AHS English Honey Bitter

Given the fact that it has been far too long since my last post and the fact that we just brewed our first beer in over a year I just felt that I had to make this post. The AHS (Austin Homebrew Supply) English Honey Bitter was sitting around in a press for quite sometime. Up until a little over a year ago we had been home brewing some very nice beers, but then something happened. We had two soured beers in a row and it kind of unnerved us a bit so we took a break from home brewing and concentrated on reviewing and trying various different craft beers over the past year.

Well about a month ago we got the itch to brew some beer again (watching the Hobbit may have helped). So we got to work on the English Honey Bitter kit we had bought from AHS the year before. It was kind of nerve racking, we definitely didn't want this batch to fail again so we redecorated the entire kitchen with new paint and new flooring (helped by +GIEnterprises Oregon ) then made sure the equipment was sanitized and ready for the brew. The main difference this time is that we had purchased two Beer Boxes from Northern Brewer. We were hoping because we wouldn't be dealing with 40 - 50 bottles that we'd be cutting down on the risk of infection and soured beer.

Tonight, nearly four weeks later we got to try our English Honey Bitter out of our new beer boxes for the first time. Glasses in hand, phone recording video and nerves on edge, we set about pouring the first glass. It had been a success, we were back brewing again and it tasted great. In fact I'm enjoying a glass as I type this post. I have said on multiple occasions how much of a fan of Middle-earth I am and how much it pains me not to be able to run around Lotro natively on my beloved Linux desktop. +Linda Dean and myself have also spoken at length over the years about what real Middle-earth ales would taste like if they were real. Well tonight I think we really came close to finding out, this English Honey Bitter from AHS is in my mind, about as close as you could get to sitting in the Green Dragon Inn in Bywater, enjoying a pipe by the flickering fire and listening to tall tales from across the river. So with glass in hand and the soundtrack to Lotro playing in my ears, I say, cheers! Have a great night all!

4th of July 2014

A few things have struck me about the 4th of July celebrations, a few very important things that are a must have on the 4th, beer (preferably craft beer), food (preferably BBQ) more beer and of course last but not least fireworks. Well this year we managed to have all three in abundance. So we made merry, ate our fill and exploded the driveway...just joking +GIEnterprises Oregon , we didn't actually explode the driveway but we did have a whole lot of fun with the fireworks.

We might as well start this 4th of July post with the food images captured on the day. We had BBQ pork ribs, two racks and they were delicious. And the bonus was that we had plenty of leftovers for the next day.

Unusually we didn't use BBQ sauce this time round but instead marinated the ribs in a mixture of Worcestershire sauce, balsamic vinegar and garlic over night.

I thought they might have lacked moisture with no BBQ sauce but they were fine, they turned out very juicy and didn't appear to dry out at all.

I have to say there is nothing quite like the taste of BBQ pork just off the grill, I'm actually drooling here thinking about it.

We also had salad with the meal though I failed to capture any images of that as I was to busy devouring the ribs.

All good things come to an end they say and this was true of our ribs, after we ate our fill it was time for some real fun. The front yard fireworks display for Talon. He was waiting anxiously at the door with a box of matches in hand...in a safe way I might add and not in a Beavis kind of way.

I love fireworks, when they are relatively low key and not setting off sonic booms to scare the bejusus out of our pets. The legal ones in Oregon though are just fine and still provide a lot of fun and entertainment.

They are mostly just fountains of colour and sparks but they do give a great light show. This is the one night a year that we really do appreciate having very few working street lights on our road.

Above, +Linda Dean  and Talon set up for a light show that very nearly reached the camera, it was very cool.

Not sure if our hops appreciated it, they were probably suffering from shock afterwords.

Being the one behind the camera meant I didn't get to set a whole lot of them off but I eventually got my chance with Talon giving me very detailed directions on how to light them properly and safely.

I hope you all had a great 4th of July and I hope you share your images with the rest of us when you get time, for now though, that is it from me.

 

Lamb shoulder roast

The roasting of the lamb continues, tonight we had a lamb shoulder roast and it was melt in your mouth good. We slow roasted it for four hours packed with onions, potatoes, garlic and broccoli. It's almost hard to believe how tasty and tender lamb is if you've never had it. It is a completely different eating experience to beef and pork. Beef is much tougher and can dry out while roasting if not done correctly, lamb on the other hand stays moist and tender.

The onions add a nice flavour to the meat and potatoes and the dripping makes a really delicious gravy for your meal. +Linda Dean is particularly good at making gravy.

Linda can best describe the cooking method of this meal though. My fun begins when the meal is cooked and I get to photograph it in the hopes that my images make your mouths water. That they stir the hunger in your bellies for decent home cooked meals and flavours that you might not have tried before.

I really do love photographing good food, it's not always easy to get the right image because you want your pictures to cause a reaction in the viewer, to inspire a desire in your audience.

I know several people back home that will be eating a roast this week because of this blog post. In fact they will probably be eating several over the coming weeks.

I'm still in shock at the lack of lamb in the USA, maybe these posts will stir more of a desire to try it and we'll start seeing it turn up in the shops. If possible try and get it from a local farmer though as it will be less processed and should be a superior cut of meat. We're lucky in Oregon that we have several very high quality farms willing to sell lamb at a good price.

The potatoes were cooked in with the meat and other veg and so soaked up all those flavours, we then mashed them with garlic and the onions and they turned out great.

The final meal was just fantastic and we have plenty of left overs for a snack later and tomorrow. For more information on the cooking method feel free to drop +Linda Dean a message.

All quiet on the western front

Its been a quiet few days here, we've been exercising away and enjoying the World Cup. I haven't really been active with the camera so I'll show you a few old ones to satiate your appetite, your hunger, your starvation, your....wait a sec, OK, back to reality. I have a pretty huge collection of images now but I'm not sure what to do with them, I'm still sorting through a lot of them.

Above a sunset from two years ago when we were on one of our nightly walks in the local park. During the late summer we get the most incredible sunsets here in Corvallis.

We have not yet had a trip out to Newport this year but we might just head out that direction in the not to distant future as we both love it out there. The beach can be a bit gusty but on a hot day it's fantastic.

Above another view of the beach out in Newport, if you haven't been out there you need to visit.

Autumn in Corvallis, the river walk is incredible when the warmth of the summer hasn't quite faded but the leaves are starting to turn to their autumn colours.

A couple of weeks later and the clean up work begins, a few weeks of endless gathering of leaves as they leave their trees for good to make room for a new generation in the following spring.

No where escapes, not even beneath a park bench. But not yet, not until the summer has passed and the evenings draw in. For now we have those balmy summer nights ahead of us. Craft beer, BBQ and summer walks through the woods. Of course all that is in between bouts of gaming and troll taming online, debating the ills of abandoning net freedom with...people and of course more beer, BBQ and beer.  

Playing around on the field

So I've been finding the last few days tough when it comes to keeping up with this blog. Some days are like that and others I feel like writing several posts at once. The exercise regime is going really well at the moment and even though my muscles feel tired and fatigued, I also feel really good. Seeing the weight dropping off day by day is definitely very rewarding. So to start off tonight's post I am going to show you a picture I took of +Linda Dean a bit earlier when we had just finished our kick around on the football pitch. She just realized that she could touch the ground again with her finger tips.

With the help of Snapseed I really liked how it turned out, I like the way the light was shining on her. Every time I play around with these images it amazes me how easy it has gotten. It is not all that long ago where you'd have to slog along for hours playing with software to get the image the way you wanted it to look.

I also absolutely love HDR, it truly is amazing to me what HDR can do to the right image. It's not just about capturing a moment in time with the camera but also almost turning it into a beautiful painting with the help of HDR.

We encountered this little fellow on our way to the park, he was just happily grazing away, waiting for us to move on so he could finish his lunch in peace. Nutria are not native to Oregon or even the USA, they originate in Brazil as far as I know. I'd love to know how they got up here in the first place, people bringing them up as pets I presume. I could be wrong with the Brazil part but I think it's definitely South America somewhere. I will have to get stuck in over the coming days with image editing, just been feeling tired the last few with all the exercise. 

A play on light and shadow

I've been playing around with shadows and silhouettes today, I love these types of images. I especially like the Noir style of photography and film, I probably get this from watching old gangster movies growing up, oh and that's Capone style gangster as opposed to a rapper style gangster. This first image I took a few weeks back but seeing it again today for the first time in weeks made me look twice at it.

It just hit a note with me, one of those ones you get lucky with when you are not trying for something special.

And this one is just one of those moments in time captured for our memories in years to come. I have never liked posed images and have always preferred action shots. The kind that look like you have just frozen people in time and space for future generations to see. I am very happy with the way this one turned out.

And another, in the background +Linda Dean and Talon can be seen in deep conversation as Linda explains the finer points of trigonometry to Talon. It is wonderful to watch Talon at times, he is so inquisitive. He questions everything around him in his quest for knowledge and doesn't blindly follow commands.

And to finish today's adventure here's one I just kind of liked, it's not fancy or artistic but I like the way the shadows fall. Once again, it was taken in our favourite park, well, the exit to our favourite park. I'm also very happy with the progress the old beard is making, kind of reminds me of my Dad in some ways. Looking forward to the day my brother decides to grow his out, we'll be like twins...at least we will be after I dye his grey and white, nothing a little chalk dust couldn't take care of! lol

Quick edit because I forgot to add the above image, I really like the way the beard is silhouetted in this shot and felt it had to be included in this post.



  

Playing with HDR and shedding lbs

In our never ending quest to shed a few pounds (double figure numbers) we've been heading out to some really great spots. We have basically spent our spare time the last week walking, cycling and hiking if only a short hike. Since I've been addicted to my Nexus 5 lately I decided to play around with the HDR, not the HDR+ on the camera but the HDR in Snapseed.

I love the effect, it's like an instant painting, if you can get the right light it works really well.

It works great with landscape shots, I haven't really played around with HDR+ yet. I have taken a few with the Nexus but haven't looked closely at them yet. I've just really been enjoying playing around with Snapseed. It would be nice however if it could handle larger images than it does.

The auto-panorama is also pretty incredible, this next one was pieced together on G+ from several images I took while we were out at Bald Hill.

And it's pretty seamless as far as I'm concerned. The software is getting really good, can't wait to see what the next few years brings us. I think though at the moment it's still better to take the photos with a DSLR and then play with them in an app like Snapseed. That's where I've gotten the best results, however, the convenience of having a pretty decent camera in your pocket does count for a lot. 

And here we go with the obligatory black n white photo, I just can't get enough black n white. I love the way they look, there is something timeless about black n white photography. I love the light, the shadows and the fact that +Linda Dean is on her Nexus in this one bitching on G+ about me taking yet another black n white picture, how cool is that?

Stiff as a plank

We have really been pushing the exercise this last week and today was no exception. In fact I am sitting here writing this post with legs as stiff as planks of wood. We started today with a cycle to north town to cancel our T-Mobile account and do a bit of shopping. After that it was time for the fun stuff, a walk through the wooded part of Crystal Lake Playing Fields followed by a kick around on one of the many football (soccer) pitches. Again I decided not to bring the Nikon as I was really going for exercise and also because I am having a whole lot of fun with the Nexus 5 right now. You are however in luck in that I decided on a few colour shots today, mainly because we had an encounter on the way with the biggest fracken dragonfly I've ever seen. This guy was big, mean, armoured and busy looking for a place to rest when we stumbled along with our cameras.

We must have been a comical sight creeping forward one step at a time trying not to disturb it before we got a few shots.

I am really not surprised this one had to rest awhile, the armour on it was really impressive. I could not imagine another creature in the insect world (at least here in Corvallis) taking this one on.

Just look at that tail, if anyone knows what kind of dragonfly this is, please let me know in the comments. I'd be really interested in knowing and maybe doing a bit of research on them. This was the first time we'd seen this particular kind and I'm wondering if it's a rare type or if they are common in the Willamette Valley.

Now before you get to excited about the colour pictures I am still in a black n white sort of mood and I thought this was a good one from today's haul. I just kind of like the way it looks. And that's really it for now, I will be taking the Nikon out very soon and I am also currently editing a whole lot of pictures from awhile back.

Nexus at the park

I have to say that I have really been enjoying my Nexus 5 over the past few months. It was a good upgrade from my HTC Sensation which was a great phone in its day with a great camera. And even though it was a phone that was a couple of years old, the camera really held up well and was tough to leave behind. But everything changes and comes to an end and when the touch screen started selecting apps on its own I knew it was time to say good buy to my beloved HTC Sensation. I chose the Nexus 5 because of price and more importantly I wanted to have the stock Google experience. The fact that the Nexus series also receives fast regular updates, also helped as I have been burned in the past (damn Moto...where's my Xoom 2 JB upgrade???) helped in the decision. Well I haven't been disappointed, the Nexus 5 is a truely beautiful piece of technology that is well worth owning. Today though I won't bore you with a review but instead show off what the camera on the Nexus 5 can do.

I know, I know, more black n white but like I said in my last post, I am just in a black n white mood right now so you will have to bear with me until I work through it. If I don't work through it I may develop itchy eyeball syndrome and not be able to take more pictures ;-)

This one I really liked, it was just a random shot but I liked the way it turned out. It's amazing how some of your favourite shots will be random snaps.

I also really like this one of +Linda Dean and Talon chilling after we'd just finished a full 18 hole round of disc golf at Willamette Disc Golf Course here in Corvallis.

Disc golf in the sun can make you thirsty indeed and so refreshments were on hand or in my backpack as the case was. Bottles of watery goodness are an absolute must when doing the full course. And again I think this photo really shows off the quality of the camera on the Nexus 5.

I used Snapseed on Android to edit these shots and like I've been saying for some time, it is a fine little editor to have on hand and in your pocket. If you're in the market for a new phone I would definitely take a serious look at the Nexus 5, it's a serious piece of kit at an affordable price.