Many interesting match-ups today, including the Gators of Florida vs. the Tigers of LSU, Georgia and Missouri, Oklahoma vs. Texas, etc. Any predictions? I hope I’m wrong, but my guess is the Gators will lose. I predict the Dawgs will win and the Sooners will also prevail.
It’s an absolutely gorgeous day here in Florida, in the 80s rather than 90s. I’m slow-grilling Boston butt for pulled pork, cooking a pot of collards (outside so as not to stink up the house for three days), baking BBQ beans and tossing together some coleslaw. Later in the day, I plan to have a few ciders.
Have you ever made your own cider? I may try it this fall, though with all the new types now on the market, it’s undoubtedly easier and cheaper to buy it. I picked up the Stella Artois version the other day — very good.
What are y’all up to today?
Mustang Bobby
Since it’s starting to cool down to tolerable humidity levels here in South Florida, I might hop in the Mustang, put the top down, put on the Ray Bans and the Beach Boys on the CD player, and drive down to the Keys for the day.
gbear
As long as this is an open thread too, I wanted to post this list of dogs and puppies that are up for adoption by the MN Animal Humane Society after being rescued from a horrible puppy mill in northern MN. Faces to both break and melt your heart. Over 200 dogs were rescued from the mill. They went up for adoption this morning.
Bitter and Deluded Lurker
I had mixed luck with ciders. The problem is that you need sour apples in with the sweet apples in order to get the right amount of acidity in the juice, and they’re harder to find.
Walker
Back before I moved to my new place I made my own cider from my own trees. My trees at the new place are too young to produce enough apples.
I like my cider really sweet, and there are not a lot of commercial versions out there as sweet as I like it. My wife likes Angry Orchard, though.
Walker
@Bitter and Deluded Lurker:
Good cider apples are not sold in stores. You essentially need your own trees.
HinTN
First, collards smell fine and I’m cooking them right there on the stove. Also baking potatoes for twice baked to go with the tenderloin smoking on the grill. Coleslaw, too – great minds and all that. Baseball, dominoes and margaritas are on the agenda here. Go Tigers
R-Jud
No no no. The Stella Artois “Cidre” is rank. You want Aspall’s or Old Rosie. Or, in a pinch, Magners. Or– do they still sell Woodchuck over there? Even that’s better than the Stella.
As we have a frost warning tonight (and 30 MPH winds blowing), I’ll be mulling some Aspall Imperial Cru (ABV 8.1%) with brandy.
JordanRules
I lurve the smell of collards cooking!
Todays nourishment sounds yum Betty.
Bitter and Deluded Lurker
@Walker: Well, yeah, that’s the best way. You can still get good apples depending on where you live and who you know, though.
Corner Stone
I’ve just been baffled by the horrible tragedy with the child of Adrian Peterson.
Corner Stone
Oh, and can’t stand cider. But love pulled pork.
Corner Stone
Go Mizzou!
dp
I hope you’re right about your Gators and my Tigers! Dinner sounds delicious.
Culture of Truth
Make your own cider? I dunno. I went to a cider place the other day and their press has hundreds of psi to crush them apples.
fuddmain
I think the Gator game will be close. Sure wish it was in Gainesville. LSU’s defense hasn’t been its usual dominant self this year. They’re giving up about 25 points per game, while the Gator D only gives up 10. Of course, the LSU offense is scoring about 45 per game and the Gators only 25. Muschamp will try to take the air out of the ball and play the time of possession game. Will probably be boring as shit to watch, but it’s the only shot they have.
I’ll be drinking Lefthand Milk Stout Nitro.
Linnaeus
Wolverines on the road at Penn State. Let’s hope Devin Gardner’s recent resistance to throwing interceptions continues.
Linnaeus
Don’t know if folks outside Washington can get it, but Spire Mountain Dark & Dry is excellent cider.
gravie
Since you asked, my husband and I are going to Seaview, Washington to hear our son’s band perform at this place: http://www.souwesterlodge.com/ We’ll be spending the night in “The Silver Streak.” Unfortunately, we’ll miss the Florida/LSU game, which is a sure-fire win-lose situation in our family, since I’m a diehard Gator and he’s an LSU fan of long standing.
Betty Cracker
@HinTN: I really don’t mind the collard smell at first, but I cook ’em about 3 hours total, and after awhile it permeates the entire house and drives me nuts. Plus the kids bitch about it. Outdoor burner, no worries.
JPL
@gravie: That sounds like fun!
Randy P
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I rarely see Nigerian scams these days. But a couple of weird new mutant apparent scams have hit my inbox. I’m not quite sure how they work. Anyone seen any of these?
1. The “Halliburton Oil and Gas Company” wants me to apply for a job. “Halliburton House, Howe, Moss Crescent, Kirkhill Industrial Estate, Dyce, Aberdeen AB21 0GN or 07747, Scotland, UK, Telephone:+44 744 824 4868… The Human Resource Department of Halliburton Oil And Gas Company wishes to inform the general public about the job vacancies currently existing with the Halliburton Oil And Gas here in United Kingdom…” It gives a “live.com” address to write to. It originates from a *.hu domain.
2. Somebody claiming to have donated $750K to a charity in my name.
3. A message from “zorpia.com” claiming that someone had left me a private message. I thought I recognized the name so I actually clicked on that one and it said all I had to do was authorize Zorpia to access my Yahoo contacts list. First reaction: Is this a Yahoo company? How else would they have access? Second more intelligent reaction: Uh-oh. So instead I googled the name and found someone else who had authorized it to access their Facebook friends list.
I guess it’s pretty simple to see what that scam is all about, e-mail harvesting. But having not followed through, I’m not sure how just saying “yes” actually gives them the ability to read stuff out of your account.
Roger Moore
@Culture of Truth:
Both my parents and one of my sisters have apple trees that they use for apple juice production, and it isn’t that big a deal. The typical home approach is to chop or grind the apples into smaller pieces, put the pieces in a bag, and press the bag with a press. Cutting the apples individually is a pain, so the most common approach is to buy a garbage disposal that will be used exclusively for apples. An ordinary hydraulic car jack provides all the force needed to press the apples, though you need a purpose-built frame to push against.
Cervantes
Stir-fried collards in olive oil and garlic last night. You could do worse.
PopeRatzy
Duroc Pork Spare Ribs
Obie-Cue Sweet Rub (rubbed yesterday)
Smoked with Pecan for 3 hours @250-275F
Glazed and returned for 1 hour @300F
Glaze: balsamic/soy/agave reduction
Served with
sage & rosemary roast fingerling potatoes
fresh green beans with salt pork
Late season white strawberries (Always the best strawberries of the year)
Betty Cracker
Oof — Jawja! I bet our pal Raven is cursing a blue streak right about now.
Roger Moore
@Randy P:
This is actually pretty common, and there are legitimate reasons for wanting to do it. Social networking sites will ask for access to your address book so they can check if your contacts are already registered and make it easy to connect to them. Other sites will do it to make it easier for you to email links. The number of legitimate uses makes it really easy for illegitimate users to ask for the same access.
Corner Stone
@Betty Cracker: I haven’t been wanting to jinx Big Mo.
Elizabelle
aimai’s blogpost on tipping (“The Punishers Want to Run the Country or We Are All Tipped Waitstaff Now”) got a shoutout today from K-Thug.
Way to go, aimai!
Betsy
Any commercial cider (just about) is crap, unless it costs $8 a bottle and is cloudy and comes from England. Woodchuck, e.g., is the Bud of cider — refined, apple flavor added, and super sugary.
However, if you can find or make apple juice WITHOUT SULFITES OR POTASSIUM SORBATE AS A PRESERVATIVE, you can add either ale or champagne yeast and make your own.
Though there are tons of recipes and instructions online, I am lazy, and can offer you my super-lazy half-assed inauthentic crappy but very satisfactory approach:
Tip a teaspoonful of the yeast into the gallon jug of cider. Screw the cap lightly on so the jug doesn’t explode and set it somewhere that’s room temperature or a bit cooler if possible (65 degrees is about good, but room temp works for lazy-cider purposes). After two days, taste it. Pour and drink a pint or so every day after it begins to fizz. It will be sweet and fizzy at first, then drier as the alcohol increases to 8-9 % or thereabouts at the end of the jug. There will be dead yeast lees in the bottom at the end. Drink them (they’re somewhat bitter, but they’re also where B vitamins come from), or toss them on the compost heap.
Repeat as desired (you may need to start a new jug every couple of days depending on how many of you there are and how much you like to drink it) No bottling, no racking, no aging and waiting, no delayed gratification, no futzing — just fizz and fast happiness.
JPL
@Betty Cracker: I was streaming it and then went out to do some yard work.. wtf.. I wasn’t gone that long.
Betsy
I meant to say, if you have a farmers market there, sometimes you can get a lot of fresh juice with no preservatives. The yeast comes from the brew store. They may also know other cider-ers who can share tips.
It’s true that real cider needs sharp and bitter apples (crabs work OK) to get the right taste, but that’s if you’re aiming for a cider that needs aging for a year or so. For my lazy-gal cider, I am usually able to get some Stayman Winesap juice from an orchard that sells at the Farmers Market and it works pretty well — has a good piquancy that carries over somewhat.
But if you have to pick up a gallon of Murrays apple juice at the supermarket, that’s fine for a first run. Why the hell not? I say.
By the way, your house will smell like a combination of apple Jolly Ranchers and rising bread dough while the juice is perking. mmmmmmmm
Betsy
PS go Gators
shelly
Betty, how long do you cook your collards? Got some for the first time, simmered them for an hour, but were still pretty tough.
Betty Cracker
@Corner Stone: So far I’m dead wrong in my predictions. Hope that trend continues w/ UF-LSU.
SectionH
My favorite cider is Julian – it frequently gets compared to champagne, not without reason -but there are many good ones out there. Anthem is very nice. For larger producers, I like Strongbow. Magners and Blackthorn are ok, with their biggest virtue being availability. For Woodchuck, I can drink their dry and dark, dislike their others. Wyders is just overwhelming fake fruit taste to me. YMMV on any or all of these.
Now then, Angry Orchard… how many ways can I explain how much I dislike that stuff? First of course, the taste. Nasty sweet. At least the type I tried (there are 3, and I don’t know which one it was, but I’ll guess it was Crisp Apple). But more: the Samuel Adams company makes it (it’s NOT some startup guys from Cincinnati); they actually brag that they make it from French apples – obviously there are no acceptable cider apples grown in the US; and the reason it has exploded in groceries and bars recently is that Sam Adams told groceries and bars that they HAD to stock Angry Orchard or they wouldn’t be sold any more of Sam’s beer either. I’m looking for a link to that last assertion – Mr S came across it when he was looking at reviews of Angry O some months ago, but I promise I’m not making it up.
Bottom line is, I will no longer buy any Sam Adams product. Not that their beers are so great that it’s a hardship.
@R-Jud: I ran across a pub in Cambridge that had at least a dozen ciders for sale. I think I managed to try 4 that were on draught. Wish I’d actually taken notes. Someday I’m going to spend 2 weeks in the West Country on a cider tour.
Dolly Llama
I’ll tell you, this Georgia game … you just can’t play when five of your six best guys are hurt.
And unlike Jadeveon Clowney, our guys are really, actually hurt.
(Fuckin’ witcha, CS. Love ya, brother. ETA: I wish your young man nothing but the best.)
Betty Cracker
@Betsy: Your lazy cider approach sounds perfect — thanks! I’m the only cider drinker on the place, so a gallon should be enough.
Corner Stone
@Betty Cracker: With both Mizzou up and my Cocks going strong (3 for 3 on 4th down so far), I might just keep my mouth shut on NCAAF until the ticker reads 00:00.
The only sad note is Texas is ahead of the Okies.
And after LSU pulled that EPIC choke job against Georgia, I hope your Gators beat the ever loving shit out of them.
Dolly Llama
@Betty Cracker: Miss Betty, with all due respect – and I do actually know how to do the “Gator respect” thing thanks to marrying a UF grad and rabid Gator fan – y’all will start getting yours in just another couple of hours. Enjoy the time up till then.
Corner Stone
@Dolly Llama: I’m waiting for him to finish the game with no tackles so I can hear allllll about it.
Robert Sneddon
@SectionH: “Someday I’m going to spend 2 weeks in the West Country on a cider tour. ”
Going shooting on a Sunday with my local club at a range somewhere near Hereford we’d stop off at a local cidermaker on the way back and stock up with cider and perry, half-gallon kegs of the good stuff at a fair price. What was left by the Friday following usually went into the slow cooker with diced pork neck and root veg, ready for the Sunday evening club get-together meal when we broached the fresh jugs. Thirty-six hours in cider will tenderise the toughest cut of pork going.
Ciders are a regular feature of beer festivals Over Here, especially from small craft makers, made without extra fizz or too much processing.
Betty Cracker
@shelly: Minimum of three hours! I’ve seen it done successfully in a bit less than that, but low and slow is the way to go.
Cassidy
No drinking for me. No one picked up OT so I got mandatory. An extra 24 hours will pad the paycheck. The family is going to come hang out at the station though, so that’s cool.
Gator90
I find myself irrationally optimistic about the Gators. I guess I just believe in Tyler Murphy.
Also too, Go Mizzou!
SectionH
@Betsy: I’ve been assured by someone I trust about these things that you can get a very drinkable cider starting from apple juice. Your post is the nudge I’ve been waiting for to try it.
@Robert Sneddon: That sounds like it was wonderful.
Hmmmm, I’ve been wondering what to do with a few free days after a convention we’ll be attending in London next summer. Think I may have just figured it out.
Linnaeus
C’mon, Mizzou. Hold ’em!
Corner Stone
COCKS!
PopeRatzy
Obviously none of you realize that all that can be said is
QUACK!
Robert Sneddon
@SectionH: “after a convention we’ll be attending in London next summer. ”
I wonder which convention that might be… if that’s the one you’re referring to I’m working logistics, MIMO and artshow plus general dogsbody before/during/after. If I’m lucky I might get to see some of it.
Corner Stone
How does Adrian Peterson play football tomorrow? How?
Betty Cracker
@Gator90: I’m very impressed with T. Murphy too. Talk about stepping up under pressure. Hope he pulls it off today.
Betsy
@Betty Cracker: I am glad to oblige with the giving of free advice, or any other activity that basically doesn’t constitute activity. You’re very welcome.
And in my instructions, I should underline that the lid must be screwed on Lightly, not Tightly. I just went back and looked at what i wrote, and it would be really easy to overlook that L.
Betty Cracker
@Corner Stone: Errr-er-er-errrrr!!!
Betsy
@SectionH: T’zawzome!
SectionH
@Robert Sneddon: That would be the one. :-D We’ll have dealers’ tables, but aren’t doing the con merchandise, so I hope to see some of the con for a change.
Cassidy
Game over. G’night Dawgs.
Dolly Llama
@Cassidy: G’night, Cassidy.
Corner Stone
@Betty Cracker: I love it when you talk…ummm…rooster.
Let’s go Gators, let’s go!
Here we go Gators, here we go!
And other cheerleading type phraseology.
Burnspbesq
Ducks and Huskies at the top of the hour. The Pac-12 schedule makers hate U-Dub: Stanford and Oregon back-to-back is just heinous.
Not sure I’ve ever seen a Duke offensive line dominate the way they did against Navy today. 4-2 with four winnable games left. Bowl games in consecutive years? Hoodathunkit? I’d say that Duke is now in fourth place in the Hypothetical Academically Elite Conference. They’ve leapfrogged the service academies and Vandy, but there is still a long way to go to catch Stanford, NW, and ND.
Burnspbesq
@PopeRatzy:
What is today’s fashion crime?
Cassidy
@Burnspbesq: It’s Navy. That’s like high-fivin’ yourself for putting your pants on straight the first time.
PaulW
University of South Florida – the team without an offense – finally won a game vs. UConn (arguably a team with worse talent woes than USF), and can claim a 2-0 spot in the AAC conference right up there with Louisville and UCF.
If this keeps up, the Bulls might actually have a chance at the Beef O’Brady Bowl again.
PaulW
@PopeRatzy:
What sound does a red blob mascot for W. Kentucky make?
Josie
I can’t restrain myself – Hook ’em Horns!!! That is all.
Corner Stone
It’s really raining very nicely here in the Greater Houston Metro Area.
I have to say I’m enjoying it.
raven
Ugh, amazingly a team is not as good when they are without their two best running back and two best wides. Mizzou get’s all the credit in the world.
PopeRatzy
@Burnspbesq
As long as the Ducks don’t play Boise St. the Ducks will always win the Emmy in Technical Achievement In Fashion Design (Horror & Science Fiction)
Bonnie
Watching the Washington Huskies vs. Oregon Ducks. The Huskies don’t have a chance in hell to beat the Ducks despite the improvements Sarkisian has made. I hate the black uniforms and believe that unless your school colors include black, you shouldn’t wear black uniforms. Go Huskies Go!
Wally Ballou
All baseball for Yours Truly today. The Dodgers and Cards, still recovering from last night’s marathon opener, are scoreless in the 4th.
But the main attraction is tonight. The Tigers, I believe, will shock the world by sweeping their way to the WS. (I know, I know. But this is the time for big dreaming.)
burnspbesq
@Cassidy:
It’s Duke, indisputably the worst team in D1 the last 25 years. All progress is to be celebrated.
Steeplejack
@raven:
Sorry, bro’. You just didn’t have the manpower today. The Vols took out, what, five Georgia starters last week?
Didn’t see the game myself. Just got home a while ago from lunch and a movie. Captain Phillips. Pretty good, but I have a few issues. Definitely not the feel-good movie of the year.
raven
@Steeplejack: Yea, it wasn’t unexpected at all. We’ll see how Mizzou does with Franklin lost for the season.
PopeRatzy
@PaulW:
*BLORK*
Ecks
Woo Mizzou! Would have been so happy if not for Franlkin going down. His backup was an uber talented high school player who did at least have a red shirt year… but man, starting your first game as QB against Florida’s defence. Ugly. UG. LY. Hope it makes him stronger rather than killing him.
(and I don’t want to hear it about injuries Georgia. Last year we lost our best RB, our entire OL 2 deep, and our only functional QB, and nobody cut us a whole lot of slack for all of that. It’s footbaw.)