The Staten Island Ship Graveyard

I scramble up and over the rusted-out hull of a small craft, lifting myself off what looks like a long mast dipping into water thick with oil slicks and who knows what else. Inside the boat, Cato walks one of the few planks left in the decayed deck. The opposite side of the plank shifts and lifts off the beam supporting it, and we all hold our breath. But Cato’s footing is firm and he crosses the deck and climbs down the opposite side. This hull sits in one below it like nesting bowls, a stack that makes up just a small fraction of the Staten Island Ship Graveyard.

Nafiun leads the way up and over.

Back In the Saddle

Even before I left Cambridge, I was already investigating what sort of short bike tours I might be able to make out of NYC and beyond. And before I even found a bike to carry me, I’d already signed up for a ride. A few weeks ago, the New York City Homebrewers Guild made its second annual ride to Captain Lawrence Brewing in Elmsford, NY. Not only was it my first long ride since returning to the States, it was also my first group ride, which was a whole new biking experience.

Stentorian Centurion

IPAs are the bread and butter of most American craft breweries. It’s the style I’m most likely to order when I’m at a bar or restaurant, as most breweries have a handle on the style by now. Since I have chosen to brew many different styles, I’ve only brewed a straight-forward IPA once, and never from all grain. One of the side-effects of this deficiency is that I don’t feel comfortable with my knowledge of hops. Additionally I usually don’t have any hoppy beers on hand, despite that often being just what I’m in the mood to drink.

Tasting: Lazy Day Ale

In their books, accomplished homebrewers often advise the reader to keep notes on how the character of a brew evolves over time. A brewer who has insight into how flavors and aromas lent by malt, hops, and yeast evolve over time can adjust the recipes and technique  to make a beer ready for consumption sooner or improve its longevity by trying to achieve stable characteristics. With this in mind, I’ve waited over a month to review my session ale, but I’ve found that over that month the only thing that’s changed are my perceptions and opinions of the beer, while the characteristics of the beer itself have not.

Brhubarb

I’ve been interested in adding fruit to my brewing, but with only one fermenter, I can’t commit to a long aging period. This has focused my attention into quicker fruiting methods, such as using pomegranate molasses. While at the Cambridge Beer Festival, I had a beer spiked with beet root, which got me thinking about vegetables in beer. Around the same time I spotted some vibrant stalks of rhubarb at the market and happened to come across this recipe for rhubarb syrup. I couldn’t ask for a more appealing confluence of inspirations – I had to seek out this tart vegetable to try brewing with it.

Lazy Day Ale

Six months have passed since I was last in the States. It was a long time without brewing. I came back feeling a bit apprehensive, somewhat doubtful that my brewing abilities didn’t atrophy. Nonetheless I was eager to turn around something quick, and so just a few hours after my return, I walked over to Bitter & Esters to pick up ingredients to brew a new version of my summer session ale, now named Lazy Day Ale. While I might enjoy this beer on such a day in just a few weeks, brew day was anything but lazy, exercising my new knowledge of brewing water as well as trying out some new beer body building techniques.

Welcome to Night Vale – Episode 35: Lazy Day

Lambicland

Dried krausen caked onto a barrel at Cantillon.

Something strange brews in the Senne valley. In the cooler months, brewers open the shutters of their breweries and welcome in whatever is borne on the breeze. Foaming wort bursts forth from old oak casks, spilling over the cobwebs networked between barrels. Some of the beer has been aging here for three years. The master brewer takes stock of each vintage and blends them together into a final concoction that springs to life once more in the bottle. Lambic and gueuze are the defining drinks of Brussels and Brabant, and this small patch of earth is the only place in the world where it can be brewed.

In Flanders Fields (Part 3)

After a rousing breakfast surrounded by sonorous Flemish voices, I cycled my increasingly heavy bike through the Brouwershuis’ verdant gate. In one day I’d added the weight of a dozen beer bottles, and it was starting to take a toll on the handling of the bike. Fortunately I hadn’t much farther to go, and quickly I came to the city of Poperinge.

Front gate at the Brouwershuis. Photo: TJ Ryals

In Flanders Fields (Part 2)

I left Johannes’ home bound for breweries and hop fields. My second day of riding (the map of my full route is in Part 1) would take me past De Dolle Brouwers and De Struise Brouwers before having a rest at In De Vrede, the café of Sint-Sixtusabdij, and finally coming to Brouwerij Sint-Bernardus where I would spend the night in the heart of the hop-growing region of Belgium called Poperinge. Unfortunately the first two breweries only open up their taprooms and tours on weekends, but as Johannes said before I pedaled away, “You never know – maybe they’ll see your cycle and the rain and feel sympathetic.” With that hope, I headed in the direction of Esen.

In Flanders Fields (Part 1)

I took off from Brugge along a broad canal headed in the direction of the Zwin. By my guess, the channel used to bring ships in from the coast via the Zwin back when Brugge was a major inland port, but over time the Zwin silted up and Brugge lost its status as a hot spot of trade. But the Zwin still sees its fair share of comings and goings, only these days the traffic is comprised of birds rather than ships. It brought me to the northernmost corner of West Flanders, so much that I crossed into the Netherlands and back into Belgium twice in the course of cycling there.