I’ve been thinking for years that SF’s love affair with nanotech was really just a symptom of a disease afflicting both physicists and technocrats in general: microorganism envy, or rather, the envy of those who work with the fascinating microworlds of biology. Well, this article has some interesting suggestions about how the growing realization of just how much of a role bacteria play in human life, and the biosphere generally.
Bacteria-mediated and bacteria-friendly surgery. The human Microme project. The mental health effects of bacteria in yogurt. This is definitely an article to check out for anyone who wants some idea of the weirdness of this so-called biotech century we’re in. Ha, and homebrewed beer fits into that, too, I’m sure.
After all, as my favorite homebrewing blogger, The Mad Fermentationist, suggests in the name of his blog, there’s something scientific–in terms of microbiology–to the art of brewing beer the old-fashioned (or new-old-fangled) way.
Well, and as for my own mad fermentation experiments:
- I need to rack my Abbey Wheat into a carboy, and will likely to it tonight.
- While I’m at it, I’ll be setting up a small sour mash to leave around for the weekend. (I would like to brew up my all-Brett(anomyces Clausenii) batch on Sunday or Monday, but it depends on how the souring goes, as well as on how the Brett starter goes. The first step of the starter was vigorous, producing a nicely tart beer, but I stupidly used a loosely-placed on the top of the flask for the second step-up; I returned home to find the stopper had been shot off the erlenmeyer flask. Now it’s in a big 1-gallon jug with more wort (fed it twice, both times while it’s krausening) and has some sanitized aluminium foil over the top, but I’ll need to wait and see a few days whether some kind of mold or bacteria got in there when the erlenmeyer flask was sitting open. Even then, I’ll just be hoping it didn’t happen. I’m new to making starters — these are only my third or fourth — and I’ll be tightening up my technique for sure.
- Still hunting for an all-Brett recipe I want to do. The one in Wild Brews looks okay, but a little simple. I’m thinking something with a little bit more malty complexity might be nice. We’ll see what recipe research turns up. I have to do a conference talk tomorrow afternoon, so the brewing cannot happen till Sunday or Monday anyway!