TARDIS Driver

This is apparently L.J. Scott's sole contribution to "official" Doctor Who canon.

I thought it funny to have a Doctor Who tale take place in fairly contemporary New York City. Imagine Martin Scorsese directing a story for the show. "Jamie and I could never be made because we had human blood, didn't even matter that my Mother was Pythian."

The Doctor, Jamie, and Victoria surveil the New York Supplementary Education Institute. Unbeknownst to them, a man named Edward is doing the same thing. It seems that people enter the Institute to take classes but seem to get consigned to perpetual after school detention and never return.

Not bad but things got resolved a bit too quickly. I do like Jamie referring to cars as beasties, though.

Do Conservationists Dream of Emperor Penguins?

 

The year is 2040 and the Doctor, Jamie, and Victoria land in London in search of fish and chips but find only vending machines that dispense fish flavored formed and pressed soy simulacra. They run into a conservationist named Stuart Mallory who gives an extended lament to our travelers on the uncaring attitude of humanity which has let cod and many other creatures go extinct.

A bleak forecast for mankind but the switch to the Sixth Doctor and Frobisher cushioned the Cassandra bit a little. Plus Ace and Benny make a cameo!

Dying should be reversible

While the Victorian setting brings Frankenstein to mind, it's really more "Herbert West - Reanimator".

Sir Charles Westbrooke is a friend of Victoria's father but, unlike Edward Waterfield, Westbrooke is not content with widowerhood. So he endeavors to cheat death. And he succeeds.

The introductory section is very Lovecraftian with Victoria setting down an account of the horrors she has witnessed to explain her vow which opens the tale.

When the Doctor, Jamie, and Victoria arrive on the scene, Westbrooke is at home with a half dozen zombies who show no gratitude to him for having been resurrected. Campbell sets a moody scene which becomes rather gory.

Somehow Westbrooke has stumbled upon an atrocious Time Lord weapon which causes blood to be turned into acid. The Doctor boasts that he had it banned on Gallifrey so what's it doing on Earth in 1866? He seizes on this as a way to dispose of the zombies who have shown that they are nearly impossible to, um, kill. Jamie and a handy claymore deal with one that threatens Victoria only to find that the hacked up parts reassemble into a blasphemous shade of a man not allowed to rest in peace.

 

In one scene, Jamie falters and is unable to shoot a dart with the horrible blood transmogrifying stuff in it but Victoria saves the day by grabbing the gun and dispatching with zombie. The description of an animated corpse melting from the inside out was both disgusting and morbidly satisfying.

A fun, creepy tale. Definitely one of the more satisfying Short Trips so far.

We Will Survive

I have started Patrick Troughton's second season as the Doctor (series 5). "Tomb of the Cybermen" is a legendary episode, especially for the scene where everyone's favorite cybernetic bad guys emerge from their slumbers.

It's Victoria's first adventure as a fully-fledged member of the TARDIS crew. In some scenes she's a classic Who screamer lady while in others she puts on a brave face and is ready to confront danger. I suppose these two modes are not wholly contradictory but they do feel at odds here.

Watching this story brought "Kinda" and "Warriors of the Deep" to mind in that it would have benefited from better lighting. It's generally flat here with most spaces getting a uniform amount of it and so there's precious little interplay of light and shadow. A little chiaroscuro could have heightened the ominous mood and perhaps hinted at the human traitors instead of having them come out with mustaches a-twirlin'. It's also too bad because the opening scene of the tomb raiders gaining entrance to the Cybermen's home was shot well. Some of the exterior shots were done with a short lens so people are close up and in focus with some nice depth of field.

The Cyber-Controller is great. I've seen him in comics but this is the first time for me seeing that big brain dome on video. Great stuff! Now, why that costume didn't get better stuffing when Toberman threw him is beyond me. It looked like a Monty Python dummy that was dropped from a building. Concomitant to this is that we got more wire work when a Cyberman lifts Toberman up. We even see the wire briefly.

While I still prefer the Cybervoices from the 80s - David Banks rulez! - the Cybermen here are genuinely menacing. They're slow and lumbering, at first, but after a bit more thawing out, they prove to be rather quick and nimble. There's a scene where the Doctor is climbing out of the tomb entrance and a Cyberman suddenly appears to drag him back down and it really startled me. No, not just startled, scared. Watching them go from a stand still to swiftly engaging in violence is really unnerving here.

Kaftan and Klieg are archetypal promethean scientists who think they can exert control over the infinite evil of aliens with technological superiority. Duh!

Oh! The American accents on the guys who brought the tomb raiders to Telos was just classic. I loved how they seemed more interested in their fanny packs than the mechanical monsters beneath their feet.

As I noted above, Victoria is hit or miss here but she does show some initiative and she pushes back at the Doctor when he basically tells her she's too precious to go walking into danger. For his part, Jamie remains a man of action. The Doctor is mostly business here with his playful side tamped down, by and large.

The Cyber-conversion process is started on Toberman and I believe this is the first time we see a human being converted.

A very enjoyable episode. At this point, the show feels like it would in the 70s, it's shed that sense of trying to find its footing that it had for most of Hartnell's tenure.

Under the Covers, 28 February

I recently found out that the theme song to The Young Ones was a cover.

Having seen the movie Elvis recently, I was reminded that his version of "Hound Dog" was a cover of a cover by Freddie Bell and The Bellboys.

WHS Librarian on City Cast Madison

My former co-worker at the Wisconsin Historical Society, Lori Bessler, is featured on City Cast Madison today.

Check out her interview about genealogy.

Sonny Boy

Seen after losing at music trivia.

Mousing

Piper's been mousing lately so methinks I should set some traps.

The Hu - Citizens Of The World

Mongolia's most famous metal band, The Hu, feature in new a documentary series called "The HU - Citizens Of The World" on  Youtube. It looks like it'll go behind the scenes with the group and into their heavy blend of East and West.

I saw The Hu back in 2021 and they were great so I am looking forward to watching this.

Now Legal in All 72 Counties!: Java Lava by Pearl Street Brewery

Sometime in the mid-1990s.
South central Wisconsin

A black sedan makes its way past the endless kalberwurst fields of Green County on Highway 69 and eventually pulls into the small southern Wisconsin town of New Glarus. The car's tinted windows draw some attention but the locals mainly shrug off the dark glass. Hans Luchsinger looks up from the alphorn he is tuning for just the briefest of moments as the town's newest visitors cruise by his shop before resuming his work.

"Must be some city slickers from Madison," theorizes Alfred Streissguth who is turning onto 69 on his way to the Glarner Stube as the mysterious car turns off of the state highway and onto County W. 

The black sedan pulls into the parking lot of the still fairly new brewery, New Glarus Brewing Company. Taking the stall closest to the entrance, the front doors open simultaneously and the sound of yodeling is heard for a split second before the engine is shut off. Two figures, a man and a woman, exit the car clad in long black overcoats, their faces obscured by mirrored sunglasses.

The pair approach the front door and knock 3 times. No more, no less. Just 3 times. They can hear a bottle drop onto the floor and some indistinct profanity on the other side. After about 30 seconds the door is opened by a mustachioed man of slightly taller than average height who appears to be in his mid-30s. He wears lederhosen and a Tyrolean hat. His mustache has a small patch of white foam on it and the man quietly blurts, "Ope!" before hastily licking it away.

"H-Hello?" he asks hesitantly.

Simultaneously - almost mechanically - the visitors reach inside their coats and pull out ID.

"We're from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. Are you Dan Carey?" they inquire.

"Yes, I am."

"May we come in?"

"Sure." Dan leads them past empty barrels and stacks of bottles ready to be filled to the brewery's break area which is a small room with only a couple tables with chairs and a vending machine that dispenses Swiss cheese sticks and Landjäger. The woman glances into the vending machine and notices all of the holes in the cheese. She decides that the sticks are not a good value.

The government agents stare at Dan who could only see his reflection in their sunglasses when he looked back. Eventually he gets the hint and sits down. His interlocutors remain standing.

The woman methodically pulls her coat open and Dan's heart skips a beat as he sees a shoulder holster containing a pistol. However, the agent instead sticks her hand into an inside pocket and proceeds to pull out a bottle of beer. New Glarus beer.

"Is this your beer, Mr. Carey?"

Dan looks at the bottle which had a deep blue label that proudly proclaims "New Glarus Brewing Co." above "Coffee Stout".

"Yes, that's my beer," he replies with more than little pride. 

The agents turn to look at one another in unison, as if their movements were mechanically synchronized. Smiles of the "We got the bad guy!" kind appear on their faces.

This time the man spoke. "Mr. Carey, did you know this beer is illegal?"

"Oh jeez! It's just beer. With coffee."

"Just beer," the woman repeated mockingly. "Just beer, he says."

Her partner smirked and continued, "Mr. Carey, coffee is not an approved ingredient in beer. The government cannot allow unregulated admixtures of alcohol and caffeine to be thrust upon an unsuspecting public. You're going to have to come with us."

"What?!" Dan pleaded incredulously.

Dan Carey was never seen again. His disappearance is listed as "Unexplained" in the gevernment files.

Afterwords:

Not too long after Dan Carey's disappearance, coffee became an approved ingredient in beer.

*********************************

It's been a while since I've had a Pearl Street Brewery brew. I think of them as one of the breweries that time forgot. They've just melted into the background and become part of Wisconsin's craft brewing scenery. Like Tyranena, to my mind.

I don't mean to demean here because I like their beer. It's just that they're not trendy. People don't seem to be waiting with bated breath for their new IPA or any such thing. Pearl Street is a stalwart, not a trendsetter and that's fine by me.

And thanks to the sacrifices of Dan Carey and the folks in New Glarus, Pearl Street and anyone else who cares to can brew and sell a coffee beer. And they do. For the venerable La Crosse brewery it's Java Lava, a coffee stout. The earliest mention I could find of it dates to 2011 and it gave me the impression that it wasn't brand-spanking new but not a veteran brew either. Perhaps it was a brewery-only thing at that point, soon to be bottled. Today it is looks to be one of their flagship brews and available year-round.

Coffee beers are generally like cocktails in that you mix them. You brew some beer and then brew some coffee and mix them together. As a fan of coffee, I'd love it if brewers gave more info about the coffees they use in these kinds of beers. Light roasts taste different than darker ones. I personally prefer African coffees above others because I find that they have an especially tasty terroir. Maybe someday some brewery will do a series of coffee beers with various roasts of various coffees. How would a stout made with lightly-roasted Ethiopian coffee tasty compared to one brewed with a darker roast of the same beans?

Pearl Street notes that Java Lava is brewed with Guatemalan coffee but doesn't note the roast.

Regardless, this stuff looked like motor oil as it poured into my glass. It's about as Stygian a brown you can find. A small, frothy tan head looked very nice but lasted just long enough for me to get a photo of the last of it before it was all gone. Clarity was impossible to determine at first but it later proved to be clear. I smelled a slightly sweet plum scent, some dark chocolate, roasted grain, and, of course, coffee.

On my first sip, I caught a good, firm fizziness and a medium to medium-lightish body. There was delicious coffee flavor to be tasted as well as a bit of mild dark chocolate and roasted grain. Although a malty sweetness grew as the beer warmed, it remained restrained. There was also some bitterness to be had with some of it coming from the coffee and the rest from hops.

That tastilicious coffee lingered after I swallowed and a bracing herbal-spicy hoppiness washed over my tongue. And so the finishing touches were a bit dry and bitter but nothing outrageous. Just a nice green kind of flavor to stand in contrast to all of the dark, roasty flavors and that malt sweetness.

I really enjoyed Java Lava. It was a glassful of wonderful roasty flavors and positively gluttonous for someone like me who enjoys coffee and beer. I think the Guatemalan coffee added a fruity tasting brightness to the flavor that complemented the bitterness. It was sprightly and kind of sharp, overall. Good stuff.

Junk food pairing: Grab a can of Koh-Kae peanuts with the coffee flavor coating. They'll add a little sweetness and creaminess to round things off.

The Corona Diaries Vol. 76 - Prelude: Bon Iver

Thumbprint 6: Weizen Doppelbock by New Glarus Brewing Co.

Back in 2021, New Glarus Brewing bid good riddance to the worst of the pandemic and its lockdowns with Gyrator, a doppelbock that eased me into winter with a rush of malty goodness and a nice buzz. Apparently others were similarly smitten and we collectively made Gyrator into a hit. Well, as big a hit a New Glarus beer that isn't Spotted Cow can be, I guess.

Realizing they had stumbled onto something good, Dan Carey and his brewhouse minions (with the blessing of Deb Carey, of course) went the doppelbock route again last fall and loosed Weizen Doppelbock upon us late in the autumn.

The weizen doppelbock is, as far as I know, a bigger, chewier, more potent version of the venerable hefeweizen/weissbier, a.k.a. - the German wheat bier. The style involves boiling a bunch of wheat that has been bolstered with some barley and then letting the resulting proto-bier mingle with a particular type of yeast that poops out tasty phenols and esters that your tongue thinks are like banana, clove, bubble gum, et al. Today I learned that this yeast strain is called Torulaspora delbrueckii. I suppose a weizen doppelbock is just this formula with more ingredients.

While hefeweizens are fairly common, their doppelbock cousins are not. When it comes to this style, I immediately think of Tap 6: Mein Avenitus from the German brewery Schneider Weisse - G. Schneider & Sohn. It is the platonic ideal of a weizen doppelbock from a brewery that turns the popular drink into an art form. They seem to have weissbier in their blut and brew various takes on the style: cloudy, clear, bocky, eisbocky, extra hoppy, aged in wine barrels, und so weiter.

In addition to increasing my yeast knowledge today, I have also learned that the name "Aventinus" refers to the Bavarian historian of that same name, a.k.a. - Johannes Turmair, who lived from 1477-1534. Now, why the bier was named after him is as of yet unknown to me. Perhaps it's just a tribute to a local boy who done good for himself.

For their part, New Glarus seem to have taken a cue from Tap 6. Their weizen doppelbock appears to be rather traditional, if the text on the bottle is to be believed. No mention of added fruit nor the use of experimental hops; no kveik-torulaspora hybrid yeast for that Norwegian farmhouse weizen taste.

 

The beer came with a lovely firm, light tan head of no small volume. And it had staying power too, owing, no doubt, to all of the protein from the wheat. (60% wheat, I hear.) It was deep copper in color and cloudy. I could smell banana even though my glass was several inches from my nose. Moving it closer, I also caught bubble gum and a wheaty-grainy aroma. Although it had been a while since I'd had an Aventinus, I felt my memories of it come flooding back in every sip of estery goodness.

Although it had a medium-full body, there was also a hefty dose of fizz here that kept my tongue from being cloyed by all the malty sweetness. Banana and bubble gum were the most prominent flavors from that special yeast, but there was a hint of clove in there too. That sweetness was a bit like raisin and balanced by some hops which had a herbal, vaguely minty taste. And there was the taste of wheat as well.

The fruity flavors lingered on the finish as the sweetness faded. Something like mild cinnamon entered the picture here as the hops gained in strength. They, along with some boozy heat, made for a nice dry, bitter finish that stood in stark contrast to the big malty sweetness that I had just swallowed.

My tasting was done in February and this weizen doppelbock made a fine companion on a chilly night. Furthermore, I can recommend its muscle relaxing qualities after shoveling snow. The label notes that it was double decocted but I didn't detect much, if anything, in the way of the toasty bread flavor I associate with that process. Maybe it was just me because, when I see "weizen", I immediately start thinking of banana and clove and all of the flavors from the yeast and how I prefer the former. Perhaps I was concentrating on that and not any traces of Maillard reactions and this steered by tastebuds in a certain direction.

Regardless, this is a very fine beer. I hope that the trend continues this autumn with a roggenbier brewed to bock strength so I can have a taste-off with Tippy Toboggan.

Junk food pairing: When drinking one of these Weizen Doppelbocks, shake hands with beef and pop open a bag of Lay's Kobe Steak flavored potato chips.

Under the Covers

I've been a music fan for decades and I still occasionally run into the original version of songs that I only knew as a cover but didn't know they were covers. Not too long ago I discovered these tunes:

The Chain-Smoking Gumshoe

Last night my Frau and I braved the cold and snow and went to see Marlowe.

It was directed by an Irishman, Neil Jordan, and based on a novel by Irish author Benjamin Black (a.k.a.- John Banville) which is a tribute to Raymond Chandler's stories and features his enduring detective, Philip Marlowe.

I know nothing about the novel that is the basis of the film, The Black-Eyed Blonde, but felt that the movie was a fun homage to the film noir of yesteryear. Liam Neeson is the titular private dick and, before long, the femme fatale walks in, one Clare Cavendish played by the lovely Diane Kruger. Marlowe is drawn into a particularly seedy part of the Los Angeles underbelly in 1939. 

The first few scenes have some lovely cinematography with plenty of light and shade courtesy of Venetian blinds.

Not knowing anything about the book, I felt that the Marlowe here was light on witticisms and aphorisms. Sure, there was a quip here and there but he's much more weary than witty.

It was a bit funny to be watching a contemporary movie in 2023 with so much smoking. Whenever Marlowe meets someone, he offers a cigarette. Today that's a good way to get a heap of social opprobrium most of the time, if not physically assaulted. Is there a sociological term for this kind of thing? When you share something as a way of breaking the ice with a stranger or easing into a conversation with an acquaintance you haven't seen in a while?

While my Frau really didn't like this movie, I thought it was a lot of fun. I enjoyed delving into the mystery. While the characters were mostly to type, I still liked watching them do their thing. Marlowe doesn't break new ground but I enjoy these retro noir hard-boiled detective tales. When was the last time we had one? L.A. Confidential in 1997?

Oh the Dalekanity!

An epic 7-parter that picks up exactly where "The Faceless Ones" left off.

With Ben and Polly gone, Jamie steps forward to pick up the slack. He's a real mensch here. Not only does he do the classic things such as going off to save the pretty girl, but he also shows pity on his enemy and gives the Doctor a piece of his mind a couple of times. Jamie is a man of action here, a companion that doesn't just stand around waiting for direction from the Doctor.

The recorder makes a return here - it is 7 parts and so has plenty of time to fill - and the Doctor has that aura of all-knowing as he has figured out things before most of the others/comprehends more than they do, having met the Daleks before. Plus, he throws in plenty of indignation and Troughton does it louder than Hartnell.

I love the Dalek Emperor in looks and sounds. (It would return to battle the Ninth Doctor in 2005.) But, overall, the Daleks are rather wimpy here. They may have overcome the need for sucking up static electricity from the floors, but they were not the mini-tanks that they would become as we see Jamie and Kemel (R.I.P.) throw one down into a drawing room from a 2nd floor hallway and it explodes like a Pinto that has had its bumper gently tapped.

Here the Daleks snare the Doctor and force him to help them with an experiment. They want to isolate what they call the "human element", those human characteristics which help we Earthlings defeat the Daleks time and again. (No help from the Doctor, mind you.) This idea would return to the show in 2007 in "Evolution of the Daleks". It was simply pure fun to see Daleks infected with some humanity frolicking here, giving the Doctor a ride, joyously spinning in circles, etc.

We've also got the scientist blinded by his lust for power along with a fine beard and big mad scientist hair. And we get a new companion - Victoria, who is orphaned like Nyssa.

It's also the end of Troughton's first season, a.k.a. - series 4. His corridor running alone makes his tenure feel, if not exactly modern, then not so ancient. Hartnell went into gremlin mode every once in a while and put a lighthearted spin on the proceedings occasionally but Troughton alternates between a goofy trickster and simply indignant rather often. While Polly did her fair share of screaming, Ben and Jamie are quite often men of action, even if they don't give their actions proper consideration.

I enjoyed the wire work and we got to see something a little different from the Daleks, who bookended the season. Is "The Highlanders" the final pure historical for a while? I think so.

Series 2 to commence soon.

"The Navigators"

Another song from the forthcoming Jethro Tull album, RökFlöte, has been released - "The Navigator". It's a good tune and I am enjoying having the electric guitar up in the mix.

Back in theaters: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

How wonderful to have Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon back in theaters. I think it was the first bit of wuxia (or martial arts tale set in ancient China) for many Americans. I presume it was brought back as star Michelle Yeoh is popular once again because of her role in Everything Everywhere All At Once.

It was a hoot watching those fight scenes once again with the actors flying around on wires. The bad gal, Jade Fox, was suitably villainous with a dose of hubris for a classical character flaw. A pair of romances provided some motivation as well breaks from the investigation and fight scenes. There were some instances of those eternal conflicts in the human condition: between man and woman and between youth and age.

My Frau came out of the theater swooning over Chang Chen. For my part, I thought Michelle Yeoh was smoking! Oh, and Zhang Ziyi was pretty little thing too. And they were badasses, both.

I'd like to read the story that this film was based on.

Global Market & Food Hall & Rock

I made my first visit to Global Market & Food Hall relatively recently and find myself going there every other week or so to stock up on tom yum soup base, a bag of potato chips flavored for the shops of the Orient and not Peoria, and other miscellany. I go mid-morning so I've never eaten at the food hall though my Frau vouches for the tasty Hmong egg rolls to be had there.

It would appear that supply chain shortages are still plaguing the snack food chain of the East as I haven't seen tom yum flavored peanuts in a while. Are they perhaps sitting in containers aboard a ship that is hanging out off the California coast?

I really adore the mural at the entrance depicting a street somewhere in the Far East with sellers hawking their wares and foods.

I have to admit that I am flummoxed by the faux big black rock, though.

A Salt & Vinegar Miscellany XII

Are these South African lentils?!

I cannot see lentils - the legume or the word - and not think of that episode of The Young Ones where Neil makes lentil casserole and spills it on the floor. "Guys! There's some dinner on the floor, if you want it."

Unlike with most chips, I could smell the vinegar with these. Unfortunately, they went easy on it in the taste department. Salt too. These have some earthy lentil flavor but, oddly enough, they mostly tasted like fried wonton skins to me. I like those so I enjoyed these chips. Just not in a salt & vinegar way.

Therese Dreaming of Dunkel: My Turn - Chopper by Lakefront Brewery

As I type, the latest in Lakefront's My Turn series is Chopper, a Munich-style Dunkel. Chopper is the brewery's controller which, if the bottle's label is to be believed, means he sits in an office with a picture of Amatino Manucci on the wall behind him as he calculates the brewery's finances on an old Texas Instruments calculator.

The My Turn series, which allows employees to brew a beer of their choice or have a beer of their choice brewed, has had some appealing brews as of late. The kellerbier was great but I didn't taste a Vienna lager, Berliner Weisse, and Dunkelweizen which all sound tasty and are most welcome as the brewery embraces the IPA ever more strongly. It's not that non-IPAs have all gone away, but Lakefront used to brew a nice variety of beers but it's gotten kind of less so.

Bitching about the ubiquity of IPAs is like shooting fish in a barrel. I get it. But I remember when Fixed Gear was a red ale, not an IPA. (I also remember when they brewed it too.) There was a witbier, a mild, an ESB...I adored their cherry lager. These days it's largely IPA this and barrel-aged that. Oh well.

One area they seem to be a pioneer in instead of a follower is with non-alcoholic beers. Just as they were on the bleeding edge of gluten-free brews, they now seem to be the leaders of NA beer brewing. I don't drink NA beers but good for Lakefront. While I miss the non-IPAs of yesteryear, I will find solace in the wonderful variety of the My Turn series.

Chopper ran the numbers and found a Munich-style Dunkel wouldn't break the bank. It's a close cousin to their Eastside Dark, which is described as a Bavarian dark lager. They have some malts in common but different hops. I presume the same yeast is used in both. A side-by-side comparison would be neat but, since I don't get paid to do this, you're stuck with just the one beer.

Chopper is a lovely bier. Dark copper and ruby-tinged, by right, it should have had a big, light tan head atop it but my pour only produced a modicum of foam and what was there disappeared rather quickly. No doubt my poor pouring skills on display once more. As is proper with Munich-style Dunkels, it was clear. The aroma had some prominent milk chocolate along with roasted grain and stone fruit smells.

Looking at the bier, I didn't see many bubbles but my tongue was greeted with a nice, medium dose of fizziness. Roasty grain, a little milk chocolate, and bit of bread gave the bier a full flavor despite having only a medium-light body. On the swallow, those malty flavors faded allowing a moderate bit of spicy-herbal hoppiness - think black tea but "greener" - to come through and deposit some bitterness and dryness which both lasted a while on my tongue.

I brought some of this over to a friend's house for a homebrew day and he, a professional brewer type, was delighted by this bier. And so was I. While I wish it was a bit breadier tasting, I really enjoyed how the hops kept the sweeter inclinations of the malts in check. Its light body made for some easy drinking and refreshment on a chilly winter day of sparging and stirring.

It has been a while since I've had an Eastside Dark so I am going from memory here. This is very similar to Lakefront's beloved annual. I think the chocolate is more prominent in Chopper and that it's a bit breadier than Eastside. Methinks I shall have to get some Eastside Dark to refresh my memory.

Junk food pairing: Pair your Chopper with a bag of steak flavored Cheetos. The faux beef flavor goes with the roasted grain flavors in the bier and cheese just goes with everything.

Rolling Stone Says "Milwaukee Rap Is Taking Over TikTok"

I am not a subscriber but, if you are, you can read the article here. Regardless, good to see Milwaukee get some positive national press.

Another full moon, another Peter Gabriel tune

Speaking of Peter Gabriel...

Another full moon has arrived, I guess, because he has released another new song from his impending album - "The Court (Dark-Side Mix)".

The Knights of Magog Standing Around

Hmm...

(Photo found here.)

You got potato chips in my croutons! You got croutons in my potato chips!: Hen of the Woods Red Wine Vingear Kettle Cooked Potato Chips

Hen of the Woods is a snack company out of Cincinnati. Their website tells an origin story involving 3 area chefs who were on a mission to make a gluten-free crouton. "Countless trials later we found it," it claims, "and our Red Wine Vinegar potato chips born [sic]." This sounds more than a bit suspicious to me. How do you go from croutons to potato chips? With drugs.

I bet they were tinkering around with sorghum or millet or corn and got frustrated. So they popped open a few cold ones and then lit a doobie. Finding themselves more than a bit hungry, they ordered a pizza. But the munchies just wouldn't wait so they busted out a bag of potato chips which got into a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup-like accident with a nearby cruet of red wine vinegar. Viola! The snack at hand was born.

That's my hypothesis, anyway.

Hen of the Woods is a type of mushroom but the company's website makes no mention of how it got named after a mushroom. (A 'shroom, eh? Hmm...)

This is apparently the first time I've encountered a salt & vinegar chip made with red wine vinegar. I thought that I'd tasted one or at least a chip that had red wine vinegar in addition another variety but, alas, I can find no evidence of such a snack. Too bad as red wine vinegar is very tasty with a fruity, vinous flavor. It's my preferred vinegar for potato salad.

These chips were light in color - a very light yellow - with some brown edges. When I stuck my nose in the bag and took a whiff, it caught mainly oil. But there was a faint vinegar tang and a hint of potato as well.

In addition to being kettle cooked, these spuds were also sliced more thickly than your normal chip. As expected, they had a high crunch factor. Concomitant to that, however, was a kind of mushiness. Kind of like a Tootsie Roll Pop with its hard candy shell encasing a soft interior. It was as if these chips were thickly sliced and not cooked long enough to imbue crunchiness throughout.

This crunchy-mushy yin-yang thing aside, they had a lovely creamy potato flavor. They went easy on the salt but get a pass, I suppose, since they're advertised as vinegar chips and not salt & vinegar. The vinegar was firm but stopped short of corrosive strength. And I could taste the red wine part of it.

Although perhaps not as tangy as is my preference in these matters, these are excellent chips. The vinegar tastes wonderful as do the chips, texture issues aside. The tang and spud comingle perfectly here.

I would also add that Hen of the Woods kept things basic in this recipe. There are no "natural" flavorings to be had. You've got some citric acid added to the holy trinity of potato, oil, and vinegar powder but that's it. You don't need to adulterate a salt & vinegar chip. Keeping it simple is a winning formula.

Grassmilk: An Amateur Flavoromics Investigation

I bought some half & half from Organic Valley made by cows on a diet of grass instead of grain.

To begin with, this grassy stuff looks a bit different than what I am used to. Instead of being white, it appears off white. Just a tad. It also definitely tastes different from my usual half & half courtesy of the cows at Sassy Cow. I'm not sure how to describe the flavor. I think it tastes more like butter and...a bit floral, perhaps? I cannot discern any green type of flavor - it doesn't taste like it would if you pull up some blades from your lawn and pop them in your mouth. The best analogy I can think of is that your common milk is like white chicken meat and the stuff from grass-fed cows is like lamb. More aromatic, more pungent.

I live in America's Dairyland. Within 10 miles of my house is the University of Wisconsin-Madison, home of Stephen Babcock, the man who figured out how to accurately measure the amount of butterfat in milk 130 years ago. Surely today it is home to the world's leading dairy scientists, at least one of whom can give me the 411 on the taste of milk from grass-fed cows.

...

I posed the question of what makes milk from grass-fed cows taste different to Jimena Laporta, Assistant Professor Lactation Physiology, here in town at the esteemed Department of Animal & Dairy Sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

She begins:

I am not sure I have a well rounded answer to your question, my understanding is that increasing the inclusion of grass in the diet of dairy cows changes the fatty acid composition of the milk (higher omega 3 lower omega 6 in grass fed cows according to the literature).

I wonder if this fatty acid composition accounts for the buttery flavor I tasted. She continues:

The gut microbes will work differently to digest grass compared to grain and legume based diets and that changes the profile of precursors and intermediates reaching the mammary gland.  Also, in organic milks there is a different processing after milk is harvested leading to (possibly) crystallization of the sugars (mainly lactose) and denaturation of primary milk proteins.

This whole milk production thing is more complicated than I thought.

I found this paper called "The Flavor of Dairy Products from Grass-Fed Cows" and, though most of it was way above my head, three things stood out.

The first is that the science addressing this question is somewhat lacking. "...there is sufficient evidence of the presence of a distinctive aroma in milk from grass-fed cows, but the connection with specific aroma-active compounds is still in progress," the authors say. "...several molecules have been identified as potential key-flavor compounds of grass-based milk and dairy products, but their real sensory impacts still need to be defined in detail," they admit.

"Further work is still needed to answer the question," we are told. "...but the increasing application of a flavoromics approach to the studies should rapidly bring about a decisive contribution to the knowledge."

Woo hoo!

We should have an answer in my lifetime.

Secondly, the paper explained the off white color I noticed:

"Under the sensory point of view, the yellow color and the smoother texture of derived butter and cheese is the most evident effect of grass feeding: these features are connected to the higher concentrations of β-carotene and unsaturated fatty acids with respect to non-grass-based products."

The final thing that stood out for me was this:

"Other potentially flavor-active compounds in milk from grass-based farming systems are indole and skatole (presenting flowery of fecal odor, depending on the concentration)."

Now there is an aroma descriptor I have never used when writing about food going in, just coming out.

I think more research is needed in this area to close our diary knowledge gap.

The Corona Diaries Vol. 75 - Postlude: Slowing down

Watch your honey drip, can't keep away: Peach Mead by Wyldewood Cellars

Here we have my final review of a Wyldewood Cellars mead. For now. While I bought a variety 4-pack, the bottle of raspberry mead ended up at a friend's house.

I was listening to a podcast earlier today and the host remarked that the pigs my medieval European ancestors kept looked different from the ones we have today. It made me wonder if peaches are in a similar predicament. Apparently they are. Thought to have originated in China, they were in Mediterranean regions by the 4th century B.C.E. and spread from there. It seems the Spanish brought them over to these parts in the late 16th century.

It says here that peaches can have white or yellow flesh but that the latter are a product of the second half of the 19th century. I have also learned about peach stones. If the flesh adheres to it, it's called a clingstone. But, if the flesh is easily removed, it's called a freestone.

As I was reading that there are a couple thousand plus varieties of peaches, I thought about how we (i.e. - average American supermarket denizens) are presented and familiar with multiple varieties of apples but not so with peaches. Sure, we may not recall which variety of apple is best for baking, canning, or eating raw, but we are accustomed to seeing green ones and red ones; apple shaped ones and shorter, rounder ones that are shaped more like tomatoes. But, generally speaking, when we go to the store, a peach is a peach is a peach. We just hope the flesh isn't mealy, which, I just learned, happens when the fruit's pectin isn't allowed to breakdown due to cold storage.

Here is a sampling of peach varieties.

We have the Doughnut peach which is a bit flattened and its stem area is a depression that gives the appearance of a doughnut hole. Then we have the Brazilian Babcock variety that is missing the iconic fuzz. Indiana Jones' favorite peach is surely the Melting Flesh. I guess it take the freestone concept to the next level. There is also a Madison peach which is hardy enough for Wisconsin weather.

Lastly, I'll note that peaches taste like peaches because of compounds called lactones. It appears that gamma-decalactones are the main culprit as they taste like, er...um, peaches.

I guess Wyldewood used white-fleshed peaches because this peach mead looked like water. Actually, this mead is a blend of their sweet mead and peach wine so I suppose it's more correct to say that their wine must have been made with white-fleshed peaches. But shouldn't the mead have been yellow? There might have been the barest hint of yellow here but really, it looked colorless. It was also clear and unfizzed. While minimalism ruled the visual aspect, the olfactory one was much less ascetic as the mead smelled very sweet with the honey being floral and aided by a bit of earthiness. The peach was in the back somewhere.

As with the other Wydlewood meads I've tasted, this was very sweet and very smooth. The earthy-vanilla aspect of the honey seemed more prominent to my tongue. Just like their other meads, this stuff is 12% A.B.V. and there was some boozy heat to be tasted. The peach was mild, at first, but became much fuller as the mead warmed. The fruity/honey sweetness lingered when I swallowed but some gentle tannins eventually came through bringing a mild dryness that made for a nice contrast.

Another tasty wine from the folks at Wyldewood. Sweet but not like drinking Libby's Peach Nectar. I appreciated how the peach never totally obscured the honey. The ratio of these 2 flavors varied with temperature, but I could always taste both. A fine lactone-laced mead.

Junk food pairing: I recommend white peach & jasmine potato chips to accompany this mead. The jasmine adds a nice floral taste to the proceedings while the salt contrasts with sweetness nicely and enhances the flavors all around.

The Corona Diaries Vol. 75: Slowing Down for the Towns That Time Forgot

(late October 2022)

(Check out this entry's rant. Er, prelude.)

Heading west out of Osseo on Highway 10, it’s about 10 miles to the town of Strum which greets you with this Potemkin village-like facade.

Although you are welcomed in Norwegian, I don't think there's much Norwegian heritage on display in town. There's the Viking Golf Course but that's about it. To the best of my knowledge, there's no restaurant offering lefse wraps like the Norske Nook down the road in Osseo, no bakeries with lefse and sandbakkels. I didn't notice any Norwegian flags.

That was one of the things that struck me when I moved to this area - the lack of ethnic character. OK, there were the Ole & Lena jokes which supplanted the Polock jokes that I knew from Chicago but that's all I can recall. My hometown is full of ethnic enclaves but I found nothing like that in Trempealeau County. I don't doubt that Norwegian culture could be found in pockets here and there and that I, a mere teenager, simply missed them, but there was nothing of any scale. No Syttende Mai parades, for example.

It doesn’t take long before you’re out of town and on your way to Eleva. Originally called New Chicago, the legend I always heard was that its name came about when someone was painting the word "Elevator" on the side of a grain elevator but couldn't finish owing to the weather and/or onset of winter. A few months go by with a giant "Eleva" in the middle of town and the name stuck. More likely it's a corruption of a French name.

Eleva is a rather nondescript town like Strum. Its claim to fame is an apocryphal tale that Jesse James and his James Gang buried some loot or gold in the area after their raid on the First National Bank in Northfield, Minnesota. Legend has it that they buried their booty either by Chimney Rock to the south of Eleva or near Hamlin, a town that was to the east. However, the raid on the bank was a failure and the robbers came away with a paltry $26.70.

Hamlin was a stop on the Tomah-Hudson Stage Coach Line and something of a town on the make by the 1880s. Prosperity came to a crashing halt when that railroad line I mentioned in my last entry bypassed Hamlin. However, it proved a shot in the arm for Eleva which got a rail stop. I think the Hamlin Cemetery is all that remains of the town.

I caught 93 north in Eleva. As I mentioned in my entry about this drive last year, the views from the ridge just north of town are spectacular.

Back in the autumn I found this photo (and a couple others) that were taken atop the ridge back in 1914.

I sent the site to my friend Jason who promptly went out on a hunt for the spot where the photos were taken. He is fairly confident that he has found it.

My next destination was the Hadleyville Cemetery. Halloween was approaching, after all.

Hadleyville was a small town that used to lie about 2 miles north as the crow flies from where I lived which was 10 miles or so north of Eleva. Since the cemetery is dated to 1859, I assume the town was also founded that year. It dissolved sometime during the Great Depression. Wikipedia cites a source claiming that the general store was across the street from the cemetery.

A friend and I were discussing this extinct community one time and wondered if the little grocery store that we used to stop at on our bike rides was part of the town. It was called Hazen’s, I believe, and was a bit west of the cemetery.

Here is what it looks like today.

An aerial map from 1939 shows the structure although it has been added onto over the years.

Was it part of Hadleyville? A definite maybe.

Here’s a satellite view of the cemetery and its surroundings today.

1939:

It appears that, within 10 years, all traces of the town had vanished except for the cemetery.

When I was in Milwaukee in October, my friend who is from this area told us a tale of how her father brought her and her brothers out here one Halloween for a little spooky fun. Things did not go as planned.

I presume Joseph D. Hadley was a founding father of the town. He was surely related to one, at least. The cemetery has plenty of space for new residents and the latest marker I found was for a poor child who died at 17 days old and was buried there in 2021.

Several tombstones had a picture at the top like Mr. Hadley’s. I must admit that when I saw this one:

I felt that it looked like something from a Monty Python animation scene. As if it was going to push an animated man in a bowler hat into the Argument Clinic or some such thing.

One thing that struck me as I walked around the cemetery was that there were no people with Scandinavian surnames interred there. The area is infested with Norwegian-Americans. Recall the Norske Nook in Osseo; the Strum welcome sign is in Norwegian; the golf course in Strum is the Viking Golf Course. Almost everyone in the area is an Olson, Nelson, Johnson, Skogstad, and so on.

Although I wished the sun had peeked out from behind the clouds more frequently, it was a fairly nice day. Not too chilly. A few cars passed by as the road the cemetery is on intersects with a couple state highways and some backroads which take you into Eau Claire about 10 miles to the north.

It was quiet and peaceful but, at one point, I noticed the cawing of crows. No surprise as they seem to need little cause to give their piercing call. But the cawing seemed to continue for longer than normal. So, as I returned to my car, I decided to see what the hubbub was all about.

I saw this scene in a tree which, perhaps, stood behind the site of the Hadleyville general store.

Those two crows were reading that eagle the riot act. How many minutes had it just sat there perched on the branch ignoring the insults? However long, the eagle just didn’t care and sat there calmly as the crows hopped from branch to branch in search of an even better spot from which to let loose their corvidian invective.

Eventually the eagle took off towards the cemetery and I made my way north in search of a little something to break my fast. My destination was about 35 miles up the road: Bohemian Ovens in Bloomer.

Bohemian Ovens Bakery and Restaurant is known for its kolache. Now, growing up, my Polish grandma made kołaczki, which were diamond shaped cookies filled with jam or jelly. And the dough was made with cream cheese. My Frau and I encountered the Czech kolache last year in Cedar Rapids, you may recall. Those were larger and round with a flakier, more bread-like dough.

I found that Bohemian Ovens made sweet as well as savory kolache. Furthermore, theirs were pasty-like with the filling enclosed in a bready dough. I bought samples of both kinds. Here was my breakfast, ham & cheese kolache:

It was very tasty. The enclosure was a very light, fluffy dough and really hit the spot. I also brought home a package of peanut butter Nutella kolache. These were smaller with a dollop of frosting on top.

Heavenly stuff!

From Bloomer it was maybe 12 miles to my next stop – the Chippewa Moraine State Recreation Area. I was there last year in mid-November and was hoping to find a few trees that still had leaves this time around. And, unlike last year, there was no rain in the forecast. Even a little sun here and there was to be expected.

On my way there I passed by some ruins and I just had to pull over and check them out.

A collapsed outbuilding, I guess.

A set of stairs that lead to nowhere…I presume there was a shed there at some point.

When I arrived at the recreation area, I found a school bus parked in the lot with a bored looking driver behind the wheel just like last year. A group of kids was running around by the interpretive center with some trying their hand at a demonstration featuring a two-man crosscut saw. We were up in the pinery, after all.

I put on my new boots which I had bought in Osseo and hit the trail. Last year I went left at the intersection so this year I went right.

Just like last year, the scenery was spectacular.

It was a lovely day – perfect for a hike. And there were indeed trees that still had leaves. This place must look simply incredible when the trees are at peak colors. Still, the trails were gorgeous.

I suppose there’s a trade off to be made. If the trees have full canopies, then views of the many kettle lakes would be obscured from the trail. Later in the autumn, you get views of the lakes but little colorful foliage.

At one spot I found evidence of a beaver that had been hard at work.

When I walk the trails, I alternate between looking up – the sky, potential bird sightings in the trees - looking around at the lovely scenery, perhaps to spot a deer (or a bear), and down at the ground so I don’t step awkwardly onto a rock or tree root and take a tumble. It’s easy to get lost in one’s thoughts.

On one stretch of the trail, I was looking up, down, and all around, my thoughts in the clouds. Then I looked down and saw this:

I took evasive action so that I didn’t step on it. Like that eagle, it just didn’t care and didn’t move an inch. I knew it wasn’t a timber rattlesnake and figured it was non-poisonous. Even when I stooped down to get photographs, it remained still. I think it’s a garter snake of some variety.

Not 10 steps up the trail from my serpent friend I spied something long and thin on the ground and the primitive fight or flight part of my brain yelled, “Snake!!” No doubt my pupils dilated as much as they could to take in the potential threat as a small dose of adrenaline shot through my veins. Closer examination revealed it to be a moss-covered stick. That’s evolution for ya.

The sun did indeed peek out occasionally and made for some nice photo opportunities.

I don’t know what it is, but I have a thing for moss covered rocks and trees.

Towards the end of my hike – about 4.5 miles – I came upon a sign.

I realized that I had gone the “correct” way around this time. Plus, I think it offered some important wisdom: Slow down. It asks the walker to “take a few minutes to relax before finishing your hike.”

This.

This is exactly why I went up north. To slow down, relax, and spend some time when I am not slave to a clock. To get out of bed when the sun rises instead of at the insistence of an alarm app on my phone (or a hungry cat, for that matter). To go about my day at a leisurely and deliberate pace instead of being pulled here and there by the demands of work and everything else that would have my time.

The recreation area is rather large and encompasses much more than the area I hiked. My walk took me along a short segment of the Ice Age Trail but it continued to the southeast. I drove around the area, including down a designated scenic road for a spell. The land is just gorgeous. One road is a narrow two-lane affair with no shoulder and no stretch that goes straight for more than 100 feet, it seemed. I took it at 35MPH the whole way and took in the scenery.

Evening approached and my stomach was insistent that I put food in it. It was back to Bloomer where I could get a beer and dinner at the Bloomer Brewing Company.

I arrived just after opening and was the only person there for a little while.

The bartender was a young woman who didn’t look old enough to legally consume the beer she was serving but that may just be a sign of me getting older. I asked what was happening in Bloomer these days and she unenthusiastically replied with something about a high school volleyball tournament. She may have been distracted by a slate of opening duties yet to be performed or was simply a young person who was eager to leave the confines of a small town and seek her fortune elsewhere. Or maybe she just wanted to be out with friends instead of being at work.

My first beer was a Hog Breath. The brewery didn’t give a style for it but it was a stout or some kind of dark ale.

It had a faint smokiness along with a maple syrup sweetness. The latter ingredient was a nice Northwoods touch. Being served cold and an abundance of fizz kept it from being cloying. It was a nice, hearty drink to relax with after a hike.

I was pleased to see people trickle in. First was an older couple and then a younger one. A trio of women who looked like they had just gotten off from work shuffled in to start the weekend. The place was not full when I left but it was slowly getting more crowded. Hopefully it’ll be around when I am up that way again.

My next destination was a hotel room in Chetek. The plan was to relax and then get to the Chetek Bakery in the hope that they’d have some Swedish limpa bread on offer.

********

Bonus photo. It’s Grabby again. She’s been sleeping on my backpack on the dining room table a lot lately. Sometimes, though, she must be moved to accommodate eaters. Here she is shortly after being awakened from her slumbers.