The vineyards first verasion is here!!!

 Its been awhile since my last post and things have been going well in the vineyard. It seems like its been forever since i took these pics back in June and so much has changed...

 The first grape plants planted were the Frontenac plants (shown above on the right) 3 years ago. This is the year, if everything goes as planned, these plants will produce their first crop. Not a full crop but enough to get a few gallons out of at least.

The plants growth had sped up as the month of June went on and they started producing many tiny grape clusters. Many of which I would remove so that the plant isn't trying to produce too much fruit, making the grapes low in sugar and very poor for the purpose of wine making.

 The trick is to get just the right amount of grapes, thinning them out just enough to get the largest crop with just the right amount of sugars. To do this i prune to one cluster per shoot, making sure to keep the best looking cluster that is closest to the first leaf on the shoot.

 In July the clusters have clearly defined berries on them now and will continue to grow. And the grape canopy continues its growth and is trimmed once past the 5th wire to keep growth in check. I want the plant to concentrate on berry growth and not just vine growth.

 And now we are at Verasion! This is the time of year when the berries start to produce their color and begin to ripen. It seems like it has taken forever to get to this stage and i can't wait to follow the ripening process for the first time in the vineyard.

 I will keep you updated!

 I've been eating these burritos for breakfast every morning over the past few months and I am still not sick of them, so i though I'd share them with you. First I take some frozen vegetables, add some water, set on med/high heat and wait for it to start boiling. I then add some vegetable bullion, let that dissolve, take it off the heat and rehydrate the appropriate amount of TVP (textured vegetable protein) to the water you added before hand.

 Next I stir in a can of diced tomatoes and add hot sauce, chili powder, and red pepper flakes. I like it hot so i add plenty.

 Then add the beans, I usually add 1 can each of kidney, black and pinto, But you can add what you like.

 Just let it simmer for a bit, heat up some wraps, put some lettuce on it with some soy based sour cream and enjoy!!!

It makes a ton so you will have enough to fill an 8 pack of wraps.

Hops... Its whats for dinner!

 Its Finally showing signs of spring around here. The buds on the grape vines are starting to pop.

 The fruit trees are in bloom.

 And more importantly, the hops have started to climb towards the sky. Hops are a very aggressive plant, not kept in check it can spread like crazy. Which really isn't the best thing when you'd like to maximize the amount of hop cones one plant will produce.

 The plant will send out many little shoots like this trying to take over the area the plant is in. These tiny shoots are a pain and must be clipped, only allowing the selected shoots to climb. I usually allow 6 shoots per plant to remain and the rest, well those make a wonderful side dish.

 Young hop shoots are kinda like Asparagus, if you cut they at just the right time they are very tender, cut too late and they become stringy.  I've been picking the hop shoots from my 7 plants for about a week now and have had enough to make them for dinner every other day. Seriously, if you stand there and watch the plants you will see them grow, the shoots can grow from 6 to 12 inches in a day and the plants will create many new shoots in that time also.

First i trim them so only the tender tips of the shoots are left, about 4 to 6 inches of the shoots will be left. I also add any of the leaves that get trimmed of in the process, I think they taste much like spinach. Then place them on some tinfoil and add olive oil, salt and pepper. Close up the tinfoil and place on the grill while you cook the rest of your meal.

 I was making some seiten burgers to have with them, which i was in a hurry to make so i made them by rolling into a log, cooking, then slicing.

Turns out perfect and the hops really pull in the salt and pepper flavor.

I can look forward to having hops for atleast every other day for atleast another month before the plants start to direct their attention to creating cones.

Cold weather, Clear wine

Its been awhile since my last post, i guess nothing too exciting going on this winter. Been doing some x-country skiing and snowshoeing to get me out of the house and combat wintertime laziness, nothing I've felt the need to write about though. Guess i need to do something to combat the mental laziness that comes with winter time too.

I've been brewing beer off and on, but lately I've turned my attention back over to the wine. The cold month of January means its time to cold stabilize the whites and rack the reds into fresh glass carboys. Oh, can't forget to taste the progress of the wine to of course.
Cold stabilization is the process where wine is exposed to temperatures below freezing to encourage tartaric acid to crystallize and precipitate out of the wine, reducing the acidity and smoothing out the wine. To do this i transfer the wine from glass carboys to plastic. I've lost a few glass carboys in years past to frozen wine breaking the glass, which not only means losing a carboy but the wine that was in it.

 After transferring the wine into the plastic carboy it goes out to the garage for a few weeks and then will be transferred back into the glass and allowed to age another 3 months until it is time to bottle.
Next the reds needed to be racked into new carboys and set aside for another 6 months to clear before being bottled.

 The 11 gallons of DeChaunac were in the huge glass carboy which i had to lift onto the work bench. This thing is twice the size of the normal carboys i use and is quite heavy.

Once the reds were transferred and stored away, it was time to taste how the wine is progressing. Both whites were very clear and dry with a fruity taste. The Cab Sav. is not a robust red because we could not add the skins, so it is more like a fruity blush, a nice red for the summer that i can bottle with the whites. Above is the DeChaunac, which has a deep purple color and very rich in flavor, I can't wait to see what some aging will do for it.
After all that wine tasting we really needed to eat, so i decided to make a fried tofu dish. First i cut up some tofu and placed it dry in the skillet and placed on medium heat to cook the moisture out of them.

While those were cooking I mixed up a marinade using braggs (or soy sauce), mustard, coconut milk, curry, hot sauce, and pepper in a bowl and added onions. I removed the onions when the tofu was done and added it to the marinade.

I cooked the onions on medium-high heat and then added green beans and cooked until tender.

Then added the rest of the tofu with marinade and cooked until done.

Place on a bed of rice and this dish was amazing!!!

I think I'm going to makes some chili this weekend, I'll need it since i have the YMCA Polar Bear 5 mile run on Sunday. The forecast is calling for a high of  7, yeah that's right seven. I'll let you know how it goes.

100 Gallons of beer and 2 feet of snow

I have been trying to increase my brewing production slowly every year. Last year i really didn't brew much due to moving and not having the time to dedicate to a day of beer making. This year I set my goal to reach the 100 gallon mark, and over the weekend I reached that goal by brewing my 100th Gallon IPA. Its really not much different from my other IPA's, just the addition of Melanoidin malt which will give it a redness.

 Just over 15 lbs of grain will make this my normal over-the-top alcohol beer that i love. Then add some Cascade hops to the Lauter Tun for that nice bitterness, and this one should be good and ready for the new year.

 This is the 3rd beer I've brewed in my new brewshop configuration, now that the weather had turned cold, and I am really liking it. Next year im planning on having a new garage and a new permanent brewshop so this is helping me to figure out what works best for me.

 It snowed the whole day while brewing but the brewshop kept warm with the burner going, it was actually quite toasty in there.

 Above was last weeks IPA which I siphoned off into a carboy for clearing and the new batch was poured onto the left over yeast. Pouring the new beer onto yeast that was used in a previous batch results in a quick start to the fermentation process. Normally it wouldn't really get going until the next day, this can create off flavors by allowing bacteria to settle in, but with this method it takes off right away. This is a video after just 2 hours.

As the yeast feeds on the sugars, it creates alcohol and co2, which you see bubbling out of the bucket and it the jar of sanitized water.

 Like i said, it had snowed all brewday thanks to the lake effect snow band parked right over top of us. This is how it looks right after brewing as Riley and I played outdoors before it got dark

And this is the next morning, we now have about 2 feet of snow on the ground and more coming. I can't wait to get the skis out tonight!

Cold Rain and Snow

It has been raining, i mean pouring, for the last 24 hours. When i woke up this morning I notice the backyard looked alittle different. It was still raining so i got an umbrella and the dog and I went out to see what was going on. When we got around the garage i noticed the lower yard had about 5 feet of water in some places. We now have a lake!!! I waited until it was light out and took the camera out to take some pics. It had receded about a foot in the last hour but was still pretty high.

I never thought the water would make it up to the grapes. I doubt it will have any negative effects on them though. The pond project though needs to be rethought, as the water completely submerged the lower pond. Good thing this part of the project has been taking awhile to complete, now i will have to figure out how to build it up higher. Maybe I'll make it smaller and build up the sides more to make it deeper.

Atleast the fish in the middle pond are happy, If i would have finished the lower pond this past year like i had planned those fish would have been long gone. Plus all the nasty water would have been pumped into the upper ponds, What a mess that would have been. As i was leaving for work the rain had turned to snow and it was starting to stick.

And now its just getting down right nasty.

Anyways, its been awhile, I won't say I've been busy, just hadn't felt like blogging lately. Nothing really going on, just been getting ready for the winter. I ran the Buffalo Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving morning, and finished in a time of 32:52 which is a PR in the 8k.

Then finished the race off with 6 beers before the crowds came in and was out the door of the convention center by 10am. Then it was off the Mom and Dad's for Thanksgiving drinking, i mean dinner. That race finished my running year in which all 5 races i ran were PR's, I'm hoping i can carry this momentum into next year. Hope Everyone had a great Thanksgiving!!!