Author: AJ

Beer of the Week: Populuxe Pale Ale

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Every once in a while, you come across a beer that will please multiple segments of the drinking population; Populuxe Pale Ale is one of them. The latest new beer in the ever growing Populuxe lineup. Lighter than you would expect, this beer clocks in at 4.8% ABV and is a nice summer addition to their lineup. As with all of their beers, it is only available on tap in their tap room.

The beer pours golden straw in color. Grain and hops dominate the nose with hints of malt. The beer starts out very mild – much lighter than you would expect based on the way it smells and then you get hit with the wall of flavor – light sweetness gives way to a significant hop profile without being bitter. You know there are hops in this beer but they don’t overpower everything else. The hops linger for a bit before giving way to a really nice long grain finish, sort of reminiscent of a hoppy pilsner. The beer is probably a little hoppier than a light beer drinker would enjoy, but it has a restrained enough hop profile that a good number of beer drinkers would enjoy. The added bonus is that the beer has enough character and complexity that a hop head like me would not hesitate to order one (or two or three) as the beer goes down easily. I could see this being my go-to beer for a warm, sunny day out on the back deck when I want hops but don’t want to be drinking a hop monster IPA.

Run down to the Populuxe brewery and try their pale. You won’t be disappointed.

Populuxe Pale Ale sings in with a beautiful 4 Whiter Shades out of 5.

Hitting Your Way Out of a Paper Bag

By Blaidd Drwg

Once again, the Mariners are hitting like they can’t punch their way out of a paper bag. Thus far this season, the Mariners have scored fewer total runs than all but one AL team – the Chicago White Sox (actually they have outscored the Nationals, Phillies (just barely), Marlins and Dodgers, but that is the NL, so it hardly counts, but more on that in a moment). It is actually worse than that – the Mariners have outscored the Pale Hose by a whopping 2 runs and have played 3 more games than Chicago, so the Sox have actually scored more runs per game than the Mariners. It has been so bad that the Mariners have been outscored by the Astros (!!!) by 16 runs in the same number of games. That is the same Astros lineup that I ripped on earlier this season. At least the Mariners offense hasn’t been historically bad this year and they seem to be hitting about as well (if you can call it that) at home as on the road.

Sadly, the despite the vast improvement, they are still in sorry shape. Morales, Seager and Morse have been ok, Shoppach and Bay have been better than expected; Smoak has been drawing walks (but not much else) and hasn’t looked completely hopeless at the plate. Montero, Ackley, Ryan, Andino and Chavez have all been wasted at bats though in this lineup. The M’s have gotten so little production out of their #9 spot in the order that they might as well be a NL team. Here is how the #9 hitter compares to the teams in the NL who have scored fewer runs. Keep in mind that the AB’s for the NL teams come from a combination of the pitchers batting and pinch hitters. Just for the heck of it, I am including the Tigers, who lead baseball in runs scored. (Stats from baseball-reference.com)

BA OBP SLG sOPS+
Mariners .168 .235 .206 63
Nationals .134 .185 .190 38
Phillies .201 .242 .329 107
Marlins .155 .214 .169 42
Dodgers .197 .255 .282 96
Tigers .292 .317 .456 180

Basically the Mariners are getting the same production from Chavez/Ryan/Andino in the 9th spot as National League teams get from their pitchers. That is not a recipe for success.

The M’s took the first step in trying to right the ship by sending Montero down to Tacoma, but they did call up a no-hit, all-glove catcher in Jesus Sucre, so that won’t help much. The next step is probably sending down Ackley and bringing up Nick Franklin. I think Ackley needs to get some time in the bandbox that is Cheney Stadium to get his groove back. The shortstop mess is probably not fixable this season, so we will probably get another 120 games of almost automatic outs from the bottom of the lineup.

My prediction – if the M’s don’t have a winning record on this home stand, Eric Wedge will be looking for a new job. I hear Don Mattingly might be available soon…

Beer of the Week: Elysian Brewing Hansel & Gretel Pumpkin Pilsner

By Iron Chef Leftovers

I love pumpkin beers and there are a ton of them out on the market these days. Fall also brings us the annual pumpkin beer festival at Elysian Brewing, who seem to roll out somewhere around a dozen pumpkin beers themselves, with just a few making it into bottles. Hansel & Gretel is one that made it this year into the bottle. From the Elysian press release:

Brewed with organic pale, Weyermann Munich and Cara-Hell malts, with pumpkin added in the mash, kettle and fermenter. Spiced with fresh ginger and hopped with lots of Czech Saaz hops 4.5% ABV

HGEditTTBThis beer is unmistakably a pilsner – golden yellow in color with a fizzy white head. Initially you get a good amount of grain on the nose, but as you get closer, there are strong notes of ginger with a pumpkin background. The is initial sip is a strong hit of spicy ginger, like biting into a ginger snap cooking without the sugar, but it is so strong that your taste buds never fully recover from it. The ginger gives way to a distinct pumpkin flavor and it finishes just a bit sweet with a touch of spicy heat from the ginger. Any grain notes are completely overwhelmed by the ginger and there are no discernible hops on the nose or the palate. The spiciness is more pronounced as the beer warms and really overpowers everything else. There aren’t many pumpkin pilsners on the market so this beer has the potential to be a good one with more balance so you get more than a one note beer (and make pumpkin the star, not the ginger), but it is not quite there yet.

This was not my favorite pumpkin beer of the patch; so as a result, Hansel & Gretel skips into the gingerbread house with a score of 2 children out of 5.

Chicken Burgers with Apple, Sage, Rosemary and Oregano

By Iron Chef Leftovers

If you are making burgers, meatloaf, sloppy joes, etc., there is something to be said for grinding your own meat. When you buy pre-ground meat, you never know exactly what it is composed of. Grinding it yourself eliminates the guesswork and makes for a better product. It is also much easier than you think it is – if you own a kitchen aid stand mixer, the grinder attachment runs about $50 and works really well. If you don’t, go to your local butcher (or even your local megamart if they have a butcher counter), buy the cut of meat that you want to grind and then ask them to do it for you. Trust me, it makes a difference.

Recently PW and her husband came over to the Iron Chef abode for dinner. I asked what protein they would like and I was told chicken burgers. I thought back to some chicken burgers I have had in the past – they were bland and dry and I wasn’t going to serve that. I then remembered back to a really good house-made chicken sausage that I had at a restaurant years’ ago and decided that would be the base for my recipe. I wanted something that was moist and flavorful but easy to make. This is what I came up with.

The key to this recipe is using freshly ground chicken thighs. You can probably use pre-ground chicken but you run the risk of the burgers drying out and will probably pay more per pound for the pre-ground meat than you will for the thighs. This recipe will make 4 good sized burgers, but can easily be scaled.

The Software
1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs; ground
1 teaspoon minced sage
1 teaspoon minced rosemary
1 teaspoon minced oregano
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/3 cup apple, peel removed and diced into 1/8 inch pieces
½ large egg, lightly beaten

The Recipe
If grinding your own chicken, cut into 1 inch cubes and freeze for 10 minutes to firm up the meat before putting it into the grinder. Add all of the ingredients to a bowl and gently toss to combine. Divide the mixture into 4 equal parts and gently form into patties (you could make sliders and probably get 8 out of this recipe). Set on a plate, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour (the burgers can be made in advance and kept in the fridge for 24 hour until ready to use). Preheat a skillet over medium-high heat and add a tablespoon of olive oil. When the oil is shimmering, add the burgers. Cook on the first side until a crust forms (about 4 minutes) and carefully flip. Reduce heat to medium and cook until the internal temperature reaches about 175 degrees (7-10 minutes, depending on your stove). Remove and serve to a hungry public.

Notes
The recipe can also be made on the grill. I would highly recommend starting these out on a cast iron skillet to form a bit of a crust before putting them on the grill surface – the burgers will seem loose and gravity will pull them through the grates of the grill initially. To check your seasonings, cook a very small amount of the mixture and cook it in a pre-heated skillet – it should cook in about a minute and this will tell you if you need to add anything seasoning wise. I used a Fuji apple for this, but you can use just about any apple you would like. It is important to use the apple – it helps to keep the chicken very moist. I suppose that you could use chicken breast for this, but you would run the risk of the meat drying out before it is done. I used fresh herbs when I made this dish, if you use dried, cut the amounts in half and test the seasonings – you can always add more but you can never take any away. This is a pretty mild tasting dish – if you want to ramp it up, some jalapeños or crushed red pepper would be really nice. Letting the formed patties sit in the fridge is important. If you don’t do it, they will fall apart when you cook them. You could freeze them and cook them later if you aren’t going to use the entire batch.

Beer of the Week – NW Peaks Stuart Stout

By Iron Chef Leftovers

One of the things I love about the mountain beer program at NW peaks is that if you sign up for 2 growlers and invite some friends over, you can compare and contrast both styles that they put out each month. A few months ago, it was stouts, and considering the way the weather had been, a stout tasting was very much in order. The beer is still available in growlers from NW Peaks if you are so inclined (or was as of this writing – check with the brewery).

The description from the brewery website:

Since Mt Stuart is one of the most noticeable, bold, non-volcanic peaks in WA we tried to make the beer bearing its name similar. We based this beer on last year’s recipe but reduced the munich malt and changed hop varietals (but the hops have the same characteristics). This resulted in a slightly smoother, lower-bodied beer while retaining the dark roastiness making Stuart Stout a rich, full bodied, deeply roasty interpretation of the style. A fine beer to drink anytime, but best enjoyed in front of a fire on a cold rainy winter evening.

Malts: 2 row, roast, chocolate, crystal 40, wheat, and a smattering of oats. Hops: Apollo, Goldings. ABV: ~4.75%

The beer pours jet black with a fizzy tan head. Lots of roasted malt notes on the nose with hints of chocolate and coffee. The initial taste yields a pleasant, slightly burnt roasted flavor (think dark roasted coffee) yielding to mild chocolate flavors with some sweetness and hints of oatmeal. The beer finishes long with a pleasant roast notes. As the beer warms, hints of cocoa powder show up and the finishes seems to go on forever.

Stuart Stout is a great beer to sip next to warm fire on a cold day to feed the soul.

NW Peaks Stuart Stout hikes into base camp with a tasty 4 s’mores out of 5.

EarthBox Update — May 18, 2013

by A.J. Coltrane

Previous post here.

The tomatillos and tomatoes are planted.

051713 tomatillo and tomato

The varieties — back to front, starting with the leftmost box. Descriptions from the Seattle Tilth plant sale:

Two Mexican Strain tomatillos. 65 day maturity.

Glacier. 56 day determinate. Grows to 2-1/2 feet high by 3-1/2 feet wide. “Great for containers”.

Siletz. 70-75 day determinate.  “One of the most reliable slicing tomatoes you can grow.”

Stupice. 60 day indeterminate. Red, 2″ fruit on 6′ vines.

Sungold. 65 day indeterminate. Apricot-orange 1-1/4″ cherry-tomato fruit on grape like trusses.

Brandywine. 85 day indeterminate. Fruits up 1 pound and 7″ in diameter. (The Brandywines are near the house to try to get some reflected sun off of the house.)

Roma. 75 day determinate.

The tomatoes were selected as a combination of low-risk (Glacier, Sungold) and more speculative (all the longer-timed maturities). I figure we’ll get something, but no idea how much.

Foreground is the cucumbers and zucchini. The brussels sprouts and bok choi are in the back right box.
Foreground is the cucumbers and zucchini. The brussels sprouts and bok choi are in the back center box.

Parsley, dill, and two cilantro. Hiding under the 2nd-story deck.

051713 cilantro, parsley, dill

The tomato cages were purchased as “squares”, and they didn’t fit the earthboxes well. Note the two bars running over the center of the earthboxes — I had to prop them up on blocks to get them that high.

051713 squares

Note the “before” (left), and “after” (right). The blocks could go away now. We’ll see how enthused I get about moving them around again.

before and after

Removing the “center bars” also made enough leftover frame to cage the tomatillo. Win win win. I feel clever. Of course, I’d feel way more clever had I purchased stuff that fit easily in the first place..

The Mariners Jekyll and Hyde Pitching Staff

By Blaidd Drwg

Once you get past Felix and Iwakuma, the Mariners starting rotation has been a lovely collection Jekyll & Hyde type pitchers, making them more than frustrating to watch. Don’t believe me, here is what you have to look forward to (stats as of Monday May 13th).

Joe Saunders – pitches like Steve Carlton at home and Steve Blass on the road. Saunders may have the ugliest platoon splits I have ever seen:

W-L GS ERA IP BB SO WHIP ERA BAA
Home 3-0 4 0.93 28.2 7 15 0.82 0.94 .180
Road 0-4 4 12.54 18.2 11 5 2.52 12.54 .424

Now I know it is early in the season and sample size issues still abound here, but if you watch this guy pitch, he looks like 2 completely different pitchers depending on the venue. Now I realize that both the home and road stats will regress to the mean, but it almost feels like Wedge needs to pitch someone else when they are on the road. That is how bad Saunders has looked in those 4 starts. Historically, Saunders was “not bad” at Safeco, which is why I am assuming they signed him, but I am not sure what is going wrong when his is on the road.

Brandon Maurer – pitches like Ricky Vaughn against right handed batters and Vaughn Eshelman against lefties. The guys over at USS Mariner had a good article about this recently. Here is the ugly truth:

AB/H 2B 3B HR BB SO BA OBP SLG
Vs RHB 70/17 4 0 2 3 17 .243 .303 .688
Vs LHB 67/24 7 1 5 7 5 .358 .419 1.135

It is not unusual to see a platoon split with a significant amount of variance for a pitcher against the opposite hand hitter, but this is pretty extreme. The issue, according to USSM is this:

Maurer has four pitches, but he’s primarily a fastball/slider guy. He throws his slider a lot, in fact. Among qualified starters, PITCHF/x only has three pitchers throwing more pitches classified as sliders than Brandon Maurer this year. As you probably know, the slider has the biggest platoon split of any pitch in baseball. There’s a reason every situational reliever in baseball throws a million sliders. It’s why the Mariners have a bullpen full of match-up guys who just come in and throw slider after slider.

The slider is not a good pitch to opposite handed hitters, but it’s great against same-handed hitters. Pitchers who throw a lot of sliders tend to have huge platoon splits. Brandon Maurer has huge platoon splits.

It is obvious Maurer has talent but he needs to learn how to get left handed hitters out at a somewhat better rate if he wants to be successful. The majors are not the place for that. He looks tentative against lefties when he pitches and I really think the Mariners need to do something about that before his confidence is completely shot and teams just stack their lineup with lefties when they face him.

Aaron Harang – well, now that I think about it, he has just plain sucked. If you want a positive spin on this, his ERA in April was 11.37 and in May it is 3.00. That should count for something.

Beer of the Week: Stone Collaboration TBA

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Another Stone collaboration beer, this time with Bear Republic and Fat Head’s Brewing to produce a beer style known as a Texas Brown Ale. What is a Texas Brown Ale you might ask? Well I have never heard of the style, so I will let Stone’s press release talk about it:

This particular beer pays homage to a relatively little–known beer style called Texas Brown Ale, which, strangely enough, has its roots in California. It originated as a hopped up version of a brown ale recipe, and it got pretty popular with a group of NorCal homebrewers in the early 1980s.

“These California guys were tweaking an English-style brown,” explains Matt Cole, Head Brewer of Fat Head’s Brewery. “They added some Crystal and Chocolate malts, and supercharged it with a bunch of Cascade hops to get a bigger version with more hop forward aromas and flavors.”

While delicious, these beers failed to fare well in homebrew competitions, since there was no recognized category they could be entered in. They were far too hoppy and bitter to be considered a traditional brown ale. But when a competition in Houston, TX, accepted entries for what they named the “California Dark” category, the American Homebrewers Association followed suit soon after, though they perplexingly changed the name to Texas Brown Ale.

The beer was sampled out of a 12 oz. bottle and this review is for the 2012 version of the beer – Stone is getting together with the same breweries to brew this beer again in 2013. The skinny on the beer:

Stats: 7.1% abv, 81 IBUs
Malts: Pale 2–Row, Crystal 60, Toasted Wheat, Victory, and Chocolate Malt
Hops: Bravo, Brewer’s Gold, Cascade, and Columbus

tba_collab_2This beer is reddish amber in color with a tan head, not the brown you might expect from brown ale. The nose is a pleasant conglomeration of hops, malt, sugar and molasses. A smattering of light hops appear on the first sip, but fade quickly into a pleasant nut brown profile. The sugar and molasses are there but don’t dominate and subtly compliment the nut brown characteristics of the beer without overpowering it. The finish is like drinking a liquid pecan pie with hints of hops; which makes for a fun and very interesting beer. Considering the hop levels on this beer, I thought the use of them was restrained and very balanced, so much so that occasionally I found myself wanting a slightly bolder hop flavor profile.

I really like TBA and wish there were more breweries doing a style like this.

Stone Collaboration TBA saunters in with an excellent 4 Lone Stars out of 5.

Getting the Call Right

By Blaidd Drwg

What is up with the umpires in MLB right now? Two days last week involved just flat out terrible decisions by the crews involved. I have written about this before – things happen very quickly on a baseball field and calls can get missed or come out wrong. This I understand; the umpires are human and they make mistakes. My issue is when you incorrectly apply a rule or use the replay and still get it wrong.

In case you have been under a rock, here is what happened:

On May 8th in the 9th inning of the A’s-Indians game, Adam Rosales hit a shot to left center field that hit a railing behind the fence and was initially not ruled a home run. Bob Melvin immediately left the dugout and asked for a review, which he was given. Crew chief Angel Hernandez came back out a few minutes later and ruled it a double, even though it was clear to everyone – the players, fans and announcers that the ball did, in fact clear the wall. Well, everyone except the 3 umpires who looked at the replay. Melvin came back out to argue and summarily (and properly) was tossed from the game.

I happened to be watching the Red Sox get pounded by the Twins that evening and was only half paying attention to the TV when they cut into the game about the issue. I looked up at the replay, said, “home run” and immediately tuned back out what the commentators were saying.

My problem here is two-fold – Angel Hernandez made the situation worse by not making himself or the crew available after the game and MLB’s cop-out response to the issue. Hernandez is generally one of the worst umps in baseball and he did nothing to aid that perception by not only getting the call wrong but then not willing to face the music afterwards. At this point, Hernandez needs to be fired – he is horrible at his job and if it was any other profession in America, he probably would have been long gone. MLB’s response was worse:

By rule, the decision to reverse a call by use of instant replay is at the sole discretion of the crew chief. In the opinion of Angel Hernandez, who was last night’s crew chief, there was not clear and convincing evidence to overturn the decision on the field. It was a judgment call, and as such, it stands as final.

I don’t see how replay is a judgment call. This is MLB admitting that the call was wrong but not being willing to do anything about it. Unless Hernandez was looking at a replay from a different game or looking at it on a 13 inch black and white TV with crappy reception, I don’t see any way he could have gotten it wrong.

Here is a montage of the call from all 4 broadcasts – both radio and TV for the A’s and Indians. They all think it is a home run.

On May 9th, the Astros initiated a pitching change. Astros manager Bo Porter brought in Wesley Wright, who took a couple of warm up pitches before Porter came back out and replaced him with Hector Ambriz. Angels manager Mike Scioscia, who probably knows the rules of the game better than any manager, came out to argue that Wright could not come out of the game without facing one batter – Scioscia is right, any pitcher who enters a game needs to face one batter unless he is hurt before the batter is retired or reaches base (which did not appear to be the case here). This is basic rules 101 for umpires and one of the 4 umps on the field – Home Plate – Adrian Johnson, First Base – Fieldin Culbreth, Second Base – Brian O’Nora, Third Base – Bill Welke, should have realized this or at least looked it up if they were not sure. This is a pretty good crew, so it is more inexcusable that they would have botched such a straight forward call.