beer: victory v-saison

man, what a gyp. i love saisons - the drinkability of a pale ale but with a nice earthy/funky layer. too bad that victory, a brewery i generally think pretty highly of, left all the funk out of theirs. staggeringly effervescent and prickly, too sweet on the opening, and limp on the finish. just not much doing. don't waste your time, get a bottle of dupont instead. oh, and the cork was so badly stuck that i had to pry it off with pliers. kabammo.

beer tasting: cantillon

the fine folks at nikki's liquors finally twisted my arm into going to one of their beer tastings, and i have to admit it was more than worth the price of admission ($0). cantillon, as i'm sure you're aware, is a belgian brewery specializing in really, really old-school lambics. the consensus:

classic gueuze: a pretty sturdy mild gueuze - not enough funk to really satisfy
iris: an entirely barley-malt lambic, hoppier than is traditional - certainly more hop impact, but not enough to drastically change the character of the beer
vigneronne: lambic laid on muscat grapes - a strong twiggy/woody opening, with a greater degree of funk - pretty good
kriek: one of the better krieks i've had, assertively dry and without a bit of cough syrup
st. lamvinus: lambic laid on merlot and cab franc grapes - really impressive, big and beefy and funky - the kind of thing i'd be happy to drink pretty regularly (so of course it's $30+ a bottle)

i also bought a bottle of victory's saison to take home - update as the situation develops.

beer: sam smith oatmeal stout

i have to confess that i'm not a huge stout drinker. it's not that i'm opposed to the style, it's just that there are so many other styles i like more. it's like ordering udon at a sushi restaurant. you can, but...

that said, sam smith oatmeal stout is the first choice around here. most american microbrews tend towards chocolate or coffee flavors in their stouts which, coupled with overmalting in general, leaves them tasting like those effete espresso drinks that lamewads drink. the oatmeal stout is much better balanced and the oatmeal notes make it a lot more drinkable with savory foods. the abv isn't absurdly high, either - a few pints would be more than acceptable on a cold winter night. and a few bonus points for their subdued label design - i was going to point out how much i hated stone's copy in the ruination post, but forgot. i don't need to read your life story on the back of the bottle.

recipe: hamburgers

readers, i am awfully embarrassed to admit that 24 years into my life i'd never made a hamburger at home. does this reveal some sort of deep-seated flaw? so tonight was a brand-new experience here at the homestead. all thanks to mama, who knows how to do everything.

assembly:
1lb ground beef, as fatty as you can find - i used 85% lean from whofo
a whole lot of salt and pepper
worcestershire sauce (or if you're like me and don't have any, just use tonkatsu sauce and fish sauce, heavier on the tonkatsu - i'm sure you have both of those kicking around)

mix all the above together into a nicely homogeneous mass. now go and find your smoke detector and take the batteries out. then rip it out of the wall. open all your windows. turn a fan on. several fans, if you have them. or, you know, turn on the fantastically efficient hood over your stove. either way. close your closet doors unless you want your wardrobe to smell like burning meat. should i point out that this is not something to make to impress your date? also, should i point out that cats can't stand the sound of an angry smoke detector?

anyhow. preheat a cast iron skillet to somewhere around "roaring hot". have your ground meat mix divided into squash-ball-sized balls. pat a ball in your hands into a very very thin patty. the thinner the better. really. as thin as you can without tearing. now smack it into the skillet and watch the column of smoke billow out. cook until done on one side, flip, and cook until done on the other. i'd say maybe a minute or less per side. i'd aim closer to raw than cardboard, but maybe that's just me. if you like cheese on yours, throw it on when you flip it. i think people use processed cheese for this because it melts so quickly - real cheddar, even grated, takes too long. try to ignore the growing cloud of smoke descending from the ceiling.

finish:
you know what you like on your hamburgers better than i do
toasted buns

put your hamburgers together and serve. these are the kind of thing where the cook eats last, or eats with one hand while cooking with the other.

makes a lot of little burgers.

bonus! secret sauce recipe!

cornichons
shallots
ketchup
mayonnaise
sriracha
honey
salt
pepper

buzz the cornichons and shallots in a food processor until coarsely chopped. fold in the rest of the ingredients. tastes just like mcdonalds but nicer.

recipe: polenta

at first glance, it might seem kind of silly that i'm posting a recipe for polenta. doesn't everyone know how to make polenta? but, not too long ago, i was converted to a completely different technique that i'm really keen on. the gist of it is that amylase (the enzyme responsible for breaking down long-chain carbohydrates) is deactivated above around 180*. if you immediately heat your polenta to a boil, as most people do, almost all of the starch remains complex and you don't get much sweetness out of your corn. this method, though much lengthier, is also a lot tastier. my thanks go to paul bertolli and his book 'cooking by hand', the best contemporary slightly-more-talky-than-marcella-hazan italian book out there.

assembly:
1C good polenta (i love the stuff from anson mills but it's not cheap)
4C water
1tsp salt

preheat your oven to about 180*, though 200* may produce better results. ovens don't seem very happy to be kept so low. rinse the polenta in your cooking pot, exactly as you would with rice. throw off all the starchy water. refill with the 4C water, add your salt, cover, and throw into the oven. let it sit in there for hours and hours. stir occasionally. three, maybe four hours later it'll be ready.

finish:
a giant knob of butter
fresh cheese, maybe?

add more butter than you might think prudent. stir in and serve.

makes a good bit - and few things are as filling as polenta. if you pour it into a pan and chill it for awhile, you can fry or grill the firmed polenta to very nice results.

beer: stone ruination IPA

hey, look, a post. amazing, you're saying to yourself. i thought he'd lost interest. but no, i just got myself off to much-too-fast of a start. pace myself, that's the key.

anyhow, stone ruination. this is a perennial favorite of high-alpha american beer snobs - i definitely don't count myself a member of that group. like everything else about american microbrew, more is "better" and pushing the limits often supercedes technical skill. that being said, this is a really well-made beer. it shows a lot of control and balance, which is vital when you're at 8%abv and over 100IBU. the malt hit is almost instantaneous, but it's followed by a really vibrant herbaceous hop middle and finish. it manages the feat of being neither cloying nor (too) bitter after the finish, both of which tend to be the failing of this style. thankfully, too, campus was selling it in 12oz format instead of bombers. 22 ounces would just be too much. $17 is steep for a six, but it's worth it once in awhile.

beer: morland tanner's jack

i bought a six of morland tanner's jack the other week at yankee spirits up in attleboro - going through a bit of an english thing here at the homestead. unfortunately, despite the cool story behind the name and logo the beer itself was a bit wan - it's the kind of thing generously described on the beergeek websites as a "session beer". this, i think, means that you can drink a lot of it without much effect on your palate or psyche. it doesn't ask much of you. low ABV - somewhere in the mid 4s, if i remember correctly. don't get me wrong, it was better than a lot of the junk micros available here. but i wouldn't buy it again.