Randy’s Blog

My limoncello.  How cool is that color.  Only 80 more days to go before I sweeten, then 90 more after that!

Found this while walking Starry at an off leash dog park.  You do have off leash dog parks where you live right?

This is a saying my uncle and my dad used to say to each other when topping the other one when they made some cool achievement, like, “you ain’t nothing, until you’ve seen a Tenrec in the wild….” (my uncle’s actual achievement) I’ve taken the tradition up with my uncle and have this to say about the Italy trip.

You ain’t NOTHIN,

• Until you’ve eaten parmigiano-reggiano cheese in Parma.
• Until you’ve tasted the finest balsamic vinegar in Modena.
• Had great Brunello di Montalcino with the winemaker, IN Montalcino
• Sat at the same seat the “godfather” did in Sicily when he asked to date Apolonia.
• Been to the top of St Peter’s Basilica at the top of the Cupola
• You’ve gotten to label you’re own bottle of Brunello di Montalcino in the actual winery. (two different wineries)
• Eaten Proscuitto di Parma IN Parma
• Had Chianti Classico IN Chianti

As you can see I nailed a ton on this trip, and they are all food related. (funny)

Snagit Mac Beta.

I’ve used this on Windows and like it.  Mac doesn’t have a good screen capture and organize program yet, this is great and while in beta is free!

This guy hacked it using Twitter as well.  Check it out.

http://www.neatorama.com/2009/09/24/hacked-big-mouth-billy-bass-quotes-monty-python-can-be-controlled-via-twitter/

Mine will be a little less grandiose, and I am using the Filet-o-Fish one.  It was $10 at Bed Bath and Beyond.  I will be using the Mbed controller, but haven’t ordered it yet.  I have been dying to get into some electronics, and I have some geeky friends who will help.  This might be the project I finally get done!

I’ve been asking Sadie all the time what was the best of the trip, and I came up with several categories.

• Best Risotto – Messina, Sicily
• Best Lunch – some cool expresso bar / lunch place in Murano
• Best Pizza – Messina, Sicily
• Best Dessert – Corfu, Greece
• Best Tour – Donatella’s to Montalcino
• Best Cookies – Toss up between Ricciarelli’s from Siena and a similar one from Montalcino
• Best Gelato – Rome, near Trevi Fountains for Pitacchio, and Giolliti for Coconut
• Best Salami – In Parma
• Best Espresso – As long as it was Illy, anywhere in Italy
• Best Wine – any house wine, Brunellos were great
• Best Hotel – out of the two, it was Hotel Athena in Siena
• Best small town – Siena
• Best cheese – C’mon, do you think I could really do this? Push comes to shove, Parmesan.
• Best big City – Rome – So much to do and eat.
• Most Memorable food – going to the deli in Siena and get proscuitto, cheese, wine, bread, and olive oil

Oh no!  It’s down again.  Games are freezing, and I have the three ring of death randomly.  Called Microsoft, they said it was out of warrantee (MS extended their warrantee for three years) and it was only rewarranteed for another year after the replacement.  Give me to the supervisor.  Explained it again, he checked, rechecked, verified, then said sure we’ll take care of you.  Nice.  Microsoft, thank you.  Now I won’t have to sell my stock (or should I since they are giving away free services? ) hmm…  Nope, it’s good customer service.

I’m out.  Just meh flavor and an odd taste afterwards.  Go the for original.  Kick ass can though.

I am trying to make Limoncello!  Here’s the recipe I am following.  Cool website too.

Batch #14 – Limoncello with Distilled Water

20090607 16:54

I changed a few things on this batch but only one that I think makes a big difference. In this batch I used distilled water instead of tap water. We have a WaterWise distiller that I used for this experiment but you can get cheap distilled water at any grocery store. And I recommend doing that because this is a VERY good batch.

The aroma is very clean and crisp. The flavor is also very clean and lemony. I noticed some film on the inside of the bottle but much less than in other batches. This is perhaps the purest tasting batch I’ve ever made. There are no detectable off flavors and it’s a batch I imagine the Italians would love. It needs some time to sit, there’s a heavy dose of heat on the finish but this could prove to be my best batch ever. Two other minor changes to help with the film buildup were washing the lemons with Environne fruit wash before zesting and in the final filtration I added an extra filtering.

Liquor: One bottle of 151 Proof Everclear

Liquor filtration: 5x

Lemons: 12 organic lemons scrubbed with Environne fruit wash

Days peels and liquor rested: 84

Simple Syrup – Cups Sugar: 1.75, Cups Water: 2.5

Final filtration: 5x

via LimoncelloQuest | How to Make Limoncello.

Vacation takes its toll.  I gained 5 pounds, but it was worth it.  We just got all the pictures downloaded and we took over 1000 pictures.  We obviously can’t post them all and will end up putting them in the gallery, with the right size and orientations, stay tuned.  I am going to post some of the highlights in the blog in individual posts.  Kitties and puppy are doing good and we are trying to adjust back to no humidity and 8 hours of time change.  No problems with the house, or the cars.  It’s back to work tomorrow.