Beer and Pizza

A cold glass of beer. A hot slice of pizza, with a wonderfully chewy crust. Sometimes, when you're gluten-free, you just want those simple things.

Living in Utah, it's tough to get a decent gluten-free beer. And brewing beer - gluten-free or otherwise - has been at the top of my "wouldn't it be cool to try" list for quite some time.

Mike's parents gave him a beer brewing kit, complete with gluten-free ingredients. This is a sorghum beer, with some orange peels added for flavor and lightly hopped. After we bottled it, the instructions said to wait a week or two for it to carbonate in the bottle.

We waited a week, and tried the beer - not quite fizzy enough. After a second week, it was just right. A surprising amount of head - usually gluten-free beers are lacking in that department - and just the right amount of carbonation when we drank it.

P.S. - I haven't forgotten about the pizza. We had some a-m-a-z-i-n-g gluten-free pizzas when we went to Italy, and I've been trying to recreate that kind of crust ever since. This pizza crust is Against the Grain, and I cooked it at 450 degrees on a pizza stone. The pizza stone seems to be key to getting that crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside crust...

Gluten-Free Beer, Bottled

On New Year's Day, Mike and I brewed gluten-free beer for the first time. After primary and secondary fermenting, it was ready to bottle last weekend.

The beer was still quite cloudy after primary fermentation, and we hadn't quite figured out how to use the siphon, so we lost two gallons...eek!

But the beer cleared considerably after fermenting a second time:

And we figured out the siphon this time. Now we wait another week or two before tasting.

I'll be sure to let you know how it turns out!

Yesterday, and Today

I hope your had a wonderful New Year. Our big celebration was last weekend, so last night we took it easy. I made a decadent salad with spinach, beef braised in red wine, and bacon. It was dressed with a red wine reduction made from the braising juices, and some cheese. We also had more pie. Then we sat on the couch with some wine and watched a movie, and were asleep before 10.

This morning, we brewed gluten-free beer for the first time. It was a bit like making soap or canning vegetables. Lots of steps, precision, and sterilization of equipment required.

We didn't have a pot big enough for all the wort, so we split things between two as best we could. Hopefully it turns out alright, but it will be a while before we know.

Tonight, we'll have Hoppin' John for good luck. This year, I tried to grow blackeyed peas in my garden, but Odie tore them out of the ground before they could even get going. No matter - I scored some dried ones from my Dad's hometown.  When I cooked them this afternoon, I forgot to look back at my regrets from last year's Hoppin' John, and made a full batch again. Whoops. Looks like we'll probably end up with a frittata again.

Here's to hoping for a wonderful 2014! Hopefully all those blackeyed peas will bring oodles of luck!