Well, the cold, err, cooler weather is among us and the Christmas Party has come to conclusion.\u00a0Once again, Larry and Jill did a great job on the ham and turkey, and the side dishes were fabulous.\u00a0Hopefully everyone had the chance to try the eggplant parmesan and those great potato casseroles.<\/p>\n
As usual, there were a few fermented beverages consumed, with some of the highlights being Ron and Paula Sup\u2019s plum wine, Mike Ellis\u2019s braggots, and Dave Webb\u2019s mead, just to name a few.<\/p>\n
Annual elections were held with the results as follows: Mac was reelected as our fearless leader (president) for another year, as well as Mike (VP) and Michelle (treasurer) Ellis, Glenn Exline (newsletter), and Joe Kintyhtt (librarian).\u00a0The new positions were Dani Parris-Exline as first VP and Sean Gregg as secretary.<\/p>\n
With the holidays right around the corner, I thought I would take a minute to let you all know what I have been drooling over.\u00a0Not so that you can buy it for me, but so that you might be able to buy it for your special brewer.<\/p>\n
Oxygenation system.\u00a0These things are cool!\u00a0What\u2019s better than watching bubbles in your wort?\u00a0These systems either infuse pure oxygen or air into your wort before you pitch your yeast.\u00a0This give those few billion yeast cells exactly what they need to do their job.\u00a0Most systems are under $50 and available through places like morebeer.com.<\/p>\n
Flasks.\u00a0No, not the kind you buy and smuggle into sporting events, but Erlenmeyer flasks.\u00a0These flasks are great for starters and storing yeast.\u00a0Now that Sunseed Co-op has started a program to discount \u201cold\u201d yeast, you might want to go pick some up and make a starter to get your wort kicking sooner and better.\u00a0Don\u2019t be afraid of those vials once they go past their \u201cbest by\u201d date.\u00a0Instead, make a starter and get the yeast active and pitch it!\u00a0Not too long ago, I ran across a White Labs 10 year anniversary blend that was almost two years past the \u201cbest by\u201d date.\u00a0Well, three days on a stir plate and some yeast nutrient later, I had krausen in the flask and beer about two weeks later.\u00a0The price of Erlenmeyer flasks vary with their size, but a 1 liter flask should be enough to make most starters.<\/p>\n
Honey, honey, honey.\u00a0To some, the best, to others, the only ingredient in your fermented beverage!\u00a0One of my favorite Belgian recipes uses 2 pounds of honey (Check the online forum for the recipe).\u00a0And who doesn\u2019t love mead?\u00a0So, make sure you support our sponsors (and fellow member) and get some honey for your honey.<\/p>\n
Of course, BEER!\u00a0I thought I would try to start a regular section that highlighted some of the newer beers that our local stores are receiving.\u00a0So without further ado\u2026<\/p>\n
What\u2019s Hoppening?<\/strong><\/p>\n I stopped by another one of our fabulous sponsors (Sunseed Co-op) a couple of weeks ago and here\u2019s the new brews Matt has on his shelf.\u00a0Bell\u2019s Third Coast (old ale), Dogfish Head\u2019s Old School, Raison D\u2019Extra (yeah, almost 20% abv) and Theobroma, Shipyard\u2019s Prelude, Longfellow, Barleywine, and Imperial Porter, Anchor\u2019s Old Foghorn, Left Hand\u2019s Warrior IPA (this stuff is so good, I got a keg!\u00a0A really awesome fresh hop beer), Sam Adam\u2019s Chocolate Bock, Eerie Brewing\u2019s Misery IPA, Railbender Scottish, and Old Red.\u00a0\u00a0 Some of the higher of the highlights I noticed were vintage 2007 Nice Chouffe, Left Hand Chainsaw (double sawtooth), and Highland\u2019s mix 12 pack.\u00a0Any of these great beers would fit nicely under your tree, or in your fridge!\u00a0If you don\u2019t live close to Sunseed you can also find a lot of these new and other great beers at another one of our sponsors, Florida Wine & Spirits in Titusville, Viera, and Palm Bay.<\/p>\n As I mentioned above, Matt has started a great discount deal ($4.99) for some of the White Labs vials that have passed their \u201cbest by\u201d date.\u00a0Also, Sunseed is still the cheapest place I have seen yeast; cheaper than any online retailer, and you don\u2019t have to worry about your yeast sleeping in the back of some big brown truck at 100+ degrees for a couple of days or more.\u00a0Matt also ordered about 15 pounds of hops for the store, and rumor is that they will be more sensibly priced than some of these places charging $4.99 an ounce!<\/p>\n Sunseed is now open on Sundays from 11am-4pm, so you can stop by on your way to the monthly meetings if you come from the north part of the county.<\/p>\n I ran across a great book recently, too.\u00a0It\u2019s titled \u201cBeer Captured\u201d by Tess and Mark Szamatulski.\u00a0This is a book of mostly clone recipes (Goose Island\u2019s Honkers Ale, Delirium Tremens, and Rogue Dead Guy Ale to name a few), but there are also sections covering beer and food pairing, hop reference guide, grain and yeast charts, and water profiles from famous brewing locations.\u00a0The book is so great that we have a new copy in our library!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-member-newsletters"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saaz.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saaz.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saaz.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saaz.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saaz.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.saaz.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1506,"href":"https:\/\/www.saaz.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16\/revisions\/1506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saaz.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saaz.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saaz.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}