This reads in a rambling manor because I have been sampling my gruit :)

Well, I just pitched my first apple cider.  I did a 2 gallon batch just to try it.  I used 2 gallons of apple juice and a vial of White Labs English Cider Yeast.  I sanitized everything, including the outside of jugs if cider, then poured the juice into the fermenter, then pitched the yeast and shook it for 5 minutes.

I'll keep it at about 70 and see what happens.   My plan is to bottle in 2 weeks with a very small amount of corn sugar, just to give it a zing of carbonation, and condition it for a 1 1/2 month or so then drink.

I used some unfiltered (but pasteurized) honey crisp apple juice from QFC.  No idea what that means, but my calculations are a 5.3% or so cider.  If it works I'll try it in the 5 gallon carboy, and maybe try pear or something.  I plan reusing the yeast and doing a pear cider or different ciders.  I'd like to experiment with sweet cider by using potassium sorbate and making more of a sweet wine.

BTW, my last gruit recipe turned out awesome.  It is by far, hands down, the most unique beer I've ever had.  It has a citrusy, floral, piney, sour, kind of cidery taste.  It's beer-like, but is not beer like most people know it.  I can re-post the recipe if anyone is interested.  

Don't try any of my Root beer attempts.  They've been bad.

That said, I want to do it again.  I'm close to doing a root beer modeled after a Strong Scotch Ale.  I'm thinking of making a fairly standard dark ale for the malt bill, but doing the long boil and the cold fermentation and lagering, like a scotch ale, event using the WYeast Scotch Ale Yeast.

I have Vanilla, Wintergreen, Sarsaparilla, Anise, Licorice, Ginger, Cloves, Nutmeg, Cinnamon, Allspice, Roasted Dandelion Root, Peppermint.  Both my Root beers have been ruined by Ginger.  I need to hold WWWWAAAAYYYY back on the Ginger.  I only used a little bit last time and it tasted so much like Ginger, it ruined everything.  I think the Root Beer Extract also had Ginger in it, so it was too much.  My first Root Beer I used a large chunk of Ginger Root!  This time I plan on using a very thinly sliced medallion for a 2 gallon test batch.  

I want to take some Malt Extract and boil it in a low amount of water for a long time to caramelize the shit out of it and make it as unfermentable as possible, then adding it into the rest of the boil.  I also plan on doing a higher (155+) mash to get the Maltodextrin content higher.  I may use Cara-pils as well.

Also on my Todo list is a Chocolate Raspberry Stout.  I also want to do a normal Strong Scotch Ale, even perhaps with a small amount of Rauch Malt, except unhopped.  I'd use Licorice, Ginger, Yarrow, and Ginger instead.  I'd do a 3 hour boil and shoot for a 80-90 OG beer, and I'd shoot for a higher Final Gravity by caramelizing more of the sugars during the boil.  It would be made in a similar style as the Root Beer, except have more traditional Scotch Ale flavors with a more Modern Scotch Ale malt bill.  Maybe only do Pale Malt and Roasted Barley, using the long boil to get more flavor.

So here’s some opinion questions, give honest opinions.  Just give a Yes or No on whether it sounds good as a Root Beer ingredient.   

Bittering Hops

Aroma Hops

Juniper

Spruce

Cinnamon

Black Cherry

Birch Bark

Sassafras (has anyone had Sassafras Root Beer?) 

Molasses

Honey

Smoked Malt

I may or may not use the results.  I do plan on doing a hopped Root Beer, but would probably only do Aroma Hops.  I <3 Aroma Hops.

If I have success I'll post the recipe. Any recommendations on good commercial Apple cider?

It's been a while, so here's a new beer post.

My root beer is going in the secondary right now.  I doctored it up w/ a glop of root beer extract I found in the spices, and added some vanilla, licorice root, and roasted dandelion root, as well as some honey to get it up to 4.5%.  it's a medium brown now, and tastes like a less gingery version of my last one.

I got all of the ingredients for a gruit-like beer (unhopped, flavored w/ herbs and spices). I have a little over half an ounce of Mugwort, and have Spruce and Lavender growing in my yard, and Dandelion growing all around it.  I'd probably still get some Heather tips, Sweet Gale, and licorice root.  

Scotland, who has long been known for excelent malt beverages was also one of the last converts to hops.  All of the above herbs and spices are historically used in Scottish Beers.  So the beer I want to make is "Scottish" inspired.  I have a beer cooler made out of a 32 gallon garbage can I bought.  I have a large number of ice packs to keep it cold, and recently got a peltier which I want to install.  I still need a thermostat.   

I'm not actually properly setup for all grain, I'll spare burnin myself this time by using some extract.  

I picked up the following:

7 lbs Light Malt Extract Syrup

2 lbs British Maris Otter 2-Row Pale Malt

1.5 lbs Cara-Pils makt

12 oz Caramunich Malt

12 oz Victory Malt 

WYeast Irish Ale Yeast.

I still may get Sweet Gale, Heather, Ginger, and MMAAYYBBEE some honey.  This should be a decent "Ancient Scottish Inspired" beer.  

The gruit ingredients need to be figured out.  I was going to soak each ingredient in some Rogue Dead Guy Whiskey, which I picked up and drank a little, and is OK, not a good of whiskey as Dead Guy Ale is beer, and mix until I get a good flavor, and add in some of the bittering herbs in the boil (Heather).  I also may pick up a small bag of dried juniper berry to dry hop with.

My plan is to try and ferment at 60 and "lager" at 45ish which is normal for scottish ales.  I'm renting a uhaul to get some dresser drawers tommorow, if I can find a fridge on craigslist I'm all over it.  If not, the 45 degree lagering may not happen.  

If anyone wants to give input, please do.  The actual herb additions are up in the air, and still being researched.  

It'll be a 7.5% beer or so, some honey could boost it a hair more.  I normally wouldn't add honey to a beer, but "ancient inspired style" beers like gruit or my "early american small beers" (root beer), it makes alot of historical sense.  

I have Aha Toro Reposado Tequila and Rogue Dead Guy Whiskey, which are both recommended.  Aha is primo tequila, and Rogue's attempt at whiskey isn't half bad, it's no Wild Turkey Rare Breed, but it's at least smooth, has good flavor, and doesnt manage to taste too boozey.  I've been meaning to try it, and recently got around to it.  I've heard they make a spruce gin I want to try.

Another project I'm working on is a crock pot still.  If I can make some whiskey I may add it a small portion to the scotch ale to boost it a percent or so. .

So, my rootbeer experiment could have turned out better, it went bad faster than any beer I've made.  I'll have to use hops next time.  I scrapped it and made an IPA-Like beer with the rest of what I had.  We'll see how that turns out :)

I'm looking at making a lager of some kind.   I built a box out of styrofoam and a thermoelectric cooler, so hopefully I can keep the temps down during fermentation.

Anyone have any suggestions for craft lagers (Shmaltz Coney Island Lager is pretty good).

I'm thinking about doing a european style beer with American ingredients, or maybe a mix. I would like to try and find some good lagers (no, not coors), and do some comparisons, then try to formulate a beer based on that.  I've had a few, but thought I'd get some suggestions.

--

Anyone have good BBQ Joint suggestions (or food in general).  Stans BBQ in Issaquah, and Pecos Pit in Seattle are the only two I've tried that I liked in the Seattle area. 

--

Here's a question, I know good places to camp, and to backpack, but does anyone know of any good areas to mountain bike in and camp out?

I have May 8 - 17 scheduled off of work.  I was going to drive to Boise to visit inlaws, but my Wife is going back next weekend instead.  Due to a scheduled product release and recent work insanity, I'm planning on keeping the week+ off for a solo adventure.

I like to Bike pack, but I like to road trip.  I can do and sometime can handle cold rain, but bike packing in it be a pain, but can also be rewarding.  I could sleep in the back of my Forester, and take my dog on a road trip, do a tour of some car camping places.  I could do the Peninsula, hitting the national forest and park, but it's more a summer time trip, and Earl (my dog) couldn't go to the National Park. I could do Eastern washington.  Maybe do some prospecting near Liberty (I LOVE that area).  I want to camp.  If I go off my bike Earl may not be able to go.  If it's off a trail or Forest service/logging road I could probably take him.  I'd like that.  I'm geared up to camp with him.

I could probably do $500 or so max, and I'm a campaholic (rain, wind, snow, or forest fires, I've done them all), so something camping related is probably in order.  I'm geared for anything short of camping on glaciers.  Snow is not an obsticle.  

Anyway,  help me.  Even crazy things like run to vegas (I'd nix that idea immediately, since the wifey would have visions of hookers dancing in her head) or hunting bigfoot all week are welcome since I like differing opinions like the new FO do.  BTW, as an Avid NW roadtripper, Corco's highway blog rocks.

***

The root beer turned out not the greatest, but not the worst.  I'm drowning the last one I have (my dad has some).  It's OK.  Too gingery, kind of funky. My next two beers are a Blueberry Honey ale, and another root beer, except it'll be done with hops.  I did a blueberry honey ale about 3 months ago.  It went fast. It was my best beer.  I'll post what I do when I do them.  In a Beer making fan post. I also plan to do a quick and dirty beer making for dummies post.

Every two or three months I run the Leavenworth to eat German food and drink German Beers and Micros.  Well, I'm here.  I love stopping at the cheese monger to get beer, cheese, and landjager.  I take the dogs to the Munchen Haus to eat hot dogs and drink beer with me.  We'll be doing that today.  I just realized Der Man Shoppe has homebrew supplies!  I gave up my weekend trip to the beer supply, so hopefully they have a few things I need, and it's not SOOOOO expensive I can't bring myself to buy anything.

Any suggestions for food and drink?  I know the town too well, but still, I honor other peoples opinions.

I'll probably not be posting anything tommorow, here's my homebrew tidbit.  I racked the rootbeer to secondary yesterday.  The taste was underwhelming, so I'm getting some Anise Extract, Vanilla Extract, Wintergreen, and Sarsparillia to spice it up at bottling.  I'm thinking an Imperial Rootbeer next time I decide to do a root beer.  8-12 percent, hopped to hell and back, lots of dark malts and/or chocolate malts. 

My next beer is going to be a casked mild ale.  Now I have to find a decent cask for 1-2 people :p

Well, I'm going to be racking my root beer to the secondary fermenter next weekend.  I could probably do it now, but I haven't taken any hydrometer readings, and I'm sure it'll be OK to rack in a week.  The problem with racking beer too early from the primary is risk of making bombs.

If you're not sure Racking is the process transferring the beer from the primary to the secondary or to bottle.  You want to make sure fermentation is done, either by doing successive hydrometer readings, or just waiting long enough (2 weeks for normal beers).

The Root beer has a wonderful rootbeer like flavor.  It also looks like root beer one my last poll, so when I finally bring some beer around, it'll be a root beer.  Probably just use a decent extract syrup, a few spices, malt extract and molasses.

I'll be bottling my heather ale tonight.  My next project might be a session style ale or a cask ale, like real ale or a casked mild ale.  I realized that 2 Mr. Beer fermenters hold 2.5 gallons of beer.  They're only useful as a 2 gallon primary fermenter, so I've considered them for test batches, but now I an thinking of making a 5 gallon batch and splitting it in half, one in each fermenter.  I'd make a small beer (I SWEAR I'm not obsessed with small beers), since I'd be forced to drink 2.5 gallons of beer as soon as I started drinking it.  You don't use additional sugars to carbonate, so it'd taste flat compared to what you're probably used to.  I could get one of those expanders, like they use in a party pig, they expand as the beer empties to keep it from spoiling.  Then I could make a higher alcohol beer and not be forced to drink it ASAP.  If the Mr. Beer works as a cask, I'll let you know. 

Did you know George Washington had a beer recipe.  It's a molasses small beer. 

http://www.beerhistory.com/library/holdings/washingtonrecipe.shtml