Dandelion Wine

“Just the yellow stuff. No green.”

That’s what the dude was emphatic about, and I could see his point. I took notes on his process, because this stuff was tasty. Yes, one day I would have a yard full of the weeds, and I would do something good with them. Dandelion wine.

Well, one day has arrived, and after a long, cold winter, I’ve got hops in the ground and a green lawn with yellow polka dots. It’s time to get that flowery concoction started.

Basically, his instructions were four cups of dandelion heads and zest of one orange per gallon. Steep overnight before adding sugar and yeast, blah, blah.

The hard part is getting four cups per gallon. I think. Now I’m not sure. Did he mean pick four cups’ worth of heads, then dig out the yellow, or did he mean four cups of yellow stuff? With a sunburn and stained but fragrant fingers, I made an executive decision that what I had was the right amount. I took it to mean four cups of the yellow loveliness. The problem was that they just kept weighting themselves down in the bowl. I was stuck at two cups for 45 minutes. Was that a fluffy or packed four cups per gallon?

Originally, I was going to do five gallons. Half straight-up, and half with an additional pound or two of honey, and a blast of saffron.

Speaking of saffron, I can see why it’s so expensive, after my day with dandelions.

In any case, I settled in on two and a half gallons. It’s steeping now. Tonight, I’ll add five pounds of sugar and remove my hop, er, dandelion sack. And then I’ll wait…

Grandma Beach’s idea of cough syrup

I’ve been dodging my boys’ bullets for the last week, but finally I’ve succumbed to a cold.

I’ve got all this beer lying around; how could I not have something with a cure involved? So I’ve got my wife’s great-grandma in mind today. Here’s her recipe for cough syrup. I take it like NyQuil, and sleep well. I need to get a batch going.

Grandma Beach’s Cough Syrup

1 part lemon juice

1 part honey

1 part “good” whiskey

This stuff is amazing when it ages for a couple of years. But I only take it medicinally.

A cheesy beer life

I find that a beer life, especially for a homebrewer, is also a foodie life, a coffee-soaked life, and sometimes a little bacony. This week, my life got cheesier than ever before.

For years, I’ve been saying I need to start making cheese. This Christmas, my family gave me a kick in the pants to get that venture started: Home Cheese Making, by Ricki Carroll, as well as a few ingredients and supplies to get started. Since many of you tend to be foodies as well, I thought I’d share my first go at mozzarella, which was easy, quick and delicious.

Mozzarella, in words and pictures:

You start by taking one gallon of whole milk (grocery store milk that has been pasteurized and homogenized will work, as long as it hasn’t been ultra-pasteurized) in a pan and bringing it up to 55F. Stir in 1 1/2 tsp of citric acid (which you’ve dissolved in 1/2 cup of cool water). Stir until you reach 90F. You’ll get some curdling started.

Once you hit 90F, you’ll add 1/4 tsp. of liquid rennet (mixed in 1/4 cup cool water). Now you’ll stir in an up-and-down motion until you hit 105F. Nice big curds, well separated from the whey, which should be getting a little clearer. The range in the recipe said 100-105F, but both times I’ve done this, I went to 105, if not a touch further. At this point, kill the heat and use a slotted spoon to remove the curds from the whey. Place them in a large mixing bowl while singing Little Miss Muffet.

At this point, press down on the curds, and pour off the remaining whey. Press and pour, press and our, until you’re left with just curds in the bowl. I tasted the whey, then gave it to our cats for their own little feast. Thor especially deserved it, as he’s been killing mice left and right lately.

Now, put your bowl of curds in the microwave for about 2 minutes. At this point, we’re looking to bring the internal temperature of the curds to 145F, while working it into a mozzarella texture. After two minutes, press and drain any remaining whey, then knead like bread dough for a few turns. Back into the microwave for three or four or five stabs at 35 seconds, kneading again after each re-heating (after the second 35-second re-heating, work in a teaspoon of cheese salt).

During this stage, you’ll notice the texture changing from sorta mottled and grainy to smooth and shiny. It’ll start squeaking as you press it and make you hungry. Take the mass into your hands and give it a pull. If it breaks or looks rough, it’s not ready. If you’ve hit the right temperature, it will pull like taffy (an instant-read thermometer would probably confirm that you’re at 145F. I can’t find mine anywhere, but this is clearly dummy-proof, as it’s ready. You just know) and you’ll begin salivating. Good thing, because it’s ready!

At this point, eat your mozzarella, in all its fresh glory. You’ve earned it. If you don’t feel like eating a pound of cheese on the spot, form it into little balls and toss it in cold water to bring down the temperature quickly, then refrigerate. I planned on making homemade pizza on this fine day, so I pulled out my cheese grater and shifted into pizza mode.

There’s something dummy-proof about kicking ass, as well. I didn’t have a thermometer or barometer or hydrometer in use, but at this point, I knew I was kicking some ass.

This was confirmed when I pulled the pizza out of the oven. I coincidentally paired it with a bottle of Saison du Pont. I don’t know what Garrett Oliver says, but I thought these worked together like magic.

I saved back a couple mozzarella balls to marinate in olive oil, garlic, thyme and marjoram. I failed to take a picture, so you’ll just have to take my word for it. They looked good and were delicious, and paired well with whatever the heck I was drinking and served as a great precursor to whatever the heck I ate for dinner that night.

Give this a try. It was tasty and complete in 30 minutes. Now, onto the next cheese for me…

Bon Scottish on St. Andrew’s Day

What an exciting day! I should have a beer today! More specifically, I should have an appropriate beer today.

As luck would have it (naaaah, it ain’t luck), I do have just the thing: my new 80 Shilling, which I call with great reverence: Bon Scottish Ale. Yes, yes, I know; Bon Scott and AC/DC are from Australia–but Bon “Death by Misadventure” Scott, one of the greatest frontmen of all time, was born in Scotland.

Perhaps I should call it, Johnston Ale after my gramps, or William Wallace Ale or even St. Andrew’s Ale. But no, I need to have a beer to commemorate Bon Scott. It’s yummy, a “live wire,” in fact. Built on malt with caramel and wisps of yeast-derived smoke, this “rocker” stops short of being “high voltage” or “TNT,” but satisfies like a “whole lotta Rosie.”

So to speak.

Wanna give it a go? Here’s the recipe:

Bon Scottish Ale

8 # Golden Promise

1/2 # Carapils

1/2 # Crystal (49-64L)

1/2 # Crystal (135-165L)

2 oz. East Kent Goldings (4% alpha–60 minutes)

Wyeast 1728 (Scottish Ale Yeast)

Mashed for one hour at 156F. Boiled first gallon for 30 minutes, then full wort for 60 minutes. Fermented 12 days @ 64F.

OG: 1.050

FG: 1.015

Thirsty Thursday–Revolution Ale

So a few times now, I’ve mentioned my Revolution Ale (here and here and here.) I suppose I should more than mention it, but talk about it.

This beer started with a long ago read article from Brew Your Own. Around that time, I had a tasty “Colonial” ale from remember not which brewery at a World Beer Festival, in Durham. I think it was a Virginia brewery. And it was somewhere between a couple and several years ago. The beer seemed “bright” and intriguing. So I searched for recipe ideas and came up with Dan Mouer’s piece from BYO.

Basically, he’d discovered a beer recipe during a dig on a Virginia plantation. He translated the recipe to today’s available measurements and ingredients and brewed it up. I translated it to what I had available and brewed that. One element of the recipe was brown malt, which at the time I couldn’t get at my local homebrew shop. And I didn’t want to fool with shipping. I told Mike, my local homebrew shop guy, what I was after, and he suggested I substitute special roast, and mash for a good two hours.

So that’s what I did. To this day, it’s one of the coolest beers I’ve ever done. The grain bill was simple: 7# pale malt and 7 # special roast (5 gallon batch). It was dark, roasty, chewy with dark fruit nuances and a touch of alcohol warmth, somewhere between a porter and an old ale–OG around 1.072. Out of necessity on another occasion, I substituted biscuit instead of the special roast. The beer wasn’t the same (duh). One summer, I scaled it back to drop some of the alcohol, and it wasn’t the same (duh). While I fully recognized the Bob Ross “happy accident-ness” of the original beer and knew that to be my Colonial Ale, I’ve always wanted to try it with the originally intended brown malt.

That’s what I’ve got in the keg today, though fortunately, I screwed up my order. I did 10 gallons with the intent of oak aging half of it (also adding juniper berries and a touch of molasses), but somehow I ordered 14 pounds of pale malt and only 7 pounds of brown malt. The brown reduction was probably the good thing.

I make it sound like this beer came out poorly. It did not. I enjoy it very much, but I can sense where half again more brown malt would be overkill. It’s got a roasty element, but not the roasted barley kind of roastiness found in a glorious stout. This is more like if you stuck your tongue on spent Folgers coffee grounds, with a little sweetness and more body. Again, I don’t mean to say that it’s a chore to drink it, but I’m just trying to give you a place to imagine your tastebuds.

Interestingly, the “regular” version of this beer scored below 30 and the oak-aged version took a blue ribbon. Click on the correct “here” link above to read why I take both results with a grain of salt. Oh, nevermind. Here it is again.

Never again will I jack with this beer. I intend to brew the special roast version again, sometime in the next few months. I won’t dumb it down for summer, because I both like this beer and happily drink dark, beastly stuff at all times of the year.

I haven’t really talked about the hops, as they’re generally irrelevant on this brew: a dose for bittering and that’s it. I used 2 ounces of Fuggles for 60 minutes of a two hour boil. For the record, I mashed at 155F.

Try this if you like, but I’d recommend the special roast version. In that case, I’d start the sentence with, “Try this if you love…”

Cheers!

Granny’s Liquor Cabinet

It’s not like Grandma Johnston is a lush. Really. She isn’t. It’s just that she makes her own booze. She also played piano at church for years and years. She knits and works puzzles. She gets her hair “done.” Let’s not judge her or pigeonhole her. She is a fine, well-rounded person. And I have her recipes.

With the Coldness and the holidays around the corner, it’s good to have a little variety in the liquid diet. Every so often, November is a signal for me to check the stock of home-grown Kahlua. Last year cleaned us out. So time to get another batch in the works.

GRANDMA JOHNSTON’S KAHLUA

Ingredients

4 cups sugar

3/4 cup instant coffee

2 cups boiling water

1 pint brandy

1 vanilla bean, sliced and cut into 1-inch pieces.

Process: Mix sugar and instant coffee. Stir in 2 cups boiling water and cool. Add brandy and vanilla bean. Pour into half-gallon jug. Let stand 30 days in a cool, dark place.

I usually double this, as decanted into 16-ounce swingtops, it works well as a Christmas gift–but leaves enough for our own private stash. I’ve used it in a right yummy porter, mixed with coffee, and well, it’s good straight up.

Granny also makes good meatloaf and potato salad. And there’s nothing quite like frosting Christmas cookies with her. But there’s something awfully cool to have and use your grandma’s liquor recipes.

If you try this one, please make it a point to toast to my grandma’s health.

Eddy Merckx in a glass

I think if I were limited to only drinking two beer styles for the rest of my life, I’d go for porter and Belgian pale ale. They do a good job of convering my desires. The porter will hit my roasty and chocolatey side, while the BPA will tackle my enjoyment of Belgian yeast juxtoposed with a juicy malt character.

For the last few weeks, I’ve been tucking into a keg of my homebrewed Merckx Belgian Pale Ale. This is one tasty beverage: luscious malt with orange and peach packed in; well-balanced, with a medium body and soft, creamy mouthfeel; spicy, peppery aroma and flavor notes. Just yum-alicious, as far as my buds are concerned.

I call it Merckx, because if you asked Lance Armstrong who the greatest cyclist of all time was, he’d likely respond with the great Belgian Eddy “The Cannibal” Merckx. I like to think that this is an Eddy Merckx of a beer, though perhaps he’d rather be named after a Belgian Dark Strong. This recipe took a blue ribbon at the 2006 US Open, hosted by Charlotte’s Carolina Brewmasters homebrew club. So it’s not just me that thinks it’s worthy of notice.

For your brewing pleasure, here’s the recipe:

Merckx Belgian Pale Ale (5 gal)

8# Belgian pale malt

1# Munich

1 # Caravienna

.5# wheat

1 oz. East Kent Goldings (4.5% aa for 60 minutes)

.5 oz. East Kent Goldings (4.5% aa for 30 minutes)

.5 oz. East Kent Goldings (4.5% aa for 2 minutes)

White Labs Saison Yeast

Mashed at 152F for one hour. Fermented 9 days at 70-72F.

OG: 1.059

FG: 1.015

Persimmon Mead from the Dragonslayer

I’m not the only person that turns to Ken Hilton for a little brewing advice. That being the case, and with some inquisitiveness from a reader about his persimmon mead, I’ve got the inside scoop for you today. As an added bonus, Ken gives us a gander at the flavors of his childhood with a recipe for persimmon pudding.

Here it is….early fall in eastern NC. Fall is my absolute favorite time of year….chilly nights, comfortable days, leaves starting to turn to their glorious hues of yellow, orange, red….and time for the State Fair. When the first frosts begin to rest gently over the landscape, my thoughts turn to the bounty of the fall harvest and childhood memories of the season. Pumpkins, collard greens, salt-cured country ham (started last year), and one of the most delectable treats you have ever put in your mouth….persimmons. If you are lucky, you may even have a copy of “Granny Hinkle’s ‘ol fashioned persimmon pudding”….a rich, sweet, gooey, spicy desert.

Persimmons are almost a thing of the past. Finding wild persimmons is akin to knocking in a “hole-in-one” on a 500 yard Par 5 at the British Open on a windy day. If you are lucky enough to spot a persimmon tree in the wild, don’t tell anyone about it and keep going back regularly after the first frost. Make friends with the landowner. Good wild persimmons will be almost mushy soft and sweet. Picked any earlier, and you mouth will turn inside out with the astringent, mouth-puckering sensation akin to dosing your mouth with a tablespoon of alum.

Unfortunately, I have not found any wild persimmons for years here in eastern NC. But a friend of mine gave me some Oriental persimmons from his father’s tree. Just before Halloween, you may notice some ornamental sized trees in yards in which people have hung miniature plastic pumpkins for Halloween decorations. Kinda’ like hanging plastic Easter eggs at Easter time. Look again!!!!! Those fake pumpkins may just very well be real Oriental persimmons ripening, awaiting someone to pick them and make some persimmon pudding….or some Persimmon Mead. Oriental persimmons are not astringent like their wild kin, but they are also not as flavorful…pound for pound, so you have to cook them down a bit more for the pudding. But, they are great for mead.

I am sharing this recipe for this Persimmon mead, because it is special….not because it has won several awards, but because of the people behind it. My friend Dale gave me the honey for this mead….eastern NC fall harvest wildflower honey. The persimmons came from his father’s tree, picked lovingly by all who attended Dale’s father’s funeral on that glorious fall day. I gave Dale a bomber to open up this fall.

Hallalujah Celebration Persimmon Mead

5 qts wildflower honey
4 gallons water
2-1/2 tsp yeast nutrient
Lalvin D-47 dry yeast (hydrate 15 minutes before pitching)

Filter the water, bring it to a boil, cut the heat and add the honey and yeast nutrient,stir, cover and let stand 20 minutes to pasteurize. Chill the must and pitch the yeast. Ferment in primary at 68 degrees F for one month.

Rack the mead and add 3 qts of Oriental persimmon pulp (pasteurized at 160 degrees F for 20 minutes…do not let the temp go higher or you may get pectin haze. I pasteurized and canned the fruit earlier.) Let the secondary fermentation go for 6 weeks, then rack the mead off the big pile of persimmon flesh in the bottom. You will lose at least a gallon. Add 2-1/2 tsp acid blend  to enhance the acidity level and 1 tsp Sorbistat K to prevent further fermentation. 24 hours after the Sorbistat K, add 1-1/2 -2 cups of honey to sweeten the mead. Stir of swirl gently to dissolve the honey. Let the mead sit until it clears, racking several times. Bottle, put it away in a closet for 6 months. Enjoy!!

Persimmon Pudding

Mix 2-1/2 cups Oriental persimmon pulp, 1-3/4 cup whole milk (or half & half), 1 stick melted butter, 2-1/2 cups flour, 1-1/2 cups brown sugar, 4 tsp baking powder, 1/2 tsp salt, and 1/2 tsp cinnamon (preferably China Cassia cinnamon). Bake at 325 degrees F for 1-1/2-2 hours. Let it sit a while….have a good mead…and serve warm (not hot).

The Session #8–Beer and Food

I’ll be blunt–I love beer and food. I enjoy them both daily, often together. I don’t have to pay big bucks to attend a beer dinner; I live like that. It’s a good way to live.

Richly fulfilling, a good meal with family or friends can’t be beaten–unless there are well chosen beers involved. Sometimes the meals are planned around the beers that are thirsted after, the beers that are in the fridge, the beers that came back from a vacation. And the recipe needn’t be strenuous. Like a simple, well-brewed beer, one needn’t do backflips to craft a solid meal (though backflip beers and meals are also wonderful).

A couple summers ago, my family took a little trip to Delaware to visit Dogfish Head Craft Brewery. We toured the brewery, loaded up on Midas Touch and Raison D’Etre and paired World Wide Stout with roasted marshmallows around the fire–to this day, the best food pairing I’ve ever tasted.

Of course, before returning home, we stocked up on a few nuggets unavailable in our own market. One sixer that came home was Troegs Brewing Company’s Troegenator Double Bock. A malt-alicious monster of love, this beer was. Hmmm…I thought. What should we have for dinner tonight?

I was craving brats, but not just the same old brats on the grill. I needed something new. After a little rumination on the flavors, I came up with a little something I call Doppel-brat Stew. Easy and flavorful.

With amazing food days like this one, I can’t imagine going back to the mundane sludge on which I grew up. There’s so much more to life than canned green beans and Hamburger Helper. Fortunate circumstances rescued me from a life of blah food. I am thankful.

Everything is okay now. Couple the tasty victuals with the yummy libations, and the good life just got better.

Pass me a doppelbock.

__________

For your cooking sensations, here ’tis:

DOPPEL-BRAT STEW

Ingredients:

6-8 New potatoes, quartered

3 T Butter

1 Onion, sliced

5 Brats, freed from their casings

1 Can diced tomatoes, drained

1 Tsp beef base

2 Bay leaves

12 Ounces Troegenator, or other fine doppelbock

Salt/Pepper, to taste

Procedure:

Boil potatoes (then drain and set aside until needed). Saute onions in butter briefly, then add brats and brown. Add tomatoes, beef base, bay leaves, beer and salt and pepper. Cover and simmer 20-30 minutes. Add potatoes and toss gently. Adjust salt and pepper.

Serve with fresh bread, to mop up the juices, and–you guessed it–another doppelbock.

Clink ‘em and drink ‘em!

__________

Need a dessert idea? Click here for a bonus recipe, tried and true.

Many thanks to this month’s host: Captain Hops at Beer Haiku Daily.

Porter and Yorkshire Puddings, a la Jamie

What I wouldn’t have given to have had an Old Peculier in the fridge last night. After years of wanting to give Yorkshire puddings a try, I finally bit the bullet and found it ridiculously easy. And rewarding.

Climbing high, they were golden brown and beautiful. Not so traditionally, we ate them plain, accompanying fresh and amazing Iowa garden tomatoes and wedges of cabbage. It worked well as a light evening meal after a hot and humid day. Boulevard’s Bully! Porter provided a worthy companion.

I used Jamie Oliver’s recipe, found in his Happy Days with the Naked Chef cookbook. Cynics can say what they like, but I love Jamie. It is an unfortunate tear for me that I also quite like Anthony Bourdain, who writes Jamie off as something of a yipping lap dog with no true chef credentials. Regardless of that, everything I’ve cooked up Jamie’s alley has been, well, pukka.

Yorkshire Puddings (adapted from the Naked One)

1 cup flour

pinch of salt

1 1/4 cups milk

3 eggs

Preheat oven to 450F. Pour 1/4 inch oil into the bottom of muffin tins–this recipe will yield a dozen Yorkies. Place these in the oven to preheat for about 10 minutes, nice and hot. Make sure and place a cookie sheet on the rack below, to catch the inevitible oil drips. Mix up the batter. When the oil’s hot, quickly divide the batter into the twelve muffin compartments. Bake for 30 minutes. Don’t be tempted to open the door, as your Yorkies won’t rise.

These are tasty, dramatic and easy. Give them a try.