on to soak.  I'll go from there.

Happy New Beer

I am the proud owner of a minimalist brewing system.

I have a sixteen liter pot, a twelve liter carboy, a bag to hold the grain, two muslin bags for the hops, and a five foot section of tubing.  I have a balance and a hygrometer and a thermometer.

I use grains.  I have around 24 flippy-style bottles.  That's it.

 HOME BREW RECIPE:
Title: New Years Brown
Author: Degringolade

Brew Method: All Grain
Style Name: English Porter
Boil Time: 60 min
Batch Size: 2 gallons (fermentor volume)
Boil Size: 3 gallons
Boil Gravity: 1.037
Efficiency: 55% (brew house)


STATS:
Original Gravity: 1.055
Final Gravity: 1.012
ABV (standard): 5.55%
IBU (tinseth): 38.03
SRM (morey): 24.19

FERMENTABLES:
4.5 lb - American - Pale 2-Row (81.8%)
0.25 lb - United Kingdom - Brown (4.5%)
0.25 lb - United Kingdom - Pale Chocolate (4.5%)
0.5 lb - American - Caramel / Crystal 80L (9.1%)

HOPS:
6 g - Summit, Type: Leaf/Whole, AA: 16.8, Use: Boil for 60 min, IBU: 34.67
7 g - Fuggles, Type: Pellet, AA: 3.5, Use: Aroma for 10 min, IBU: 3.36

MASH GUIDELINES:
1) Infusion, Temp: 150 F, Time: 60 min, Amount: 12 qt, Single Step
Starting Mash Thickness: 1.5 qt/lb

YEAST:
Fermentis / Safale - English Ale Yeast S-04
Starter: No
Form: Dry
Attenuation (avg): 75%
Flocculation: High
Optimum Temp: 54 - 77 F
Fermentation Temp: 70 F
Pitch Rate: 1.25 (M cells / ml / deg P)

TARGET WATER PROFILE:
Profile Name: Milwaukie A&C Blend
Ca2: 15
Mg2: 13
Na: 8
Cl: 4
SO4: 6
HCO3: 0
Water Notes:
Average of Entry Points A and C, Milwaukie City Water
NOTES:
This is the simplest possible all grain system.

Take a four gallon stockpot, dump in three gallons of water, put it on an electric burner and turn the temp to medium (50%)

When the water temp hits 100 F, dump in the grain.  Stir well and continue to stir well every ten minutes until the temp hits 150 F.

Turn the burner down to between low and simmer (20%?) let it sit for an hour.  Strir every 15 minutes and play with the temp so that it doesn't go above 155 F.

After an hour, pull out the bag o'mash and squeeze out what you can and add the squeezin's to the big pot.

Bring to a boil, then drop the temp controller to between low and medium.  Toss in the first muslin bag of bittering hops.  Check every fifteen minutes, then at 45 minutes of boil, toss in the aroma hops.

At the end of the hour boil, pull the hop bags and put the top back on, let it cool naturally for about 1.5 to two NFL football games (I am cooling it during SF vs Seattle and GB vs Detroit)
Toss the yeast in the fermenter and then siphon the cooled wort into the fermenter.  Take a post boil sample at this time.

When the wort is cooled to around 80F, toss the yeast into the carboy and then siphon the wort into the carboy, swirl away.

Cover the outside of the carboy with an old t-shirt and let it rip.