We've all heard the expression that wine and cheese improve with age, and even grocery store cheese manufacturers will use the amount of time their cheese is aged as a selling point. The average consumer may see aging as part of a process that has already happened, but depending on the product, a little patience can be greatly rewarded.
Step 1: pick your item to be aged: This can be tricky, but a good rule of thumb is higher alcohol or bolder flavor means it will do well with a bit of time to relax. Bold red wines (such as a Cabernet Sauvignon), fortified wines (like port), high gravity beers (such as barley wines, or imperial stouts), and many oak aged spirits do well with some extra time to mature. I find that oak aged wines, beers, and spirits with a little extra aging, as you can still get the oak flavor with less of the bitter, headache inducing tannins. If your product has a "best by" date, aging is not advised. Some producers (including the brewery I once worked for) intend for their product to be consumed soon.
Step 2: Find out what you like. This is even tricky. You will need to find out what exactly you like and be patient enough to figure it out. For example, some people like bloomy rind cheeses (like Brie and Camembert) very young, and other like them very ripe. I recommend getting two (at least) of what you want. Drink or eat one helping right away and take notes, and wait and save he rest for later (still taking notes!) This should give your a loose guideline. Whether it's brie after two weeks, a certain barley wine after year, or tawny port as soon as your buy it, experimentation is key.
Step 3: Be patient... but keep in mind that the right time may come sooner. Whatever you're aging, keep in mind that it was made to be enjoyed. While your barley wine might reach its peak in another few months, I promise it will be much more enjoyable if cracked open to celebrate a new job. Aging is as much about improving a product as it is about waiting for the best moment to enjoy it.
Friday, February 10, 2012
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
In response to Arisia and "Earthlings"
As some of you freaks and geeks may know, last weekend was Arisia, one of my favorite sci-fi cons. While it was an epic weekend, and I was thrilled by the fact the hotel bar had Duvel, Chimay (red), a good Gruener Vertliner, and could make a decent martini, only a few minutes of the con are relative to this blog. Once of the bar friends I met and I got onto the topic of food science and food ethics. I brought up my views on meat, which brought up some relate issues of culture and class. My bar friend made the point that without factor farms fewer people would have access to protein. I responded by saying that there are a number of ways to inexpensively get animal free complete proteins and B vitamins (citing the Latin American tradition of beans and rice), and his response was that many Americans don't know how to use plant proteins. As a gringo who didn't know about the nutritional powers of beans and rice until a high school health class (something not everyone has access to!) I can see his point and now realize that the ethical issues of factory farms are more complicated than whether or not an animal suffers.
So, this somewhat brings me toward the film . Netflix recommended it for me based on my positive rating of . The synopsis was somewhat misleading, so when I started watching and saw a definition of specieism (sp? dang!) and Holocaust footage paired with a narrator talking about the number of animals killed for food in a day, well, I was a bit surprised.
Before I continue, allow me to say how disgusted I am that some people see it fit to compare killing animals for food to making an entire group of people a political scapegoat and killing them because of it because a totalitarian dictator saw it fit. Disagree if you must, but this is my blog and these are my views.
I will give the film some credit. I agreed with some of their points (they also talked about puppy mills and animals used for entertainment), and I am glad that footage for factory farms is available so that more people have access to the truth about where food comes from. However, this film suffers the same sort of myopia to which many animal right activists fall victim. There are the cultural and economic considerations I already mentioned, but this sort of media also highlights the worst of the worst and makes it seem as if all slaughterhouses and meat farms follow the same practices. They use footage from the factory farms while ignoring that there are humane operations. True, the most available meat and animal products are the factory farms, but media like this sends the message that the only options are being a strict vegan or being an an animal killing Nazi.
I also feel the need to mention some related ethical issues as related to the human species. In some areas of the rural south, raising chickens for big companies is the best option for a career (relatives may recall the "chicken factories" near Blount County). Additionally, produce farms are not devoid of ethical problems, it doesn't take much time or research to see how poorly undocumented workers are treated in commercial farming companies, and how employers take advantage of workers who have iffy citizenship status.
Well, I suppose what all this ranting comes down to is the reductionist attitude that plagues food ethics, and certainly all ethics. For a self-described animal rights person like me who is not opposed to eating animals, often there is no niche to fill. We're often inclined to say that morality is not black and white, but within the animal rights sphere, that is rarely the case.
In a perfect world, there would be no factory farms and no animal testing. In a perfect world, there would also be no poverty, no disease, no pain, and everything John Lennon described in "Imagine." We don't live in that world, so until we do, I ask you all to consider all sides of the food ethics issues I discuss in this blog, and feel free to challenge my points. It seems like something we were supposed to learn as little children, but it's always worth being remind that there is always another side, and it is rarely worth dismissing without consideration.
So, this somewhat brings me toward the film . Netflix recommended it for me based on my positive rating of . The synopsis was somewhat misleading, so when I started watching and saw a definition of specieism (sp? dang!) and Holocaust footage paired with a narrator talking about the number of animals killed for food in a day, well, I was a bit surprised.
Before I continue, allow me to say how disgusted I am that some people see it fit to compare killing animals for food to making an entire group of people a political scapegoat and killing them because of it because a totalitarian dictator saw it fit. Disagree if you must, but this is my blog and these are my views.
I will give the film some credit. I agreed with some of their points (they also talked about puppy mills and animals used for entertainment), and I am glad that footage for factory farms is available so that more people have access to the truth about where food comes from. However, this film suffers the same sort of myopia to which many animal right activists fall victim. There are the cultural and economic considerations I already mentioned, but this sort of media also highlights the worst of the worst and makes it seem as if all slaughterhouses and meat farms follow the same practices. They use footage from the factory farms while ignoring that there are humane operations. True, the most available meat and animal products are the factory farms, but media like this sends the message that the only options are being a strict vegan or being an an animal killing Nazi.
I also feel the need to mention some related ethical issues as related to the human species. In some areas of the rural south, raising chickens for big companies is the best option for a career (relatives may recall the "chicken factories" near Blount County). Additionally, produce farms are not devoid of ethical problems, it doesn't take much time or research to see how poorly undocumented workers are treated in commercial farming companies, and how employers take advantage of workers who have iffy citizenship status.
Well, I suppose what all this ranting comes down to is the reductionist attitude that plagues food ethics, and certainly all ethics. For a self-described animal rights person like me who is not opposed to eating animals, often there is no niche to fill. We're often inclined to say that morality is not black and white, but within the animal rights sphere, that is rarely the case.
In a perfect world, there would be no factory farms and no animal testing. In a perfect world, there would also be no poverty, no disease, no pain, and everything John Lennon described in "Imagine." We don't live in that world, so until we do, I ask you all to consider all sides of the food ethics issues I discuss in this blog, and feel free to challenge my points. It seems like something we were supposed to learn as little children, but it's always worth being remind that there is always another side, and it is rarely worth dismissing without consideration.
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