I came across these old cake photos today. One of a beer glass stout cake I made years back, and another one of a cake that was excellent, however the frosting attempt was my first crack at fondant and looks like it was destined for an episode of 'nailed it!'

Today I brewed up a summer ale loosely based off of the Honey Weisse I brewed. I did fifty percent grain mash. I don't have a lauter tun up and running yet so I did a mash in a bag. It was a little difficult keeping the temp held at 152 but fortunately enzymes are flexible and still do their job even when the temps jump around a little. According to my iodine test and my O.G. I got pretty good conversion just using a bag, and stirring the grains in the bag keeping the temp in the 48 to 56 degrees Fahrenheit range for about an hour.

Spent Grain Bread
1/2 Cup Warm Milk
1/2 Cup Warm Water
2 1/2 Cups Spent Grain
4 Table Spoons Sugar
1 Egg
1 Package Bakers Yeast
1/2 Table Spoon Salt
2 Table Spoons Vegetable Oil
3 Cups Flour

Combine the water, milk, and yeast. Add the salt, oil, spent grain (I ran it through the food processor), and a couple cups of flour. Stir well together and keep adding the flour until it gets stiff. Knead in the rest of the flour and let it rise until doubled (about an hour).Punch down and shape into two rolls, let rise till doubled again and bake at 350 F for forty minutes.

Let it sit for a half hour before slicing so you don't crush your bread as it still bakes on the inside for a bit.

This past Saturday I dropped into Honey Creek Inn to have a pint. Founders Dry Hopped IPA was the cask ale on tap. To misquote princess bride 'Since the invention of the pint, there have only been five pints that were rated the most passionate, the most pure. This one left them all behind.' It truly was the best pint I have ever had.

            My first experience at Honey Creek Inn was a few weeks ago. I had been biking the Canonsburg State Game Area and decided to drop in. The amber walls are adored with a well over a hundred of tap handles. Neat, clean, and smoke free it had an authentic pub atmosphere. Eight tap handles advertised a selection a great brews with Bells Two Hearted occupying the cask ale tap. Impressed by the friendly patrons, many of which who were locals who have been visiting for years; I started up a conversation with the couple next to me. They introduced me to Don Kurylowicz, the owner of Honey Creek Inn, and for that matter owner of Cannonsburg Michigan. Don is a friendly down to earth kind of guy. He exemplifies pretty much everything a small business owner should be in my opinion. I would be surprised if a day goes by that he is not right there in the midst of things. His businesses are not just a business; they are his passion, an expression of himself and his creativity.

Don explained to me that every tap handle on the wall had actually been served on tap right there at his pub. He explained the origins of the public house what it really meant to be one. He ran me through the history of Honey Creek Inn and its close relationship with Larry Bell and the local breweries in the area. He was the first to have cask ale on tap in Kent County, and still one of only two that I know of. The food was great, the beer was great, and the atmosphere was great. Whether you are a billionaire or a concrete finisher you can find sit down and experience what every pub should be at Honey Creek Inn.

 Due to the family atmosphere and great food, on May 21^st I decided to take my family to Honey Creek Inn for dinner. Unfortunately I had underestimated the fourty-five minute wait that might be experienced on a Friday night, and my wife was starving. In many ways this is the real test of a restaurant - the wait staff was super busy, and they were packed - despite all of this they were very prompt, helpful, and quickly put us on the waiting list, even giving me a menu to take out to the car. They provided answers to all my questions about what nights were busiest, explaining what specials they ran, all this even when  we had decided to come back another time.

Since, I have asked many persons if they knew of Honey Creek Inn with at least half telling me they have been faithful customers for twenty years. So this last Saturday was no accident, the perfect pint just happened to be at my favorite pub.

Thank you to foodnetwork for the following recipe.

Beer Bread

Ingredients

3 cups self-rising flour

1/2 cup sugar

12 ounces beer

2 tablespoons melted butter

Directions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Butter a loaf pan and set aside. In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, and beer and mix well. The mixture should be

sticky. Pour into the loaf pan and bake for 55 minutes. At the last 3 minutes of baking, remove from oven, brush the top

of the loaf with butter and return to oven.

On Saturday I attended Brew-UICA 2002. It was the urban institute for contemporary arts' attempt to provide southwest Michigan with a beer tasting event. Thanks to a good friend of mine I got in free. Except for one brewer all the beer was in bottles. That states a lot if you ask me. This was a bunch of contemporary art people's attempt at a beer fest. Frankly, contemporary art people suck. My apologies to all those contemporary art people visiting my site. You may go to uica.org now, come back when you know what a mash tun is. Ok so enough with dissing people of culture. About the beer. There were seventeen tables with no less than four styles of beer per table. Not bad indeed. My favorite was an import, Flag Porter. Flag Porter is brewed from a traditional 19th century British recipe, fermented with original 1825 yeast salvaged from a sunken vessel in the English Channel. Good stuff very English, it had the sour thing going on. Try it if you ever get the chance.

Kalamazoo Brewing Co was there. Their Stout was terrible. I will give them the benefit of the doubt maybe it was just that bottle. Founder's had a nice Porter, very hoppy, good stuff. Roffey Brewing Co. knows how to make good beer. Their Lake Effect Stout rocks the boat. Their Forecaster Pale Ale is also an excellent pale ale. Motor City brought their Amber Wheat. It tasted like crap. Sorry Motor City maybe you should take up contemporary art or something.

Butte Creek from Chico, CA came with their Organic Porter. It was good but it tasted pretty organic if you ask me. Could we please give up on Organic Beer! Who's idea was it anyhow? Organic granola bars; great idea. Organic beer??? Don't we have anything better to do folks? Why not experiment with organic contemporary art or something.

Well I am back from the New England Beer Tour. We started off at Carl's for breakfast. Carl's is a diner about the size of a 1971 Chrysler Newport . I ordered french toast which is about four dollars. I made it through the first 10 pieces or so. I also got a side of bacon which comes with about five pounds of potato's and 12 strips of Bacon. Needless to say we were all stuffed. From there we visited the Harpoon Brewery. Harpoon has recently purchased Catamount. I tried the Catamount Pale Ale, UFO Hefeweizen, IPA, and Hibernian Ale. The Hibernian is a very good Irish Red. My favorite however was the UFO. From there we went to Magic Hat Brewing in Burlington, VT. There I sampled a experimental brew with Northern Brewer Hops. Very Excellent. I also tried their Heart of Darkness stout. It seemed a bit drier on tap than in the bottle. We sampled their Humble Patience. This is an Irish Red on tap with Nitrogen. It is the same thing as Bob's first except for the Nitro-tap. Simular to Guinness in head. Of course the simularities end there. We also made a couple of other stops.

After sampling a couple more brews at Magic Hat we headed on down to Otter Creek Brewing in Middlebury, VT. There I sampled the Stovepipe Porter. It was similar to Saranac's Black Forest. It was a good brew, but is not in my definition a porter. It was way too hoppy for a porter, and had a very light body. It reminded me of a steambeer porter I once brewed myself. I also tried their Pale Ale, Copper Ale, and their Mudbock Ale, which is not a Bock. Frankly I was not impressed at all by any of their beer. I will never drink it again. For a good Bock try Brooklyn's Doppel Bock. Now there is a beer! I tried one last evening, and I was very impressed. It has the typical sour taste that a bock should have. There is a reason that Garret Oliver is famous. Next on our list was the Mendocino Brewery in Saratoga Springs, NY.

We most definitely saved the best for last. At Mendocino we sampled one of their new products not yet released. It's called Old Saratoga Lager, it's a Vienna style lager. Very similar to Brooklyn's Lager. One of those beers we have to thank for bringing the American beer drinker around to real beer. To say that the bartender was a great gentleman is an understatement. If anyone would like to see how a brewery should be run, stop by Saratoga Springs, Mendocino Brewery. We were able to drink several other products as well. Unlike Otter Creek these were not 2oz samples, but rather beer by the pint. The bartender showed us how to make a black and tan using Black Hawk Stout, and Eye Of The Hawk. Eye Of The Hawk is an 8.0% ale. It's color and flavor are reminiscent of a barley wine. We also sampled their Blue Herring pale ale. At our departure we were obliged to take six free pint glasses. Their beer by the case prices were excellent, frankly the best deal I have seen for such high quality beer.

About the only negative thing I have to say is that I don't like Mendoncino's labels. Needless to say I'll put up with the poor graphics if they continue to produce the same quality beer consistently.