Lessons in bike repair

In an effort to enjoy the outdoors more and rely on cars less, Mike and I have been riding bikes to run errands and sometimes get to work. I've had a decent bike for a few years but lately have had problems with chronic flat tires. Today Mike was out of town, so I thought it would be easier on myself to just ride his nice shiny new bike to work instead of worrying about whether my tire's slow leak would become a fast leak.   

Halfway home, with 2 miles to go, I hit a hard bump. Then I got a flat tire. Then I regretted riding Mike's bike.

I walked the bike home and prepared to demonstrate how handy and independent I am by patching the tire.

Mike hates when I do this to his shiny new bike. He probably didn't know it before, but he does now.

I found the leak! Hey, that wasn't so hard! There it is. 

Feeling pretty pleased with myself, I patched it up and started inflating the tube. Then I realized that there were two holes. My thumb was blocking the second hole in the previous picture. Drat.

Because I know without asking that Mike wouldn't appreciate me doing not just one but two amateur, janky patch jobs on his tire and calling it a day, I threw away the old tube and just put on a new one. Approximately 200 pumps of our tiny travel pump later, the bike appeared good as new. But when I get up tomorrow morning, I won't be able to relax until I've given the tire a squeeze to check that it's really all better.

And that's how you turn a 20-minute commute into a 2-hour-long ordeal. 

Making cheese

My most recent cheesemaking attempt was semi-successful. Successful because it's kind of tasty, but only semi because it turned out exactly like two different types of cheese I've made and not very much like it was supposed to.

The type I made, bondon cheese, uses probably the simplest cheese recipe I've ever seen. I poured a gallon of milk into a big pot, warmed it up to room temperature, and added the starter, which is a bacterial powder that starts converting sugar into acid. Then I added rennet, which makes the milk start curdling and separating into curds and whey (solids and liquids). I let the pot sit at room temperature overnight.

Rennet is traditionally made from an enzyme in calf's stomachs. This cheese was my first attempt using vegetarian rennet, which is made from mold instead. That doesn't necessarily sound more appealing, but I try to be a good vegetarian.

By the next day a lot of the whey had separated to the top of the pot, and I ladled the curds into cheesecloth and hung it over the sink to drain overnight again. After it stopped dripping, I put the curds into my cheese press that Mike made me for Christmas and used 10 lbs of weight to squeeze out more moisture.

(My apologies for the terrible photos in this post. It was late. I was tired.)

I didn't follow the recipe's instructions for the amount of time on these steps, and I think I let the cheese get too dry. I may have also used too much rennet, which leads to toughness. At any rate, my finished cheese is really crumbly and dry, like feta, not soft and spreadable, like it's supposed to be. Oh well; it's good sprinkled on top of tomatoes.

You don't need much equipment or ingredients to make simple cheese, but making a specific type of cheese seems to be tricky. Usually my results are edible, but I'd rarely try to pass it off as the type it was meant to be.

Adventures in camping

Last week we went camping at Great Smoky Mountains National Park, our 11th national park and umpteenth camping trip since we started enjoying each other's company seven years ago. 

Our first camping experiences together involved a number of mishaps, including wildly underestimating how long it would take to walk 1.2 miles in the Colorado mountains with arms full of supplies. But since then, we've pretty much perfected the fine art of car camping. As much as we love the idea of being minimalist backpacking campers, carrying the few things we need on our backs, on each trip we tend to fill up a sedan with the tent, tarps, sleeping bags, pillows, cushy sleeping pads, a cooler of food and drinks, a box of cooking supplies, games, etc. It's probably my fault, but Mike isn't usually complaining by the time he's relaxing in a comfy chair, drinking a cold beer, and cooking a delicious meal over the fire.

All our camping trips tend to have things in common. Mike gets to work building a fire while I pitch the tent and set up sleeping bags. Then he sits down to enjoy the fire, and I take photographs. Of him.

(Clockwise from top left: Custer State Park in South Dakota, Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, Great Smoky Mountains in North Carolina, and Acadia National Park in Maine)

Then we usually cook dinner in a skillet over the fire. Favorite meals include fajitas and corn on the cob.

Typically, then we play some backgammon.

And none of these things would be possible if we only backpacked. Someday we'll try to make the switch -- maybe like when we can just trek off through our backyard and camp in our own woods. 

Bottling beer

For months, a 5-gallon batch of beer had either been sitting neglected in our closet or been aging to perfection, depending on your glass half full/half empty perspective. But last night our resident master brewer decided the time was right and did some bottling.

When washing and sanitizing the bottles, he got to try out his new bottle-drying tree (the red contraption in the foreground). It saves time and keeps the mess of dripping water to a minimum.

With me helping, it took about two hours to get the beer (a strong, coffee-flavored imperial stout) from a 5-gallon glass carboy into individual bottles. They'll sit in boxes for a few weeks now to age and carbonate before we can enjoy them.

Because of the ingredients needed, this homebrew was more expensive than usual. ~$90 in ingredients turned into ~512 ounces of beer, which works out to about $2.15 per beer (not counting the price of bottles, equipment, and time). That's pricier than most beers in stores but would be good in a restaurant.

The imperial stout is the eighth type of brew Mike's done since he started a few years ago. So far, we've also enjoyed:

• English brown ale
• Irish stout
• Rye IPA (India pale ale)
• Tripel
• ESB (extra special/strong bitter)
• Red/amber/Vienna/brown mix
• Cider (twice)

Next up is a Belgian dubbel. I'm looking forward to a very tasty fall!

The point of return

Uh, hey there! It's been a while. I don't know where my enthusiasm went, but in retrospect I don't know that we made huge advances in the last 15 months, so it's just as well that I didn't log all our mundane goings-on.

We've learned some new things, though. Mike has read a bunch of books on self-sustainability and gardening, preparing us for our soon-in-the-future lifestyle. His first attempt at composting on our porch didn't work out, but he did get a master's degree and a !job! doing good things for an environmental nonprofit. Meanwhile, I've learned to quilt:

We learned how to struggle through a marathon (not that running has anything to do with the theme of this blog; I'm just bragging):

And I learned to bale hay:

Just kidding about that one. I had nothing to do with that bale.

We're only slightly better gardeners now. But we're better about recycling, nagging other people to recycle, canning stuff, baking bread (Mike), and making cheese and cakes (me). So, progress.

And speaking of our soon-in-the-future lifestyle, the hunt for a house is on! Ideally, it'll be 15+ acres of woods with a clear acre or two for a big kitchen garden and chickens. And someday maybe goats and cows. And a dog. And Stephanie Tickle.

I plan to blog (much) more regularly about our progress as we find the future Spotty Pine Farm and implement our grand plans. We'll see how that goes.