There’s actually a group here in Portland called “Beer and Blog” that I’ve been meaning to check out.  It’s a bunch of people who get together and…well, I don’t want to ruint he surprise for you.  They always seem to get together so early, though!  I mean I have been known on occasion to have a beer or two at 4 PM, but really, at that time I’m just getting off work and usually have something in mind that I want to do, like go for a run or something of the sort.  Granted I think it’s once a week or so…but there goes the rest of the day if I fill my mug a couple of times.

“But Andrew!” you say, “Why don’t you just have one beer or not fill your mug?”  Pssh.  This mug demands to be filled.  It needs to be filled.  Whenever I get just a half mug of beer I think that somewhere a beer angel loses its wings.

This weekend was pretty interesting, to say the least.  Friday evening Hanne was a bit burnt out from her paper she’d been working on for a few weeks, so we just stayed in and had a generally lazy evening of Thai food and television.  Saturday Hanne found herself up on campus to work on her paper some more, and I stayed home and played some City of Heroes, cleaned up a bit, and generally had the sort of day I’d been missing out on when my computer died.  More on that later.

At some point in the afternoon, though, I heard sirens.  That’s nothing too uncommon, but then I realized there were a lot of sirens.  Huh.  Then it sruck me that they were getting pretty loud.  I decided that I’d better investigate, and I went over to a window and looked out.  What I saw was my next door neighbor and a number of other people standing on the other side of the street and looking back across.  Of course, I had the sort of rational thought that everyone in that scenario thinks: “Oh shit.”  I went outside to see what the hubbub was about, and I was presented with quite the sight.

OK, so I actually have pictures, but my blogging software is being annoying and it won’t let me rotate an image once I’ve uploaded it, and it’s seemingly oblivious to rotating it on my computer first.  I did what any concerned citizen would do and I ran inside to get my camera.

What I photographed was the house two doors down with the upper floor engulfed in flames.  There were fire trucks pulling up, and there was thick smoke everywhere.  We ended up with six or seven fire trucks on the street and a parade of firemen dragging hoses into the house to put out the fire.  There was no one home, fortunately, but man…that sucks.  I certainly wouldn’t want to come home to that at the end of the day.

That was pretty much the most exciting thing that happened all weekend.  Saturday night I made a small roast chicken with mashed potatoes and roasted broccoli for dinner, and Hanne and I split bottles of two of last year’s brewed gems: Bridgeport “Stumptown Tart” and Deschutes “The Dissident,” both sour beers that we enjoyed when they were new.  We’ve kept a few bottles for later consumption, and we’d both read an article about how they weren’t aging well.  I don’t know why the author wrote that–they both had lost a bit of the sour zing, but both were still delicious.

The chicken made some lovely stock that will become the base to a risotto tomorrow night, I think.  I don’t have any particular recipe in mind, but rissotos are a little like omlettes–just toss in whatever’s fresh that you have.  I have potatoes that need to be cooked, too, but something tells me that rissoto and potatoes might be a bit too much starch for one evening.  Maybe I’ll cook ‘em anyway, and eat them as leftovers.  Better cooked and cold than thrown out, I say.  Cooking fod “resets” a food’s expiration date, as far as I’m concerned.  I have chard to use up, too, but since I still don’t have a very good recipe for chard, I’ll probably just throw it in the same polenta dish I made last time.  Thursday night, perhaps, when Hanne’s in class until 8 and I have the time to putter about the kitchen and generaly make a mess of things.

Speaking of making a mess of things, tomorrow I’m going to brew beer for the first time in a number of months.  I still have a whole batch that is as of yet untasted, but I have a unique opportunity that I couldn’t pass up.  There’s a brewfest coming up in a coupel of months called “Portland Cheers to Belgian Beers” where a number of local breweries all brew different Belgian-style beers using the same yeast strain.  It’s an interesting way to level the playing field, as it is, and let beer consumers such as myself taste the variety that can happen with just changing up a few ingredients.  That’s the main brewfest.

This year, however, the organizers decided to throw in a homebrew competition as well, so I can brew using the same yeast strain that the pros are using.  Only 40 yeast packs were made, so I thought this would be a once in a lifetime (or once in this year, at least) event that I thought I should participate in.  I have all my ingredients, and tomorrow I’m knocking off work early (with permission, of course) and brewing my entry.  I should have just enough time for it to ferment and bottle condition before the entry deadline.  And hey!  With my entry I get a free tasting glass and several free drink tickets, so I’m already saving money!

Belgian style ales are usually defined by a particular flavor and aroma, despite the wide variety of styles in the category.  I remember when I first discovered that I could identify a Belgian or Belgian-style ale just by the aroma.  I thought I was so awesome!  Yeah, that’s easy now.  My entry, however, is going to blend the traditionally lightly-hopped Belgian ale with the over-hopped West Coast IPA.  Stone Brewing has a beer like this, called the Cali-Belgique IPA.  Green Flash Brewing has another called Le Freak.  I’m making my own version of this, a hybrid of a Belgian pale ale with the hop profile of a beer I made that I was especially proud of.  I don’t have a name yet, nor do I even know if it will be palatable, but I do know that it’s going to be a hell of a first Belgian ale brewed for me.  I like experimenting.  There’s always a place for your standard ales, but the real challenge comes from testing out a theory.  Here’s hoping it’s not completely undrinkable.

Well, so far only one batch has come out that way…but that was an error that I don’t think I could ever repeat.

The Green Dragon tonight is bustling.  Part of that is because of tonight’s Meet the Brewer with the McMenamins Cornelius Pass Roadhouse brewer who’s products I always enjoy, but as I look around I realize that I don’t recognize a lot of the people here.  The Rogue buyout has affected a few things–they sell shirts and growlers to go now, and there’s an American flag hanging behind the bar, and there’s definitely more floor space–but it’s still the same dark pub.

Oh well.  Time for some food, I think.  And another beer.