Hive Door tasting

22 days in bottle; Nov 19 @ cellar temp

Appearance - Finger or so head, fairly quick dissipation into bubbly film; amber brew with golden highlights; not much lacing, if any; a bit murky

Aroma - Banana, honey, pepper, almost note of cola, slight vanilla

Taste-Mouthfeel - Smooth malty, wheaty intro into fairly high carbonation, nice hop spread lays out on the pallet with definite pepper notes, honeysuckle; dry spicy finish (coriander?)

Drinkability etc - This is a fairly complex brew, lots of flavors; I need to do another serious tasting on this one. Each time I've had this one, I have noticed different things that jump out, though this is the first time I have sat down to actually take notes on what I am tasting. Strong honey/banana/pepper aroma pulls you in - I think the Trappist yeast worked well with this brew; Maybe a bit too intense flavor to session (also with a well hidden 7.5% alc/vol); but an interesting brew; look forward to seeing how it ages; I think this one would be good cask-style

Below is a photo of another pour where the head was much more active (may have had to do with the fact that this one came from the fridge, whereas the one I took notes on was straight from the cellar).

Abe Lincoln's Apple Pie (follow-up)

So this is a bit of a follow-up to the below posting about spotting Abe Lincoln in a pie crust while about to make a pumpkin pie.

We decided not to use the crust right then (though we did make the pumpkin pie with another (you, know, they come in twos)). After receiving numerous responses, and emails (thanks Arrow!!), about the sighting, I learned that Abe Lincoln's favorite pie was an Apple Pie. Apparently, Honest Abe's favorite dinner was cheese and crackers.

Anyway, learning this info, H decided to send our Abe phantasm to culinary heaven by baking him into an Apple Pie. As you can see from the photo above, he was still there, waiting...

Not only did she bake him into the pie, but she used him for the top crust! You know he was loving it.


We put vanilla ice cream on our slices. Really tasty. Used a simple (yet yummy) recipe from River Road Recipes, a Southern classic.

Gingerbread Monk Ale

So Hannah and I decided to brew up a beer together. My idea was to do a seasonal brew that we could enjoy with friends (and ourselves) this Christmas season, so we went with a gingerbread beer idea from the awesome book, Radical Brewing. One thing I like about this book is that a lot of the brew ideas/recipes leave a lot of room for you to come up with your own parts... Like for this one, really, you were only told a specific mixture of spices to add at the end of the boil, those you would use for a gingerbread cookie: ginger, clove, cinnamon and allspice.

Though it said to compliment this with a lightly hopped brown ale, I decided to fill out the rest of the recipe with a more caramel malty version of the Trappe Door, hence the Monk part of the recipe. Here is the wort after mashing the grains and adding the malt extract, waiting for boil...

Boiling...

Only did one hop addition (since the spices are supposed to be a large part of the profile) at the begin of the boil (1 oz of Fuggles and 1/2 oz of Hallertauer). Also, channeling my inner monk, added 1/2 lb. of turbinado sugar.

Midway through the brew, it was looking nice. Added more of the sugar.

Gingerbread spices were added around 5 minutes and then after the boil, started cooling it down asap with Pete's wort chiller (thanks Pete!!!). We had it down to around 78 within about 15 minutes.

Warning: Before yeasting, always make sure that no babies have crawled into the fermenter.

Here you see Hannah pitching a vial of White Labs Trappist yeast before we shut the lid. Before yeasting, I took a sample for the hydrometer. Around 1.070 OG. Let it ferment around 9 days, now reading 1.014. This brings it to 7.2%. All exactly the same as the Trappe Door. About to rack it into the carboy now, weather outside cooling down...

Brewed on Sun, Nov 9
Racked on Tue, Nov 18
Bottled on Wed, Dec 10 (half batch went into Party Pig)

Abe Lincoln spotted in pie crust

This weekend, I was prepping a pumpkin pie, and when I looked down at the pre-made, frozen crust, I spotted Abe Lincoln. See the below photo. I dont know if this is some magic mojo moving up to the election this week, but it was quite amazing to say the least. After showing the photo to numerous folks that evening, we also realized there was a man whispering in Abe's ear.

I hope to follow up with another seasonal soup recipe soon, a pumpkin soup I have been trying to perfect this fall. A fusion of a Mexican soup with a Cajun one. Really good, more to come on that...

Trappe Door tasting

After about 20 days of aging, I finally sat down with a chalice of Trappe Door for a serious tasting...

Hannah drew the label for me, and I changed them up in color, etc, kindof like some psychedelic beer Easter eggs.


Nov 1 @ cellar temp

Appearance - Pinky finger head into malty film, brown reddish tints in the pour; dark brownish brew, reddish tints up to light; dark

Smell - Woody, chocolate notes; banana; vanilla; alcohol

Mouthfeel/Taste - Smooth & sweet malty nose, slight caramel & definite chocolate flavor into nice hop bitterness; low carbonation; slight fruit finish, almost grape-like; slight spice

Drinkability - This one hides the alcohol well, I am feeling its 7.2 % only halfway through - tasty Dubbel-style, almost leaning towards a stout, though not that thick; definitely easy to drink, though potent!

Hive Door (bottled)

Hive Door was finally bottled Oct. 28, and then lugged to the cellar the next day. Samples tasted out of this world, seriously. Really looking forward to having this one when it's carbonated etc. I primed it with a healthy amount (3/4 c.) of Washed Raw Sugar. Below are just the tall boys from the batch (notice the two champagne bottles in back - we plan to age one for a year).

Dragon Door Ale

My latest brew, is a Chinese-themed brew titled Dragon Door. What you are seeing below are the basic ingredients: Demerara sugar (1/2 lb), Clover Honey (1/2 lb), Malt Extract (6 lbs), Brown Rice (1 lb), Ginseng Oolong tea (will use around 10 tsp), and a bag of grains (Belgian Pils, Carapils & Crystal 10L). These were the basics used, along with some other things I added like 1/2 tsp soy sauce and 1/2 tsp ground ginger.


I cooked the brown rice in a rice cooker, and then, along with the adjunct grains, I mashed them at around 160 degrees for about 45 minutes, then sparged and lautered into my brew pot (I think I am using the correct terminology here, as this is the closest I have gotten to mashing grains myself).

Added the hops, using 3 oz of Saaz (2 oz at 60 minutes, 1/2 oz at 30, and last 1/2 oz at 15). I chose Saaz as a Tsingtao clone I spotted online used them as well (plus I already had some in my freezer!).


I totally forgot to buy ice that day before brewing (I usually use two bags in a tub of cold water to cool off the wort - old school style), so Pete brought over the wort chiller that he made himself. Check it... Cooled the wort down to about 67 degrees within around 20 minutes. Nice. The spots floating below are ginseng oolong tea leaves I added at flameout (only 1 tablespoon).

To hook the wort chiller up to my sink, we had to use some plumbing skills. An ancient roll of Babolat tennis racket tape (used to help from scuffing the end of your racket) came in handy.

So, keeping with Chinese tradition, I fermented (using White Labs German Kolsch yeast) for 8 days (8 is good). I then, the morning before racking, boiled 4 cups of water, then turning off the heat, dropped in 8 tsp of ginseng oolong tea and let it steep for about an hour and half. I then strained it into a Pyrex and funneled it into my carboy. I then racked the fermented beer onto the tea in the carboy. Hydrometer readings for this one gave me 1.050 Original Gravity and around 1.015 Final Gravity, meaning the finished brew should be around 4.5% alc/vol. Should be interesting how this one tastes. I plan to keep in secondary for 13 days (in Chinese numerology, 13 is a good number, versus in Western culture).


Brewed on Fri, Oct 24
Racked on Sat, Nov 1
Bottled on Fri, Nov 14 (note: half into a Party Pig/half into bottles)