First Hop Harvest
[Thanks to the economy, I had to lay off the entire editorial staff of mere cat, interns and all, hence the long gap in posting. Although I have a backlog of blog drafts that I hope to turn into actual posts, it’s just me doing everything from now on, so I think posting will continue to be light.
A few drafts were devoted to hops. Here’s the first. It should have been posted in October. Confound those insolent, indolent interns.]
Anne picking the driest Glacier hops off the bines in the first picking session in early October.
Besides our regular crop of tomatoes (a record 350-odd this year), we (meaning my wife) usually grow other random crops in a corner of our little quarter-acre lot. Some brewing experiments led us to try growing our own hops.
We picked up five hop rhizomes from Keystone Homebrew in early 2008. None did well the first year, but this year our Glacier plant really took off, covering an entire wall. We started harvesting the hops while they were still on the bine, picking the driest ones at first. As novice hop growers, it was difficult to determine when to harvest them. We may have harvested them a little late, but most still seemed green and moist and only just beginning to dry out. We air-dried them briefly and bagged them for the freezer. Below is a picture of about half our harvest. Hops weigh almost nothing, but I think we came close to a pound.
Mirror Neurons, or Why I Can’t Dance
The other day I was watching a TED Talk by neuroscientist Vilayanur Ramachandran describing the function of “mirror neurons” in the human brain. These neurons are like the motor neurons (which fire when you move), but mirror neurons fire when you merely watch someone else moving. Amazing; that’s empathy at the physiological level. As Ramachandran said, “They must be involved in things like imitation and emulation, because to imitate a complex act requires my brain to adopt the other person’s point of view.”
Fine, but I don’t think I was born with any mirror neurons. Let me illustrate.
Over the last week, I’ve been trying desperately to imitate a “complex act,” viz., a video of the great drummer Peter Erskine playing brushes. He explains every stroke and sweep, all the while moving in slow motion, and I still had a remarkably difficult time imitating it. The experience reminded me of my ballroom dancing days where learning each step was a painful process that took months. I can’t believe it’s this hard for everyone. I should distinguish between the first stage of learning a movement and the subsequent practicing of it until it becomes “natural” (or in the case of my dancing, merely less grotesque). I expect practicing to take lots of time; my frustration is only with the first stage.
Admittedly, Ramachandran doesn’t say that mirror neurons make imitation easy, just possible, so maybe my expectations are just too high. On the other hand, I can imitate things by ear pretty easily, so I imagine others can pick up things by eye just as easily. What I do seem to have, at least, is the perseverance to keep trying until I get it. I guess we are each blessed with an unevenly distributed set of gifts—weakness in one area is compensated by strength in another.
Talk Like a Real Pirate
Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day. I guess it’s fun to talk like an 18th century pirate, but I thought wouldn’t it be even more fun to talk like a real pirate? But how do they talk?
Well, according to this NPR story (reported by Chana Joffe-Walt), today’s Somali pirates are quite businesslike and professional. “They’re not making threats or anything. They’re very polite in their whole demeanor,” said Per Gullestrup, one of the victims. Arrr, that doesn’t sound like much fun, does it, me matey?
Jenkintown’s Jazz and BrewFest This Sunday
The tenth annual Jenkintown Jazz and BrewFest is this Sunday, September 13 (I will be one of the orange-shirted volunteers). I have been coming to the Fest even before I moved to Jenkintown and always had a great time. It’s so much more than a beer festival with lots of great food and world-class jazz (alto saxophonist Richie Cole and singer Denise King this year). Plus this year there’s a new special tasting event before the regular BrewFest: “Breakfast and Brew,” hosted by award-winning author Lew Bryson. Info and tickets here.
World’s Longest Lobster Roll
I don’t know what possessed me to drive all the way to Maine just to witness the creation of the World’s Longest Lobster Roll. Sure, I love lobster rolls, but I prefer rolls you can pick up and eat (unlike the giants from Red’s Eats, Pearl Oyster Bar, or Mary’s Fish Camp, for example). In the end, I decided it was worth making an exception to be in on this history-making event. Besides, it was great fun.
When we arrived at the site on Commercial Street in front of Portland Lobster Company around 11:00, a long string of tables was already set up on the sidewalk. We paid our $20, which entitled us to a certificate of participation, a T-shirt, and, of course, a piece of the Longest Lobster Roll. All we had to do now was stand around in the beautiful sunshine and wait. And take lots of pictures!
The giant bun showed up near 11:30, but the truck didn’t stop and continued down Commercial Street toward the ferry terminal. By the way, this video includes a description of how Amato’s Bakery made the roll with an oven they mounted on wheels.
The bun was unloaded from the truck and brought back to the assembly area by a large group of volunteer bun bearers that included members of the Maine Roller Derby team.
The sixty-foot tray was conveyed gently...
...and set down on the tables.
Margaret Salt McLellan, Linda Bean’s executive chef, got to work slitting the roll.
Then a team of volunteers laid down a bed of Miracle Whip. (Kraft was a generous sponsor of this charitable event.)
The next step was stuffing the roll with about 48 pounds of lobster meat donated by Linda Bean’s Perfect Maine Lobster Roll.
Almost finished.
Done! Sixty-one feet, nine and a half inches.
The last step was cutting that roll into almost 200 pieces.
Show us the money. The event helped the West End Neighborhood Association provide swimming lessons for needy children.
Here’s our portion, complete with chips and lemonade. The meat was superb, very fresh with a hint of the flavor of the sea and absolutely no filler. It’s a shame they couldn’t grill the roll, but that would be completely impractical. Honestly, the Miracle Whip didn’t bother me.
It’s a shame I didn’t get decent pictures of the awesome people who made this all happen, including Linda Bean, the mayor of Portland, and people from the West End Neighborhood Association. It’s also a shame that this would be our only trip to Maine this year, but we had a wonderful time during our one-day stay.
I never thought I would see a lobster roll bigger than Red’s, but this one definitely was. I wonder if Rockland, home of the Maine Lobster Festival, is going to let Portland steal the lobster limelight? The emphasis at the Rockland festival is on whole lobster, not lobster rolls, but the Festival would be a perfect setting to mount a challenge to the record.
National Train Day
I don’t know much about the history or genesis of National Train Day (I think this year is the first one), but I do know that May 10th was selected as the date, because it is the anniversary of the driving of the “Golden Spike” in 1869 at Promontory Summit, Utah, which completed America’s first transcontinental railroad. I’ll be heading down to 30th Street Station to partake in the celebration (and probably slip into Bridgewater’s Pub for a pint at some point).
Speaking of trains, mere SEPTA has been a huge success—I think upwards of six people have used it. :-) I wasn’t able to add all the features I had planned for National Train Day, but did make some incremental improvements. The most visible change is that it now shows the train number and endpoints for each train. I also reworked the connection algorithm, which has two benefits. Gone are the spurious connections that showed up in certain situations, and it now shows how to make a connection between stations on the same line that are skipped by express trains.
Gig at Chris’ Jazz Cafe
My friends Katie Eagleson and Lenny Pierro have another gig at Chris’s Jazz Cafe this Wednesday, April 29. Their regular drummer can’t get there until later, so they asked me to play the first set. Sweet!
Chris’ Jazz Cafe is at 1421 Samson Street. Two sets, 8:00 PM and 9:45 PM. Cover is $10.
mere SEPTA: Regional Rail Schedules with Train View
Besides my daily commute on SEPTA’s R5 line, I sometimes take the train at odd hours at night and on the weekend, so I was thrilled when iSepta was released about a year ago. It is a model of good design and is by far the nicest of several third-party schedule apps out there.
Eventually I noticed that iSepta didn’t support trips that required a connection. I don’t need to make connections that often, but when I do, it involves juggling two SEPTA schedules. Another nice-to-have would be data from “Train View,” which reports each train’s on-time status. (Train View is annoying to use as is, because status is reported by train number, which makes it a pain to figure out which status applies to your train.)
I thought it would be fun to try creating a web app that supported connections and integrated Train View data. And it was, um, “fun.” So, while it’s not very pretty or full-featured, it does what I need. I hope others find it useful as well.
Although I am still tinkering with it, today seemed like a good time to make it public since SEPTA just updated five of its regional rail schedules. I’ll call this version the “beta.” I hope to have a final release ready for National Train Day on May 9. Meanwhile, please let me know if you have any suggestions or find any bugs.
To use: Go to merecat.org/septa/, pick a start and then an end station. That’s it. You will see a list of trains for the next three hours or so. If a train’s scheduled time (plus any delay from Train View) is a couple minutes in the past (meaning you can probably still catch it), then it will still show up, too. Train View delays (if any) show up in red right next to the scheduled time.
Standard Disclaimers: While it should work on any web browser, the app was tested primarily on iPhone. I am not affiliated with SEPTA in any way.
Philly Beer Week 2009: Winding Down and Wrapping Up
I promise this will be the last Beer Week post until next year—because Beer Week is over. *sniff*
My Beer Week ended with a whimper rather than a bang. For the last three days of Beer Week, I strayed rather far from my “plans,” such as they were. On Friday, I was planning to head solo to Eulogy Belgian Tavern for Brasserie d’Achouffe night, but when Anne expressed an interest in some Beer Week action, we switched the plan and headed back to Teresa's Next Door for Chimay Night.
Although Chimay is one of the most widely-available Belgians, I believe I have only had one before. We ordered a flight of three: Red, White, and Blue. (I should repeat this on Flag Day.) All were very fine, but I particularly liked the spicy White (the tripel is my favorite Belgian style). As good as the Chimay was, the big surprise and thrill of the evening was tasting Monk's Café Sour Ale (a “Flanders Oud Bruin”). I have only had a couple of sour ales before, and I think this was my favorite, mostly because I felt it was well-balanced and not too sour or too anything.
Saturday came and went with no beer outings. On Sunday we stopped at Moriarty’s (after the Go Green Expo), because they were one of the places hosting Ballast Point. They still had two on tap: Abandon Ship Smoked Lager and Black Marlin Porter. I had the porter, which was exceptionally smooth and satisfying without any heaviness.
I didn’t come out of this year’s Beer Week with much of a shopping list, but I did make mental notes of a lot of new places I would like to get to during the year. In that respect, the promotional side of Beer Week in lifting the profile of local bars is working very well indeed.
Philly Beer Week 2009: Summit at Bridgewater’s Pub
I knew I wanted to support one of my favorite haunts, Bridgewater’s Pub in 30th Street train station, by showing up at least once during Beer Week. They were holding tastings almost every day, and I pass through 30th Street every day. Ergo, easy peasy. Thursday was the day I picked, and the featured brewer happened to be Summit Brewing of St. Paul, Minnesota. They were pouring (in Summit pub glasses!) three Summit brews: Maibock, Great Northern Porter, and IPA. The Summit IPA is often on tap at Bridgewater’s, and I have had it a number of times, but the other two were new to me. My favorite was the Porter, but then I love porters.
Comments
That is so cool that you are growing hops on the side of your house!
Also, I'm jealous about all of your wonderful tomatoes!
Posted by seadragon on January 14, 2010 at 12:02 PM
When do I get to sample the Glacier Hop brew?
Robin
Posted by robin Odland on January 14, 2010 at 5:37 PM
seadragon, Full disclosure on the tomatoes: We have a community garden plot where most of the plants were; that's how we got so many. Our yard is too shady for more than a few tomato plants.
Posted by Tony Green
on January 14, 2010 at 10:53 PM
Robin, No one gets to sample the Glacier Hop brew, which is a pale ale—it was a disappointment (post coming soon explaining why). We plan to use those hops in a style that doesn't depend on strong hop flavor. Hope to share some of that. :-)
Posted by Tony Green
on January 14, 2010 at 10:58 PM
Looking forward to seeing the brew that these are used for. :)
Posted by Steph on January 17, 2010 at 11:17 AM
I love hoppy beer. I'm about to crack a Hop Wallop and take Judy out for a walk.
Posted by Jimmy CraicHead on February 3, 2010 at 9:29 PM