Learn Something New Every Day
Items related to food, drink and cooking
The replacement dock arrived from TheGreaterGood the other week but with one thing and another I didn;t get round to starting the brew off. I have done so just today. According to the recommended instructions I need to let it brew for 6 days (up to 8) and then condition for 2 days (up to 15).
No rush – let’s see how it goes. I put the iSpindel in too. Something not quite right with the calibration as it is reporting an OG of 1.03 which doesn;t feel anywhere near strong enough.
Well it’s all gone wrong on the brewing front. I received an email to state there were huge delays to delivery (afteralready having waited nearly a month) for the Pinter. I’ve cancelled the order for now and might try again in a few months. It looks like there are some significant manufacturing issues to iron out as well so perhaps it’ll adapt over time.
In the meantime I might get a more traditional kit and see what I can do.
As part of my venture into home brewing I need* to monitor progress of fermentation. Typically this is done using a hydrometer – a weighted glass bulb thing that floats in the brew to a certain depth. The idea is that the more sugar there is in the brew, the denser the liquid is, and the higher the hydrometer floats. As the sugar is converted to alcohol by the yeast, the liquid gradually becomes less dense and the specific gravity – alcohol strength – can be read off.
Two problems with this with the closed cask Pinter system I have on order:
The solution is(n’t) simple! I bought an iSpindel. This is an electronic hydrometer comprised of a waterproof plastic cylinder containing a couple of circuit boards and a rechargeable battery. Basically it monitors temperature and tilt of the device. The more the device tilts in the liquid, the more dense the liquid is, and the more sugar there is and the less alcohol there is.
The third circuit connects to the wifi in the house and sends data.
To access the data you need to connect to a ubidots account which is a generic dashboard system designed for monitoring measures and triggering events based on values.
What I really wanted was to link this with IFTTT but there doesn;t appear to be an easy channel on either ubidots or IFTTT to enable that. The perfect scenario for me would be to collect the data over time and be able to plot specific gravity by temperature by time butthere is no way to readily access this data without paying a huge subscription fee.
So I’m building my own, using the cURL function in PHP to access the latest JSON data deom ubidots. It’s early days but I’m learning as I go.
<?php
$headers = array();
$headers[] = "x-auth-token: REMOVED";
$headers[] = 'Content-Type: application/json';
echo 'Headers set up in array...</p>';
$ch = curl_init();
echo 'CURL initiated empty...</p>';
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL,"https://things.ubidots.com/api/v1.6/devices/ispindel000/temperature/values/?page_size=1");
echo 'URL set...</p>';
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
echo 'Returntransfer set...</p>';
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER, $headers);
echo 'Headers set...</p>';
$fp = fopen("brew.txt", "a");
echo 'File initiated for writing...</p>';
//fwrite($fp, "Go...");
//echo 'First line written...</p>';
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_FILE, $fp);
echo 'File for CURL to write to set...</p>';
curl_exec($ch);
echo 'CURL executed...</p>';
if(curl_error($ch)) {
fwrite($fp, curl_error($ch));
}
curl_close($ch);
fwrite($fp,"\r\n");
fclose($fp);
// $state_result = json_decode($state_result);
?>Another ‘lockdown hobby’ I thought would be fun to start off – home brewing! Getting barrels and bottles and casks and kits and yeast and sugar and steraliser and syphons and hydrometers and CO2 and secondary tablets and everything else is such a faff though.
So I’ve ordered a Pinter. This is a new device – an all-in-one brew keg and beer conditioner. The concept is quite simple: add your fresh press (fruity stuff and malt) plus a load of water and a dose of the yeast (comes as part of the kit) into the plastic cask; attach to a special docking stationb; leave for 7 days or so.
Then, remove the cask from the docking station. All the dead yeast crap will have sunk to the bottom, out of the cask, and into the docking station. Condition the brew in the fridge for a few days and then tap directly for 10 pints of intersting craft beer. It’s from here:
I also added an add-on keg so I am able to brew one batch while conditioning the next. One in yellow, one in black. I ordered it on Sunday 14 Feb and it says t should take 10-15 working days to arrive, som hopefully I can provide an update on or before 7 March.
On top of this, I’m getting itchy about waiting so I’ve also ordered a gadget to go with it. This is an iSpindel – a digital hydrometer that measures specific gravity by its tilt. Just bung it in the keg at the start and monitor via wifi and phone. Hopefully it’ll integrate with IFTTT so I can auto-publish progress:
Having bought the amazing Dishoom cookery book I started making long-game* Indian food.
Virtually every dish requires this amazing garam masala spice combination, which is nothing like you buy ready made in the shops. Ingredients are:
Put the lot on a baking trak in the oven at 50 degrees Centigrade for 2 and a half hours. Grind to a powder.
* items that take many hours if not days to cook from start to finish. Very satisfying.