This is your fault Gordy!

A few posts back I got excited about my bubbly fermenting kimchi and one of my 'regular readers' foolishly asked if it was possible to make kimchi beer. Well, only one way to find out I guess :)

After a bit of digging around on the internet I figured that for various scientific reasons* it would be hard to make a brew that would stronger than about 2-3% by volume. Not so bad if you're making a tasty mildly fermented beverage like kefir but I was after something with a little more kick. So I decided to follow the techniques I used to use when brewing 'hedgerow' beers & wines back in the UK.

First you need to develop the flavours of your ingredients. This has already been done in the case of the kimchi, so I just ladled half the jar into a plastic tub and added some sugary water.

 Then I added some beer yeast, which quickly took hold and started to go a bit nuts

I added about 2 litres of water into the tub and a kilo of sugar and let it sit menacingly on the kitchen windowsill for a week or so, where it gurgled ominously and scared the neighbours. No pictures of this, but you get the idea.

After the initial foaming of the fermentation (or to get technical, the krausen) had died down I filtered out the vegetable matter by sieving the solution into a clean demijohn

Then topped up with water (filtered of course - don't want to introduce any off flavours) and added an airlock

It's still very sweet so this needs to bubble away for a few more weeks - it doesn't look very enthusiastic at the minute. I may need to add some more  yeast to help it along and ferment it up to the 8% or so it has the potential to reach, but we'll see how we go.

Edit - It seemed to recover well overnight, and in fact had made a bid for freedom via the airlock

Looks tasty doesn't it? I'll be sure to get a photo of Gordy sculling a glass or two.....

*and now for the science bit, at least as I understand it. Fermentation can work in a few different ways. If you've been paying attention over the last few years you'll know that yeast works by nibbling away at sugars stored in grains, fruits or in some cases vegetables and converting them to alcohol, farting out carbon dioxide as a by product. The active ingredient used in cheese, yoghurt, pickles, kimchi, sauerkraut etc is lactobacillus and this works in a slightly different way. It converts sugars to lactic acid, which lowers the acidity or Ph of the solution. This in turn acts as a preservative and a way of storing food for extended periods of time without refrigeration as well as adding a tasty tang to whatever is being fermented.

The problem is that there are many different types of lactobacillus and only a few produce alcohol. So to be sure to get a drink that will be strong enough to allow someone to stomach the potential taste, I needed to help it along with beer yeast. I'm not sure how the beer yeast will cope with the increased acidity, although I'm pretty sure it will be better than how everyone else will cope with the kimchi beer...

Just Ride!

Continuing the recent beardy trend, I picked up a book by Grant Petersen called 'Just Ride' at the weekend

As you can see it's plugged as a 'radically practical guide to riding your bike'. What this means is that it's aimed at those people who ride on the road but aren't racers, or 'Unracers' as Grant calls them. He has a very pragmatic and somewhat controversial approach to riding bikes - flat pedals, no need for special bike clothing, sensible bike setup that's designed to be comfortable for the average rider instead of fast for a well-honed athlete, a frank discussion about helmet laws.

I'm not too sure what the end market of the book is. Racer types will obviously pooh-pooh the whole thing, new riders will probably be freaked out by the fine detail of the articles and the average tourer or beardy will find themselves nodding in acceptance over the points that they agree with but unwilling to experiment with those points they don't - riding without bike shorts? Ouch!

But what really comes through is a love of cycling for the sake of cycling in and of itself, so if you like bikes and are willing to consider an alternative and well-discussed viewpoint then it's worth a read. Unless you're saving up for a new set of Zupps and training hard with your local cycling club in order to podium in B-grade crits, in which case you're probably better re-reading 'It's not about the bike'...

Nice rack!

I've been trying to commute into the office on the bike a bit more but it's hard when I'm out on site 2 or 3 days a week. I need to plan in advance, take spare shirts into the office, make sure I have my laptop at home when I need it for evening meetings etc etc etc. So to avoid the excuses I bought myself a bike rack, which means I can carry my laptop & all appropriate clothing whenever I need to without pre-planning.

I had a look around and went for a freeload rack, designed in New Zealand for mountain bikers. I can actually fit regular racks on my normal commuter bike but I decided to spend a little bit more and get a rack that can attach to any of my bikes. Plus it looks a lot cooler and is easily removable.

The rack is well built, easy to fit and very versatile. It straps on to the seat stay of the bike which means that regardless of the bike setup you can put a bag on the back, or on the front if you mount it on the forks (all the mounting gear for both options come with the pack) . A very cool piece of kit, delivered within 5 days and well worth a look if you fancy some bike touring on a bike that's not built with rack mounts.

Fortunately Gordy had a surplus laptop bag which after a bit of tweaking fitted perfectly

It's surprisingly hard riding with a pannier. It only adds a few kilograms but the bike feels very sluggish and hard to get moving, and makes me respect cycle tourers like Kitty immensely . Admittedly riding a single speed with flat pedals doesn't help, but in the long term I'm sure it will only make me stronger. It's also got me thinking about cycle-touring (or 'bikepacking') - the idea of strapping a sleeping bag, a bivi bag and a bottle of scotch to a mountain bike and heading out for a night under the stars is very appealing.

Cycle tourers are often considered the 'beardy wierdies' of the cycling world so it's good to experiment with that element of the sport without fitting into all of the conventional cliches.

 

Guest post - Hairy legs and old Bikes.

Something a little different now - an outside broadcast from a good friend of mine. So put your hands together and welcome Gordy, aka 'the man without a blog'.

Today came the realisation that I am in a new riding demographic…

Apart from riding as a kid on my Speedwell dragster and some bmx at highschool, cycling for me started around ’90 when I got my first MTB. A Repco MaxTracks, not a serious mtb at all, but enough to start me on the long road of up-grade-itis.

Racing cross country and downhill meant a race every couple of weekends through the 90’s. Then 1998 came along and so did my son Conor. I spent the next few years being a Dad and less a cyclist.

Early in the noughties I headed back out on my mtb. Now more recreational than racer, I got in with a good group of people, who rode a variety of bikes. Mtb, road, singlespeed, even fixed gear. I no longer think of myself as a mountain biker, but as a cyclist.

I now own more road bikes than MTB’s, most are steel, some are alloy, none are carbon! I blame Graham for opening my eyes to vintage roadies. Now I had found my new calling. There is a beauty in an old steel road bike. The welds, the lugs, the pantina, the history.

After Pushies Galore last week, I was keen for more vintage action. Fortunately Noosa Eroica answered my call. Old steel roadies, down tube shifters, hairy legs (on the men) and wool jerseys.

30 men and women lined up for the mini Eroica on Saturday morning - there is also a longer ride is on the Sunday.

We rode from Noosa Marina through the Tewantin National Park, which included a 3km climb up the MG Car Club Hillclimb course.

There was a great moment about 2/3rds of the way up, where we came around a cutting and as we climbed we were cheered on by a bunch of mtbers riding the bush tracks. Awesome moment.

We continued onto Cooroy along back roads that included strada bianche ( the white or unsealed roads) in the same vein as the original L’Eroica in Chianti, Italy.

There was a diverse group of bikes. Graham had his Chesini, set up as singlespeed for the day.

There were many classic steel roadbikes,

but also a guy riding 3 speed sturmey archer gears and a lady on a Brompton (small wheeled fold up bike).

From Cooroy we headed back down to Noosa Marina for the Show and Shine. Despite the steel on display, my favourite was an alloy Vitus 

So this is who I am now, though my average speed has dropped, my interest in cycling has not diminished. I now look forward to a slower pace and taking in the scenery as I go.

I am Beardo!

Barefoot at Southbank

Southbank on a sunny Sunday morning in the winter can seem like an idyllic place to go for a run. Beautiful blue skies, great scenery, a car-free riverside path and an exercise-friendly temperature of around 16-18 degrees.

 Look a bit closer and it's not so appealing for a barefoot runner

The embedded gravel is not easy on the soles of your feet! It's something I'll need to harden up and get used to as one of the 5km 'fun' runs that I want to do goes along here. I am spending one day a week with a client near here and there are lockers available so I will be able to go for a run after work, and maybe go for a dip in the beach pool afterwards. That's one of the advantages of barefoot running - less stuff to carry down with me!

I ended up doing a 'lap' of Southbank and covering just under 2km, and given the recent problems with my achilles I'm happy with that.

You get some odd looks running barefoot though - even more so when you're carrying your shoes in your hands...

Bubbling Kimchi

I've always liked the acidic bite of the spicy kimchi and chilli sauce that you can get in some Chinese and Korean restaurants so decided to try making my own the other week. True kimchi has large chunks of vegetable in it (carrot, radish, cabbage) and I didn't have the ingredients to hand so I just mixed some chilli & garlic flakes with some brine, some diced carrot and some leftover whey and left the jar on the windowsill.

Not much happened for the first week or so but after I got back from Newcastle the lid was bulging - fermentation is what gives kimchi part of its sharp taste and it had obviously taken hold in a big way. When I nervously opened the lid it sprayed spicy sauce across the kitchen and then bubbled ominously for 5 minutes or so.

I think that that's a good sign.

I have a jar full and it's far too hot to eat a lot of, so put your hand up if you want some! 

Vive Le Tour! *snore*

As anyone remotely interested in cycling will know, it's the middle of the Tour De France right now. And it's hard work. The live coverage starts over here at around 10pm - just around the time I'm normally going to bed - so I'll stay up just to watch the summary and discussion over the previous nights events. But then there's a breakaway, a puncture, a sprint stage in 30km time, a particularly nice castle or some over-exuberant spectators and you just get sucked in. Two hours later it's midnight and you're debating how long it will take for the peleton to finish off the last 50km. Before immediately nodding off on the sofa. I just wish they would pedal faster, it can be an exhausting three weeks.

Unfortunately I can't do that tonight because I have a 4am start tomorrow to fly down to Newcastle to give a couple of days of training. Which means I'll probably be too buggered to stay up and watch the Pyrennes stages later in the week either. I'm thinking about going to Fair Work Australia.

Look's like I'm not the only one getting carried away with the Tour in Annerley though.....

Pushies Galore

One of the scary things about writing a regular blog is how quickly annual events come around. This weekend was the second annual 'Pushies Galore' bike show for the bike tragics of Brisbane, and it doesn't seem like 12months ago since the last one.

It seems like the event is getting more popular and this year they introduced a 'BNE' section to the show & shine to highlight bikes built locally - BNE being the airport code for Brisbane. It was funny to hear my mates comparing the bikes on show to similar models in their sheds or garages and swapping stories about their meetings with the frame makers.

 Other classifications included the ever popular track bike section

and a wonderful vintage section which showed that what is considered up to the minute in bike design now was being tried out over 100 years ago

There were also three BMX classifications, for old-school, modern and a phrase I've never heard before - 'mid-school'

Some of the guys I hang out with have been riding bikes in Brisbane for 20 years or more and seem to know almost everyone in the riding community, but that doesn't seem to extend to the BMX scene. The BMX community over here is massive but runs in parallel to the roadie / MTB / track / hipster scene with very little crossover. Some beautiful bikes though

and some great innovative engineering. Although my favourite thing about this bike was that after it had been welded up it was resprayed and the 'Specialized' (sic) brand name on the down tube was spelt correctly.

The event was held at a local Bowls club, which was also providing some fine craft beers in a classically 60's environment that modern pubs will spend thousands of dollars trying to achieve

Although I'm not sure if the guys behind the bar were on top of the beer choice, as when you ordered a specific beer they would ask if that was the red or the blue one.

There was also a 'swap meet' where you could find any number of long-buried treasures

 After a couple of beers Gordy found the perfect frame and decided to invoke the N+1 rule.

Good luck sneaking that home mate - oh, and nice t-shirt :)

All in all it was a splendid way to spend a Sunday morning. I just need a bigger garage!

Cold beers

We're going through a spell of bad weather in Brisbane at the minute. It's been raining on and off for at least four days, and some days the temperature doesn't get above 20 degrees C. Every outdoor cafe and open bar is using patio heaters to save their clients from freezing to death. How can people live like this?
Ok, just one more to let the rain clear...

French cheese nightmares

My second batch of Camembert & Brie was looking great in the cheese cave - I'd left it alone for a few days and the mould was fuzzing over nicely. Tonight it had been 11 days since the cheese was made and it was time to take it out and cover it.

Unfortunately the mould was a little over-succesful and managed to embrace the bamboo mat it was sitting on as well as the cheese itself...

The floor of the 'basement' layer of the cheese cave was in a very close relationship with the cheese and the seperation didn't go well...

 Topless french cheese! Oooh la la!

 Probably curtains for the sushi mat as well...

The cheese itself isn't as bitter as last time but I'm not sure how it will fare after its early exposure. I've loosely wrapped them all in silver foil and put them back in the cheese cave (which is at around 10-12 degrees C), so we'll see how we go. It looks like it will probably take a few goes, but I WILL produce a Briesbane cheese.

In the meantime I can take solace in the fact that my carrot & parsnip kimchi is looking good, enjoying the sun on the window ledge and gives a satisfying fermenty hiss every time I open it....

Match the breakfast to the bike - slight refrain

My last competition post was one of my most popular. So here's the sequel....

Four bikes (apologies for the poor photo):-

• GT Edge with Sushi bars
• On-one Pompino with riser bars & 26" wheels
• Vintage Chesini with drop bars
• Norco Rev BMX

and four breakfasts

• Avocado salso on sourdough with bacon
• 'Hellenic' Eggs Benedict (ie with haloumi)
• Avocado stack
• Salmon omelette

Can you match them?

Tiebreaker - describe in 25 words or less the reaction of the lycra-clad roadie throng at Garage when we stopped off for coffee.....

Starry starry night....

Over the last week in Brisbane the nights have been beautifully crisp, cold and clear. I headed out for a barefoot run a couple of days ago and it felt great to be out again. I ran for just over 1km and although my achilles tendon was hurting for a day or so afterwards it seems to have recovered quickly. I think that it must have been self-chilling.

It's also full moon time and she looks gorgeous up there

I may have discovered a new hobby - trying to take pictures at night. Although I quickly learnt a few things that would help, in particular -

• You need to know where the buttons on your camera are and what they do. It's hard to figure out what does what when it's dark and you can't see them. A torch would also help.
• You also need to figure out what you want the camera to do. Long exposure shots don't work with the moon as it's so bright, instead you need to reduce the exposure as much as you can. 
• Drinking beer whilst standing around taking photos in the cold plays hell with your bladder.

Luckily my camera also has a 'starry sky' setting which takes all the thinking out of it and, as long as you have a tripod, does the hard work for you...

Got to love the Southern Cross.

Home again

We got back to Brisbane on Thursday and since then I've been keeping myself busy.

There's been city rides

 Beer rides

 and dirt rides

as well as another go at making my own brie & camembert (with a more luxurious cheese cave this time)

I was also inspired to make some 'pulled roo' - smoked, slow cooked and then pulled kangaroo fillets

and of course checking on the beer - my Imperial Stout has reached a gravity of 1030, which means that it's around 11% at the minute. It's dark, roasty, hoppy & bitter - the only question is whether to age it as it is or add champagne yeast and go for a 15% brew?

It's also Tour De France time, which means many late nights and uncomfortable dozing on the sofa. Liz has already prepared her Tour De France viewing platform in preperation :)