Posted: April 2nd, 2008 | Author: Stacy | Filed under: Chit Chat | No Comments »
While my hands haven’t been bothering me since adding beer and limited other glutens back into my diet, my knees have been really achy of late. And then suddenly my left wrist was really stiff for no reason! So I’m going to try a couple of gluten-free weeks to see if that clears up my aches and pains. If not, then more beer! All the beer I want!
Getting older sucks, especially since I’m not even old yet!
Posted: March 30th, 2008 | Author: Stacy | Filed under: Chit Chat | No Comments »
Check out those hops shoots!… the hops starts growing again! Every year, the whole plant dies off in the fall and I have to cut it down to the crown. Then it comes back to life in the spring, starting out like weird purple asparagus. This will be the third year I’ve had this plant in the same location, which probably means it’s going to be
huge this year. I harvested 2 gallon bags of cones from it last year, which is more than enough hops for a homebrewer for an entire year.
I took the hops as a rescue plant from a friend, and was told that it’s Cascade. But it’s not! Instead, it appears to be Willamette hops, which is just as well for me since it’s a slightly lower alpha hops (4-6%). Kathy and I have talked about using some of the hops for wedding flower arrangements this fall! Grow little hops, grow!
Posted: March 21st, 2008 | Author: Stacy | Filed under: Brewpubs, Chit Chat, Newsworthy, Organic | No Comments »
They’ve taken their sweet time getting to this point, so it’s really exciting that Hopworks is actually opening for business on Tuesday, March 25. I’ve had their IPA while schmoozing with fellow designers at Holocene, the ESB at Meridian and Cava, and the lager at Fire on the Mountain. Predictably, the IPA was way too hoppy for me, but I kinda knew that when I ordered it. The ESB is an easy drinker and a solid beer, and their lager sure was tasty with hot wings.
I’m just excited to see worthwhile, stripper-free, quality beer-oriented establishments move in on SE Powell.
Posted: March 1st, 2008 | Author: Stacy | Filed under: Chit Chat | No Comments »
Ok, so it’s not here at my house, but the Amnesia Brewing truck just pulled up in front of a neighbor’s house. Maybe I need to go make some new neighborly friends…
What would be more awesome than the ice cream man? The BEER man!
Posted: February 25th, 2008 | Author: Stacy | Filed under: Chit Chat | No Comments »
I’ve had two beers now after my month off from gluten, and I don’t seem to be suffering any adverse effects. No noticeable arthritis flare ups, no joint stiffness or pain, no nuthin’. I’m not going to go out and gorge myself on bread and beer, but it does give me hope that I don’t have to give up beer entirely! My goal is to stay on a low-gluten diet for the time being and see how that works.
On Saturday, I bought the makings for a maibock, but now I think I may try making up a recipe for a low-gluten lager/maibock instead. Rather than use malt extracts, I’ll use rice and corn syrups with some toasted 2-row malted barley to add a more authentic beer flavor. Seeing as I’m not allergic to gluten, there’s no reason to completely avoid it. But there’s also no reason to tempt fate, so a lower gluten beer might be the regular beer-drinking answer! More on that recipe when I try it out.