Tag: beer

Dec 03 2008

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Ahh…the holiday season is now in full force.  My second Thanksgiving in LA.  This time I did have a meal a little closer to my families traditional Thanksgiving dinner.  I got a ham (just over 8 pounds), and made a couple recipes from my friend Nicole’s blog (Pinch My Salt).  Extra Creamy Mashed Potatoes (Recipe) and one mentioned on Nicole’s site, but actually from one of her food blogging friends, Stuffed Sweet Potatoes Wrapped in Proscutto (Recipe).  The food was all good, though I did end up having a lot of extra food.  One of my friends ended up being sick, so he wasn’t able to come over.  So it was just me and one other friend.  Oh well, I’ve turned the leftover ham into two soups so far, and have plans for a third soup for the last of the ham.  The Proscutto wrapped sweet potatoes were really good, as the saltiness of the proscutto really complented the sweetness of the potatoes.

I did unfortuntely miss out on going to the LA Auto Show.  I couldn’t find anyone who wanted to go with (well except for my friend who got sick).  So largely the extra long weekend was pretty lazy.  Lots of watching football, including a great Civil War victory by the Ducks, which likely will keep the Beavers out of the Rose Bowl.

I found out last Wednesday, that one of my best friends from Eugene is getting married, and pretty quickly as well, the wedding is at the end of December.  Monday night, he called and asked if I would perform the ceremony, so I fired up the internets and got ordained at http://themonastery.org/.  So this Dec 27th, I will perform my first marriage.  Wow.  Crazy.  It will be cool to be such an integral part of a special day in my friends life.

Tonight, I’ll be bottling my first batch of beer brewed in LA.  In a little over a week it’ll be carbonated and ready to drink.  I’d like to invest in a keg system sometime soon…bottling is such a pain.  Someday.

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Nov 19 2008

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Friday was the big opening of the new Bond movie.  I went with a group of about ten folks to the 8:30 showing at the Cinerama Dome at the ArcLight.  The movie was full of action, but in the end a little disappointing.  Unlike pretty much every other Bond movie, this movie was a sequel of the previous movie (Casino Royale).  The movie doesn’t really stand up on its own, unless you’ve seen Casino Royale, and that is a problem in my opinion.  A big let down after the promise of the direction of the franchise given by Casino Royale.

With the fires in the surrounding areas of LA, the air quality was pretty poor over the weekend.  I ended up staying inside watching football all day on Saturday.  The Ducks held on in their game, the Beavers rolled over Cal, and the Trojans pulled away in the second half against Stanford.  So good results all around for my friends and I.

I’ve got all the ingredients to make my first batch of beer in LA, but haven’t gotten around to brewing yet.  I do need to figure out where I’m going to put the carboy while it is fermenting though.  I’ll prolly move some stuff out of my tiny closet as my room is generally pretty cool.  I’m going to try and motivate myself to brew tonight.

I also need to figure out what, if anything, I’m doing for Thanksgiving since I am not going home.

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Nov 13 2008

Red Car Brewery

Last night after work, I had to meet a friend that I’m consulting on some website work with.  While looking for a nearby place for lunch earlier in the day, I stumbled across the Red Car Brewery, so I suggested we meet up there.  I hadn’t even heard of this brewery…despite looking for local breweries a few times in the course of living in LA.

I arrived a few minutes before my friend and went ahead and ordered their sampler of the 5 beers currently on tap.  I’ll go over my brief notes on each of them below.

Electra Lite: 4.42%.  Very light, very lightly hopped.  Very clean tasting.  Good for a warm summer day.

Winsome Wheat: 5.74%.  Nice light bodied wheat beer.  Lightly hopped.

South Bay IPA:  9.04%.  Nicely hopped.  High alcohol level is largely hidden.  Probably the best LA-area IPA I’ve had.

Big Red Ale: 5.74%.  Nice malt forward beer.  Very clean tasting (only slight aftertaste…which is largely pleasant).

Pumpkinhead Ale:  4.42%.  Sweet, malt forward ale.  Pumpkin flavor hidden by the maltiness.  Doesn’t taste artificial, like many of the Pumpkin ales on the market.  They didn’t have a description of the ingredients, but my guess is it includes real pumpkin and very little “pumpkin pie” spices if any.

All in all, I was pleasantly surprised by the beers.  It would be a trek from LA proper…but since I work nearby, it could end up being a nice happy hour location.

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Sep 08 2008

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Well of course the big news of the week is that I have to find a new place to live.  Now that I’ve got a working computer at home, I’ve been scouring the listings on craigslist for new apartments.  So far the pickings are slim, at least in the range I’d like to stay in.  All in all, its kind of a pain in the ass to have to find a new place right now.  Even if it was just another month past, I’d be in better shape for a move.

Friday night, I met a few friends at the Blue Palms Brewhouse to celebrate both mine and a friends recent birthdays.  I had Craftsman Brewing’s Black Sour beer and Victory’s FestBier.  Both were pretty good.

Saturday, I drove up to Santa Barbara to pick up a computer from a friend (Thanks Jen!).  Took the long way home on Highway 1 between Oxnard and Malibu.  Very nice drive, but can see why the 101 route works better.  It’s great to have such good friends (and to be back online at home).

Sunday, I went to the LA Greek Festival with a friend and had some Greek Food, which was pretty much the entire point of the festival as far as I could tell.

I’m thinking of checking out the LA County Fair this weekend…if I decide the drive to Pomona is worth it.

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Jun 26 2008

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From the 17 – 24th I had a friend visiting from out of town.  So basically we spent the week playing tourist in LA.

After picking my friend up at the airport, we headed straight to the beach (Manhattan Beach).  Spent a little time there and then headed back to my neighborhood.  My friend was craving mexican food, so we walked over to the taqueria that is near my house.  After that we just kind of chilled out for the rest of the evening.

The next day we did some more exploring around the neighborhood.  We walked down Melrose, to about halfway between Fairfax and La Cienega.  The plan was to check out some of the stores (even though neither of us had money to spend).  However, we left a little early in the morning, and a majority of the stores weren’t open.  In the end, we got some coffee and did about 7 miles of urban hiking getting there and back.  Needless to say, after that much walking in pretty warm sun, we didn’t do much else the rest of the day.

Thursday, we got day passes for the Metro and did some exploring public transit style.  We had an early lunch in Little Ethiopia, went to the La Brea tar pits, and in the evening went a saw a sneak preview of the movie Finding Amanda in Beverly Hills.

Friday, we got up early and headed downtown to check out the LA Flower District.  They claim its the largest flower market in the world.  It’s basically 2 big warehouses full of venders selling flowers (and other accessories).  It’s mainly geared towards the wholesale market, but they have public hours each day as well (though some of the vendors shut down by then).  After that we went up to Griffith Park and walked around the Observatory for a bit. I’m pretty sure we went to the beach at some point as well.

Saturday, my friend wanted to visit another friend in San Diego.  So we headed down south to do that.  I dropped my friend off at her friends and headed over to one of my friends place to hang out with her and her husband.  They decided to take me to Coranado Beach to check out that area.  We first went to Mr. P’s Irish Pub for lunch.  Mr. P’s is a big Navy hangout (my friend’s husband is in the Navy.  I had a pretty good corned beef sandwhich.  Then we walked over to the beach and hung out there for a few hours.  My friends husband and I spent a significant amount of time body surfing.  It was pretty much a great time (and I managed not to get sunburned).  Later I met back up with my visiting friend and her friend for some dinner at California Pizza Kitchen.  After dinner, we started our journey back to Los Angeles.  But on the way, stopped at Stone Brewing Co. in Escondido.  We got two beers to split between the two of us, a 2006 Double Bastard and a Cali-Belgique IPA.  Both were good, the cali-belgique was a really interesting hybrid beer.

Sunday, we went to church and then to the beach all afternoon.  I think we got there a little before noon and didn’t leave until after 6pm.  It was great (and again…no sunburn).

Monday we got up late, had some breakfast and had a somewhat lazy day.  We went and saw the new Incredible Hulk movie at the Arclight.

Tuesday, we went to Doughboy’s for breakfast and then it was time to drop my friend back off at the airport.

It was a great week…and fun being a tourist in my own town.

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