Pursuit of Hoppy-ness!

I have given up all pretense of any regular update to this blog. As it is I figured that "Well, it's been a week or two since my last update, guess I post something." Only to find out that it's actually been three weeks since last we spoke. Oh well, frankly, I have been so busy at work lately that I have had absolutely nothing of interest happen that I'm able to blog about.

I did get a fair amount of project related stuff accomplished this last weekend, almost none of it actually planned. The only item that I really had intended to do was the dry-hopping of my latest endeavor, California IPA. I'm not actually sure what makes an India Pale Ale a California IPA, but no matter, the sample I had at MoreBeer in Riverside tasted extremely promising. Anyway, I boiled up a batch the weekend before last, sometime around when the Chargers were going done in flames against the New York Jets.

Dry hopping is a new technique for me, something I should probably not be attempting at this point. I mean if I can't accomplish the basic techniques to my own satisfaction, why would I start throwing new wrinkles into the mix. But the siren song of the IPA won me over. I picked up a packet of Citra hops at Morebeer last week. They smelled FABULOUS, but then I'm a hoppy kind of guy. Hops in fact are interesting little buggers. I guess interesting little gals, as I have learned that they are actually female flowers.

Anyway, I'm dry hopping the beer in my secondary fermenter as we speak. Next weekend to the bottles, a couple weeks worth of fermentation and another couple for aging and my around the end of February maybe I'll have a beer to drink.

I continue to consume my Holiday Ale, the taste actually having grown on me. I was a little disappointed at first, maybe because I didn't age it long enough, but it's a somewhat serviceable beverage.

The other projects I completed last weekend were mostly Leo-induced. It POURED rain here over most of last week and the yard is a complete mud bowl. Needless to say, Leo has the sense to stay out of neither rain nor mud, so every evening we return home to find him soaked, dirty and freezing. He got a bath about every night last week just so we could let him in the house. So, Denise decided the dog needed a covered area to get out of the rain. One would think that the garage would be sufficient, but he refuses to stay in there. So, I spent a good chunk of Saturday putting up plastic roofing sheets on our patio cover trellis. It's raining now, the patio is staying relatively dry, but the whole endeavor is likely doomed to failure for one simple reason; Leo will probably not stay under the damn thing.

In addition to the cover, Denise decided the dog needed a raised platform under his bed, someplace to sleep under the new patio roof. I dutifully built the dog a new bed, which he seems to regard as some sort of fiendish trap. So far Denise has only lured him onto the thing once, with copious doggie treats, but alas the mattress slipped as he was getting off it and now he's more afraid of it than ever.

Another lesser feat was installation of a hot water recirculating pump for our bathroom. I think I mentioned previously that because our water heater is so far from our bathroom that we have to run about 2-1/2 gallons of water down the drain whenever we want to shower, just to get to the hot water. We were saving the cold water in buckets and using it to water the garden, but in the midst of the rainy season that was pretty pointless. The new pump seems to be working well, operates on a timer, so that nice hot (or at least tolerably lukewarm) water awaits for my morning shower. We'll have to watch the electric bills to see if this whole plan comes back to bite us.

Multiple other projects ensued, but my favorite was either the Tempeh Shepperd's Pie that I made for Sunday dinner or maybe it was the half-dozen Caipiroskas that I mixed up and consumed. (Actually I modified the recipe; halved the vodka and added some club soda - very refreshing after a long weekend of projecting. And a very satisfying way to use up the glut of limes from our tree.)

But enough about me. Both boys are now back in school, Jacob having left on Thursday the 14th to make the drive with a couple friends. Sounds like an epic trip, leaving Temecula around 8:00AM and arriving at Humbolt around 2:30AM on the 15th. He is now taking classes in natural resources, communications, logical writing(?), guitar and Aikido.

Denise was finally able to schedule Jake's surgery for his wisdom teeth removal and bone graft. We have that to look forward to in March.

Nicholas is winding down his college career, hanging out with his girlfriend, snow skiing up at Tahoe, spending money he doesn't have and having a generally good time. Can't say as I blame him. Oh, and he is now a vegetarian. Not sure if he's gone the whole vegan thing. I'm pretty sure beer is still allowed in his diet.

Two Birds, One Stone

I'm multitasking. I just completed upgrading the Internet circuit to my office (well, technically I just swapped a cable from one router to another; one of our network services techs in Minnesota did the real work.) So I am both testing Internet connectivity by updating my blog and simultaneously killing time while waiting the arrival of Jake's flight from Sacramento at Ontario Airport. Since time flies I figure it easily qualifies for one of the two birds being killed.

I guess I should 'splain why Jacob is in Sacramento. A new quarter started at UCD for Nicholas on Monday, so he had to head back up to Davis on Saturday night. Jacob tagged along for the ride to visit a friend in Sacramento.

I thought the original plan had been for them to leave Sunday morning, since they had both been gone about all day Thursday, Friday and Saturday. They returned home late Saturday afternoon and Jake immediately decided they should head for Davis that evening. So, they didn't get on the road until about 7:00PM and arrived in Davis sometime around 3:00AM, according to my wife who received the safe arrival text message. Oh, to be young again. Being college students they can apparently run all night. I would have been quietly snoozing behind the wheel until an abrupt end in oncoming traffic.

Anyway, Jake is coming back home tonight. Has to be here for an appointment with the orthodontist and for no end of pinochle games with his Grandmother who arrived at our hovel on Sunday.

My sister Jackie and her husband Mike brought Mom up from San Diego. They also brought their new puppy, Abbie-something. She is quite cute. The dog that is. Which is not to say that Jackie and Mom couldn't be considered cute. I better stop there before I get in trouble.

Leo loved his new cousin dog, but then he loves all dogs. The two of them ran around like maniacs in the backyard, wearing themselves out. You can check out the chaos here.

I had planned to do a little tailgating party for my family when they came up, serve a little lunch and watch the Chargers game, which is always on TV. As it turns out the game was not on in Temecula, apparently the network having decided that since the Chargers had already clinched the division title they would show some other game instead. Jackie and Mike are huge Charger fans and I'm sure hugely disappointed by my failure as a host, but polite enough not to spit on me.

They did get a free lunch out of me, and some Hot Brazilians, so the trip was not a complete loss. Falafels with Tahini Sauce and a Green Lentil Salad and a Toasted Pecan/Red Lentil Pâté (more of this vegetarian stuff.)

Now, here I have to make a confession that I might have been a little hard on Tyler Florence in an earlier post about his Ultimate Chili Dog recipe. The falafel recipe was by Tyler Florence and was pretty good, although I probably should have added a little more salt and a lot more crushed red pepper to satisfy my tastes. I also made a Tyler Florence black bean recipe in my new pressure cooker (Did I mention that I bought myself a pressure cooker for Christmas?) and converted them into vegetarian black bean burgers. Also very good. I think the secret to my black bean vegie burgers was one key ingredient in the black bean recipe; a smoked ham hock. OK, IT'S MEAT, but it was just a very little meat, so I think it should still count.

I should make one small aside about this vegetarian cuisine; all this black bean and lentil and general legumieness has a certain, shall we say, less-than-totally-pleasant byproduct. Man, I was starting to feel like the Hindenburg. Anyway, I found the perfect restorative: Carne Asada Breakfast Burrito. I can't think of a better way to cure a vegetarian overdose.

Anyway, I think I will have to keep this short tonight. Need to wrap it up and head out to the airport. More later. Bye.

Happy New Year...

...and a belated Merry Christmas! As always, I had intended a pre-Christmas post to wish you all the best but failed miserably.




Christmas was exhausting. Not Christmas itself necessarily, but all the prep the week before hand. I had a couple projects to complete that took most of the week.

Nicholas decided that he wanted to build a patio seat for his Mother, a gift to replace the current bench that is rapidly deteriorating out on our deck. I helped with the design, assembly and, of course, the purchase of the materials. He did a serviceable job as shown...

The bench is still unfinished a week after Christmas. Nick presented it to his mother with a classic ploy; "I didn't paint it because I didn't know what color you would want." I don't know how many times I've used that one, but it never gets old.

Christmas day was good, if a little over the top. Leo received two squeaky toys both of which were pretty much dead within 15 minutes of their receipt.

The big boy has for some reason decided that he will not suffer a squeaky in his presence. Once he's got the squeaker and the stuffing extracted he leaves the gutted carcass on the floor and moves on to better things.

We had a few get togethers over the holidays, my family at my sister Jean's in Newport Beach and Denise's family at the Universal Citywalk. At the Citywalk we ate at Samba, a Brazilian churrascaria, which, in case you have never experienced one, is a sort of carnivores dream. They serve all manner of skewered meats, all-you-can eat. They give you a little green-light, red-light sort of thing. As long as you have the green side up the meat keeps coming. The meat is tasty, but the concept is really a little bit disgusting. On the plus side there were a few scantily clad Samba dancers for entertainment, one of whom pulled a couple of my nephews and sister-in-law onto the dance floor. That's entertainment.

On the other plus side, I had a Hot Brazilian. No, I wasn't waxed. Samba served some interesting cocktails based on Leblon Cachaça, http://www.lebloncachaca.com/, one of which was a Hot Brazilian. Recipes are at the web link.

This week was mostly uneventful. Jake had yet another followup at Loma Linda, a point of discontent, as we had hoped to get his oral surgery completed over the holiday break. Instead they scheduled the followup and now can not get him onto their surgery schedule until sometime in February, which will create another logistical problem, getting him home from Humboldt for the surgery and causing additional lost class time. Oh well, slowly but surely we are putting this stuff behind us.

Nick invited a friend, Teresa, to spend a couple days in Temecula. Teresa is a recently converted vegan and was coming into dangerous territory at my house. I actually cook a lot of vegetarian recipes, but usually cheat in various little ways. For instance, a vegetarian recipe calling for vegetable stock usually gets chicken stock instead, because I stock chicken stock and not the vegie stuff.

Anyway, always up to a challenge I made a vegan dinner of Curried Red Lentil Soup and a Chickpea Shepherd's Pie (with mashed potato/cauliflower topping). I thought they were both pretty tasty. This was also good practice, since Nick informs us that he is planning to become a vegetarian, or at least a pescatarian, starting this year. I may join him as a vegetarian, but the kind of vegetarian who still eats meat.

Last night we had dinner with the next door neighbors to celebrate the New Year. I made a variation on the jalapeno/cucumber Samba cocktails for the ladies. Did not manage to make it to midnight however as I was completely spent and in bed by 11:15.

Anyway enough for now. Here's wishing you all a Hot Brazilian in the New Year!