Jackson US Summer Tour 2013 - South Carolina

     While in Atlanta for a two-week stint, we broke it up with a quick trip up to Greenville, SC to visit my brother and his family.  It has been a busy year for their family, especially with the addition of their son Fisher in March.  We were eager to see them after a year and to see how much our niece, Arden, had grown.  It was a nice couple of days where we hung out and spent some time in downtown Greenville.

     Highlights from our time in Greenville:

1.  Stroll through downtown Greenville
     We'd never been to Greenville proper in our previous visits, so it was nice to see some of the shops on Main Street and the bridge over the old waterworks.

Jason and Fisher at our ice cream stop at Marble Slab 

On the bridge near the old waterworks. 

Downtown Greenville 

I got some practice using the stroller. 

2.  Catching up with the family

     Great chats were had and we had some quality time with the Jacksons.



Aunt Marisa and the kiddos 

Candace and the kiddos 

Jason and the kiddos 

Brothers



--Justin

Jackson US Summer Tour 2013 - New York City

     From Philadelphia we took a train into New York City for a day with the main purpose of seeing the Atlanta Braves take on the N.Y. Mets at Citi Field.  We went in a bit earlier to spend some time walking around and to meet up with our friends, Andy and Amy who live in Brooklyn.  The weather was hot and the tourists were out in droves, but it ended up being a great day.  As a bonus, we also got to visit Marisa's sister Kendra, since she was in town for work.

     Highlights from our time in NYC:

1.  Braves vs. Mets at Citi Field
     While it's not really my official goal to see a baseball game at all of the ballparks in America, it is fun seeing a game in different cities - especially when you can see your home team.  I guess Citi Field is one of the newest baseball stadiums in the country and just hosted the All-Star game this year.  The only two bummers were that the Bravos lost 4-1 and we missed seeing Zach Wheeler (East Paulding HS alum) pitch for the Mets by couple of days.  Otherwise it was an awesome time.

Citi Field

Mr. Met

Shout out to Jackie Robinson since he played for the Brooklyn Dodgers.

Local beer



Couldn't have asked for better weather.

2.  Times Square
     We had been to New York before, but it had been several years and it was nice to just walk around again along Broadway Street and take in the sights.

Empire State Building



Marisa loves mascots and there was a hoard of them outside the Toys R' Us.



We poked our heads into the Toys R' Us in Times Square and were blown away by the scale of the place.  They had this giant ferris wheel, an ice cream place, life-size Lego sculptures and several floors of awesomeness.

3.  Dinner in the park with Andy and Amy
     It was also nice to visit with our good friends we met in Frankfurt who now live in Brooklyn.  We wish that we would've had more time to explore their neighborhood, but time was short so we settled for dinner in a park and a couple of hours of catching up.  It was really good seeing them and we hope to have a return visit.

The crew in front of one of these temporary art exhibits in the park - piles of nautical rope, tied in knots, and died in bright colors.



4.  911 Memorial
     When we visited before in 2006, the plans were still in the works for the 911 Memorial and since it recently opened a year ago we definitely wanted to check it out.  The museum is still under construction, but they have opened two memorial pools where the previous foundations were for the World Trade Center.  Engraved along the guard rails are the names of all of the victims from the attacks and the rescue attempt.  I thought that it was very well done (and designed by a Georgia Tech architect) and serves as a very serene and contemplative monument.  The visit definitely brought us back, thinking about where we were and what we were doing at the time of the attack and it had an especially personal meaning for my step-dad who had a friend who died in one of the towers.



There are two pools that look identical, with waterfalls running down the side walls and falling down into the inner square, of which you cannot see the bottom.

Each pool is dedicated to different groups of victims with one pool containing names of those of the flights and rescue workers and the other with names of those in the WTC.

There is a master plan to build several new buildings around the park and I think that this one will be the largest of those - planned to be the tallest building in the USA upon completion.

 



5.  Bonus hangout with Kendra
     Although we would be visiting her in Massachusetts in a week, Kendra was in NYC for work so we got to meet up with her for drinks after the Mets game and again for lunch the next day.  It was random, but fun having a chat before our visit.  More details to come in the next post...



--Justin

Jackson US Summer Tour 2013 - PA

     On this summer tour I came one week behind Marisa and had a short week in Atlanta before flying up to visit my mom and step dad in Philadelphia.  We were joined by Marisa who came up from Virginia after finishing her summer classes.  It had been a few years since we'd visited them in Pennsylvania, so we were excited to see them and check out some new sights.  My mom had also purchased a book on the "breweries of Pennsylvania", which I was keen to put to good use.

     Highlights of our week in Philadelphia:

1.  Victory Brewery
     Probably the most famous craft brewer in Pennsylvania is the Victory Brewing Company.  This was high on my list to see during our summer craft beer tour, so we didn't waste time in dropping by the brew-pub in Downington, PA for lunch and a couple of pints. 

Give me a "V" 

One suggestion I picked up from my book on PA breweries was to try some of the craft-brewed lagers.  Pennsylvania has a rich history of German/Bohemian immigrants who have a lot of pride in their beers.  Since the lager is from this area it is a safe bet that brewers in the area know what they are doing.  I tried the Victory Lager and was very pleased with the clean, yet full taste that most mainstream lagers don't deliver.  If you are a beer snob that is partial to ales, I would implore you to give craft lager a shot. 

Food was amazing. 

Marisa, being the shy person that she is, asked around and ended up meeting one of the head brewers of Victory - Bill.  She chatted it up about the craft beer scene in Hong Kong and our summer beer tour. 

 

 

2.  Mural Mile

     One activity that we would recommend in downtown Philly is exploring the "Mural Mile", which is a self-guided walk that takes you past about 20 different murals painted on different buildings.  The murals were all done over the past twenty years or so and they have a variety of themes.  The whole walk can be done in less than two hours.

 

Marisa's favorite, entitled "Taste of Summer" 

3.  Quality time with mom and Ed
     It had been nearly a year since we had last visited my mom and step-dad, so it was nice catching up and visiting, having home-cooked meals and watching movies.  We also had a day trip to NYC, which I will talk about in my next blog post.

 

At Monk's Cafe - one of the most well-known beer bars in Philadelphia.

 

4.  Using the amenities at my mom's apartment

     My mom lives next to the Valley Forge National Park as well as a river and a well-maintained cycling/running trail.  Over the week I was able to take a couple of runs along the trail, work-out in their gym, and hang out at the pool - all with great summer weather.  In a summer where you are eating out a ton, it was nice to get some exercise and eat at home a few times.

 

5.  Trip to NYC

     See next post...

 

--Justin











Home Brew Part 3: The Good, the Bad, and the U-mazing

     In this third installment of the home-brewing series (see part one and part two) I'll walk you through the next three batches of home brew that we produced this spring.

Our best home brew to date - the Edinburgh IPA



     First........the Good.  Since time was short for us before the end of the school year we decided to go with a small batch from Brewferm - the Belgian Triple.  I love full-bodied, high gravity beers and I was especially keen to make one since some of our other beers had a relatively low alcohol by volume (ABV) and we hadn't had a very malty-tasting brew yet.  We used a liquid malt extract (LME) and just added water, basically, which I've decided is not the most fun way to brew.  However, after two weeks of fermentation and another two weeks in the bottle the beer turned out to be quite nice with an ABV of around 7.5%.  It has been said and I will concur that the longer the beer sits in the bottle, the better it tastes.  Luckily, I've left a few more bottles at our place while we vacation in the USA this summer so they should be very nice when we get back.

The Belgian Triple was indeed a small batch, yielding only around 9 liters.  Here it is just after the lid of the fermentation bucket was opened.

And here is the batch before bottling - after transferring it to an intermediate container and cleaning out the sediment and yeast remnants.

 

A final gravity measurement confirmed the approximate ABV of 7.5% - nearly double what our other beers were packing.

The batch was small, but it still managed to fill up twelve 750mL bottles which is enough to share.

     Second........the Bad.  With our second brew we went with another LME kit - this time the European Lager from Cooper's (an Australian brewery).  Again, the process wasn't as fun, but we tried to make it more interesting by adding some additional hop pellets during brewing and some additional pellets for dry hopping during fermentation.  One thing that you should note about brewing lagers is that they require approximately three months of bottle conditioning time, so don't expect to be able to turn these batches out any time soon.  We didn't time it well and were only at 10 weeks in the bottle before I left for the summer.  However, the bottles that I did try up to that point all tasted a bit "medicinal" or almost like an antiseptic.  It was not so nice.  I'm going to give it the benefit of the doubt though and wait until I return from summer break to see how it tastes after the suggested wait time.  Somehow I'm not too optimistic about the result, but we'll see.

     Lastly.......the U-mazing.  With our third brew we departed from the liquid malt extract kit ways and went with an india pale ale (IPA) recipe using dried malt extract (DME) and hop pellets.  This brew felt more hands-on, but we were pretty sure that it was going to be too hoppy after following the recipe.  After two weeks of fermentation and 2-3 weeks in the bottle, however, we were blown away by the result..............we had beer that I would happily pay money for!  It was quite a relief to finally have a batch that we were proud of and that is more than enough to motivate us to continue our hobby.  Since it was a recipe that we used from the distributor I must give credit where it is due, but we are intent on tweaking the recipe using our own combination of hops to make our own version of an IPA.

"Edinburgh IPA" - post fermentation.  It had a nice malty smell, but you could definitely tell that it was going to be hoppy.

Vlada is prepping the bottles for bottling by adding carbonation drops in each one.  They're basically sugar tablets that give the remaining yeast just a bit more food to produce just enough carbonation to make a nice sound upon opening and the refreshing bubbliness that I prefer when I drink a beer.

     We feel pretty good about turning out four different batches of home brew in that many months.  Every batch is a learning experience and we are pumped to travel to our respective countries (USA and New Zealand) over the summer break in search of raw ingredients that we can't get in Hong Kong to use for batches this fall/winter.  The goal is to come up with at least one brew to enter into a home brewing competition next March.  I think we're up for the challenge.

--Justin