Yakima Chief

Just a pretty Christmas scene

Yakima Chief  - not an Indian tribe (that I know of) but a grower owned company in Washington, and Idaho.

We had home brew club last night The Sun Prairie Worthogs and a representative was there to talk about hops, the cultivation and all things hops. It was rather fascinating but I won't bore you with the tiny geeky details.

Many people do not know that hops and cannabis are in the same family.  When I was in Denver and lifted a tub of cannabis to take a wiff . . . .it smelled EXACTLY like hops.

Cascade hops picked at The Hop Farm

Yakima has 5 farms which produce a total of 110 million pounds of hops a year.  What interested me was that it was rather like harvesting grapes for wine.  Each variety of hops has, on average, about a 10 day window for picking and pelletizing but like grapes it varies.

The farms are rather calm for 11 months of the year and then BAM - it's controlled chaos as varieties near harvest time.  If they are lucky each variety will be ready at separate times but it varies.  Some years it's a 2 day window for 3 or 4 varieties and on the west coast where they get the REALLY good beer, hops are picked and trucked immediately to the brewery.

Literally picked and put in a truck for freshness. Most breweries use hop pallets like home brewers but a beer with fresh hops is OUTSTANDING.

Each year I try to brew a batch with fresh hops and it truly is a different, wonderful beer. It's something very special and very messy to brew as each cone is like a sponge and sucks up the wort. M E S S Y but magnificent.

So last night we were able to experience the same hop from all 5 farms and see the miner differences in each farm.

   
You have to take some and rub it in your palms to heat it up.  Like cannabis heat is needed to activate the oils.  Thus you boil the hops. The round plugs come from a sample from each bale and is tested for seeds, stems and water content before they are pelletized. 

MAN I bet those workers wreak wonderfully of hops when they get home. Yet another great meeting for our 10th?? year?  I'm one of 3 founding members and the club is still going strong with about 40 members. 

One member will be a brewer at One Barrel, one is opening a brewery in Sun Prairie and another is brewing at a new brew pub in Beaver Dam which has fantastic water for brewing.  Madison has so much magnesium in their water it's like a laxative.  Sun Prairie is OK, very very hard water.

At the club meetings we all bring whatever we have been brewing and pass it around. If we have nothing we try to find some exotic beer just so we can check it off as "tried it".   My records have me at 592 unique beers but that is half of what some members have.

I brought something that I discovered and fell completely in love with.  Viking Blod (HEY - I did not spell it wrong) .

 it's actually a mead with hops.  I was at a place that had 5 different mead (honey wine)  and the first four all tasted sort of the same and then this one knocked my socks off.  WOW - WHAT IS THIS!!

OMG - this is the best mead I had ever had.  But was it me?  So I purchased a bottle (about $30 at HyVee) and passed it around.  The group LOVED it.  I kept seeing people picking up the bottle to get the last drop.

A couple reviews from Beer advocate

One of the most incredible experiences. I love beer, not wine, but I idolize this gift from the gods. I've had it on tap and out of the bottle. I absolutely canNOT wait for my next encounter!


Look: light amber, no carbonation, and obviously no head
Smell: Honey, Peach, Floral
Taste: Absolutely amazing! While I like mead on occasion, I have never particularly liked sweet mead. That changed today. Tastes like it smells but better. The alcohol is present, but not at all overwhelming. Simply delicious. 
Mouthfeel: nothing surprising here...slightly syrupy with a mild astringency from the alcohol.

and as I was looking at reviews I read one that I totally agreed with. And then I see I wrote it a last year LOL 

Purchased October 2017 in Door County. Amazing mead that does not taste 19% ABV but does have a little boozy bite (but not a 19% bite). Sweet as a after dinner drink like a port I suppose. Lots of honey and molasses(?) in this. I wonder what hops are used. A little expensive even for Door County in the off season but love this. Certainly NOT a beer

So if you want to give a booze present or share an amazing after dinner wine go to HyVee. They now have it next to the beer by the single bottles.  I know some club members are going to buy some.

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In the NFL - ratings are up 5% along with scoring.  I think fantasy football is changing the real game as they continue to change the rules to get more scoring.

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The average age of death in America is falling. The reason is drug overdoses yet no one in government seems to want to fix this problem.  Don't get me on the anti-opiates rant but with personal experience CBD is so amazing.

At DOJ in Madison MOST workers are on some sort of anti depression drug like Prozac.  DJ was on Prozac but now is totally free after weening off the drug to a totally safe and legal CBD oil.  This oil has zero psychoactive THC (actually THCA - you really cannot measure THC because THC is created with heat.  THCA is what THC is before it is heated and you can measure that).

If anybody out there has anxiety issues and are on anti-depressants - check out CBD and talk to your doctor. The CBD you can get is from hemp which is why it is legal in Wisconsin.   REAL issues can be fixed with REAL CBD.

Scientists have concluded that for CBD to be PERFECT it needs ALL of the other oils and so for kept in.  It's why cigarette smokers who also smoke cannabis have a lower chance of lung cancer. It's an amazing cure for so many things. 

Anyway - Drug overdoses have become the leading cause of death for adults under 55.

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Giant frosted Mini Wheats