Category — Beer

Holy crap what a great deal.

Give this:

Get this:

Tacoma has been trying to figure out a way to get more blood donors and I think they have finally done it. You can go in and trade your blood for beer!! Yippiiee!!! Unfortunately there are some silly rules like a bartender can’t serve you with in 4 hours of donating and some other nonsensical health restrictions, but all in all I would say this is a great deal.

Now if we could only set up permanent blood banks at bars.

Here we are on the cusp of another day of thanks and it seems the norm for folks to stuff them selves silly sit in front of the boob tube and watch their muscles atrophy as the fat grows.

Fortunately we have a bit of a tradition, well this is the second year of it. We ascend the Manitou Incline for a cold beer toast on the top then head down to the local pub for a feast!

Last year one of our UpaDowna devout, BLOS (see photo above) won a turkey in a local turkey trot race decided to cook it up and share it with us all and well the tradition was born! Each person usually brings a dish of something but not everyone, but if you don’t bring food we simply ask for a beer! And while the majority of the attendees are without families we sometimes get a few with families in tow. So come one come all and join the fun this year. I’ll be handing out UpaDowna stickers to those in attendance!

Well I just bottled the pumpkin ale I brewed a few weeks back and wow it tastes great!! Looks to be a hair over 6% and is smooth as can be.

Now I am off to brew a UpaDowna Incline IPA and an UpaDowna Hefeweizen, not sure what I am going to call the Hefe so if you have suggestions let me know!

Here is a quick cut and paste version of my pumpkin ale. I decided with all of the pumpkins I have left over from this year’s harvest on the farm, that they should go to good use. I made this batch and I have two buddies that will be making batches as well…can’t wait for the tasting!!

Given the copious amounts of pumpkins we had this year I decided that I should brew up a batch of pumpkin ale. This makes me pleased to no end to be producing beer from the farm. I guess having only the pumpkins coming from the farm is not all that great of a leap but next year we hope the hop vines produce and this will gives us more and more ingredients straight from these fertile fields.

I had been toying with the idea of brewing a butternut squash beer as well but I think the pumpkin will work better. After scouring the internet and picking a few fellow brewers brains I setted on the following recipe:

3 lbs Amber malt extract

3 lbs Light dry malt extract

1 lb crystal malt (med dark)

1/2 lb chocolate malt

1 tsp gypsum

1 whirlfloc tablet

2 oz kent goldings hops

1 oz fuggles hops

8 lbs pumpkin

pumpkin spice

4 cinnamon sticks

3 tsp nutmeg

6 whole allspice

1 pk London III ale yeast

3/4 cup corn sugar

Directions:

Quarter pumpkin, remove seeds place flesh side up in 1″ h20 sprinkle with pumpkin spice bake @ 350F 2 hours. Cut into 1″ squares slightly mash and set aside. (I left the skin on!) Steep crystal and chocolate malt and gypsum @ 155F for 30 minutes. Remove grains and add malt extract, kent hops, pumpkin, nutmeg, cinnamon, allspice, and a few shakes of pumpkin spice, boil 1 hr and add fuggles hops and whirlfloc last 5 mins of boil. Remove spices and pumpkin and cool wort. Pitch yeast and wait eagerly!

OG 1.054

Now I cheated by not doing an all grain batch but I think I will brew a second batch with all grain but drop the chocolate malt and add pilsner malt and use a Bavarian yeast like wyeast 3638 to see if I can make a pumpkin hefe. YUM!

Can it be? Is it true? That we here in the US are little girly drinkers? Well look at the data and it appears that we are middle of the pack when it comes to volume of beer consumed per person per week. UpaDowna reader Jerry recently brought this to my attention obviously nudging me on due to my lack of posts recently. In this surprising yet unofficial study Americans drink an average of 4.4 bottles of beer a week.

And for those of you that numbers makes no sense, here is a beer comparison.

Yeah the U.S. is the last glass on the right on the top row which is just fine and furthers our split in thinking about if the glass is half empty or half full.

It appears the poll was taken by Japanese beer manufacturer Kirin and I think it was more than likely a means to try and get the Japanese to consider drinking more so as to be as “manly” as other countries. Otherwise this seems like it was a really bad idea and reflects on their inability to convince their own countrymen to hammer their swill.

I wonder how this test was done because I would think we would be much higher given the prevalence and popularity of keg stands and binge drinking in college age folks, but what do I know?!

Now get out there and drink!! COLD BEER!!!!

Thanks again Jerry and your stickers will be on their way soon.

Man am I getting amped up for the Teva Mountain Games!!! Last year we had a blast checking out this great venue for tons of great sports. For a little beta check out these posts as well as The Gear Junkie’s info.

Here is some info on this year’s games. And below is some info and photos from last year’s games!

• Day 1
• Day 2
• Days 3 & 4
• Photos of the action!

The TMG are held from June 4-7 2009 in Vail CO. If you are planning on attending be sure and book your room now, or better yet do as we do and find a sweet camping spot. When Vail camping fills up remember the surrounding areas provide ample camping areas.

Also don’t forget to check out the Facebook group where you can join up with some of us as we make the trek again this year!