Moldy Grapes!

...ght them down somehow. In this case, I had a baggy full of salt water (salt water so that if it leaked, it wouldn’t dilute the brine) sitting at the top of the jar. But I didn’t pay attention to the jar during the fermentation, and a couple of the rolls popped up at the sides and mold set in––a kind of fluffy, spider-webby black mold that crept from the exposed bundles up the sides of the jar. The lesson to be learned here is to pay s...

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Bisphenol-A

Above, the bisphenol-A or BPA molecule, a type of plastic found in all kinds of products including baby bottles, plastic food containers, Nalgene bottles, some wines (from the plastic stoppers and the lining of fermentation tanks) and the lining in metal cans. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration says it’s safe, a viewpoint contradicted by at least 100 studies. The problem: BPA is a endocrine disruptor linked to a host of problems, acco...

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Making Beer in Plain Language

...hrough it, to bring that temperature down. 6. The cooled liquid is poured into a glass carboy and yeast is added. After a week or so this will be transferred with a tube into a second carboy. After about two to three weeks of fermentation some additional sugar is added (for carbonation) and the beer is bottled. After bottling I’ve discovered that it’s best to wait for at least three weeks, to let the carbonation happen and the flavors...

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Post Petroleum Lecture – a reminder

Homegrown Revolution, drunk from our many fermentation experiments, goofed and gave you all a bad link to reserve your spot in the upcoming lecture by Albert Bates, author of a brand new book The Post Petroleum Survival Guide and Cookbook. To reserve your spot go to www.sustainablehabitats.org Bates will be speaking at the Audubon Center at Debs Park on Saturday March 24th as part of the 2007 Sustainable Habitats Lecture Series. Here’s th...

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Homegrown Revolution Visits SF

Homegrown Revolution will be heading up to San Francisco this week in search of tales of fermentation, backyard chickens, humanure and bikes. We’ll be back in LA just in time for mycologist Paul Stamets‘ lecture “How Mushrooms Can Help Save the World” at the Farmlab. The lecture will be on Friday April 13, at 7:30 pm at 1745 N. Spring Street #4 Los Angeles, CA 90012....

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