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Late Night Thang

Posted: October 12, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: Festivities, open thread | Tags: |16 Comments

So, it’s Oktoberfest month.

How about a recipe for Pretzels?

 If you are using active dry yeast, mix it into the warm milk along with the malt powder (or brown sugar) and give it 5 to 10 minutes to activate before incorporating it into the dry ingredients.

Pretzels

Makes 6 large pretzels
1 teaspoon instant yeast
1 tablespoon malt powder or brown sugar
2-3 cups all-purpose unbleached or bread flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup warm milk (approximately 110 degrees, which is 1 minute in my microwave)

Combine all of the ingredients in a bowl and mix together until it forms a ball. I start with 2 cups of the flour and mix it together until it forms something like a thick batter, then add more flour a handful at a time until it’ll form a nice ball that I can knead by hand.

Either use an electric mixer to mix the dough for 5 minutes or remove it from the bowl and knead it by hand for 5 to 10 minutes until the dough begins to get smooth and satiny.

If you are going to ferment the dough (more information on whether this set is necessary below), return the ball of dough to a clean, greased bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and set it aside to rise until it has doubled in size, approximately an hour.

If you fermented it, degas the dough gently before moving on to the next step.

Before shaping, start preheating the oven to 425 degrees.

Cut the dough into 6 pieces. Roll each one into a short log, cover with a towel, and let the dough relax for 5 to 10 minutes. After it has relaxed you should be able to roll it out and stretch again fairly easily.

To boil them: If you want to boil them, bring a pot of water to a boil. Dunk each of the pretzels into the boiling water for 5 seconds, then place them onto a baking sheet and sprinkle with coarse salt (I use the kosher stuff that is easy to find at the grocery store) or other toppings.

I also like all this time of year because around here it’s Voodoo Fest and the Blues Fest and all kinds of good music is around!

Here’s a list of the top 10 fall brews.  My own personal favorite these days is Blue Moon’s Harvest Pumpkin Ale.  This one is straight from Germany.

Ayinger Oktober Fest-Märzen
Brauerei Aying
Aying, Germany
Märzen / Oktoberfest
5.8 per cent ABV

The Ayinger Brewery, founded in 1878 and located in the Bavarian village of Aying, is no stranger to brewing medals. It regularly brings home gold medals from the World Beer Championships and its Oktober Fest-Märzen is one of the most medaled and highly respected Märzens in the world. It pours with a golden color tinted with amber and a nose of floral hops balanced with slightly sweet malt. Flavors of caramel and nutty malt form the backbone and it’s balanced with just enough hops to prevent it from coming off as too sweet. Its medium body and moderate alcohol (5.6 per cent ABV) is not overpowering, making this an easy drinking beer that will pair nicely with roasted chicken, fish, sausage or sauerkraut.

I personally love pumpkins.

I think they’re wonderful!

I also like watching goofy old scary movies!

My favorite of the old but good horror movies is a 1932 classic called “The Old Dark House.”

What’s your favorite scary movie and fall treat?

16 Comments on “Late Night Thang”

  1. minkoffminx's avatar JJ Lopez Minkoff says:
    October 12, 2012 at 11:16 pm

    I love real pretzels…Hey, I was looking just now on the news and there is word about a shooting at the Denver Obama Campaign headquarters.

    I also saw this…Kudlow: Obama to Pin Libya on Hillary Clinton?- Kudlow – CNBC – CNBC

    According to proprietary reporting from Ed Klein, Bill Clinton is concerned that Barack Obama is about to throw Hillary Clinton under the bus.

    On The Kudlow Report, Klein said that President Clinton is reaching out to friends in the legal profession trying to figure out what his wife should do if she’s subpoenaed – called in to testify about events in Libya.

    Joe Klein went on to say if you listen to the language used by Joe Biden in the debate closely – Bill Clinton’s move may be more than simply precautionary.

    “Biden said something like we were unaware – nobody told us. What does that say? The only person who did know is Hillary Clinton,” explained Klein.

    “This is exactly what Bill Clinton was afraid of,” he added. The administration is going to pin the whole thing on Hillary.

    • dakinikat's avatar dakinikat says:
      October 12, 2012 at 11:32 pm

      I thought that Biden was saying it was the ‘intelligence community’ so I guess I don’t see any evidence so far.

    • RalphB's avatar RalphB says:
      October 12, 2012 at 11:38 pm

      Ed Klein? That creepy so-called Hillary biographer. That asshole knows nothing.

      • dakinikat's avatar dakinikat says:
        October 12, 2012 at 11:43 pm

        I think he’s just being a trouble maker, frankly.

      • RalphB's avatar RalphB says:
        October 13, 2012 at 12:07 am

        That creep publishes all kinds of weird shit about the Clintons in the NYPost. Either they are conspiring to do something or being conspired against. He’s stirring the wingers pot or in this case pumas.

      • bostonboomer's avatar bostonboomer says:
        October 13, 2012 at 7:54 am

        Kudlow isn’t exactly a reliable source either. That conspiracy theory is in the Daily Caller this morning. I’m not going to link to it, but it’s on Memeorandum.

  2. minkoffminx's avatar JJ Lopez Minkoff says:
    October 12, 2012 at 11:23 pm

    One of the scariest movies to me was Rosemary’s baby…of course, The Body Snatcher was good…as was Mad Love.

    • dakinikat's avatar dakinikat says:
      October 12, 2012 at 11:33 pm

      I still love Psycho although all the 30s stuff–like The Black Cat–are still my favorites.

      • RalphB's avatar RalphB says:
        October 13, 2012 at 12:10 am

        Psycho is my all time favorite. That movie could put you off showers for a while 🙂

        I loved Hitchcock’s movies because I think the scariest of all are the ones where you let your imagination go and the movie is as much in your head as on screen. He was the master of that high suspense.

    • dakinikat's avatar dakinikat says:
      October 12, 2012 at 11:34 pm

      Have you ever seen Daughters of Darkness?

    • bostonboomer's avatar bostonboomer says:
      October 13, 2012 at 7:57 am

      I love Rosemary’s Baby too. It really scared me when I first saw it. I love Invasion of the Body Snatchers–both versions. That is one remake that is really good. And of course Psycho is a classic.

  3. RalphB's avatar RalphB says:
    October 13, 2012 at 12:18 am

    Just some suggestions for dealing with GOP debate spin from SteveD.

    If you hear “Biden was mean” you say “Ryan was weak.”

    If you hear “Biden was classless” you say “Ryan brought up Romney’s car accident anecdote knowing Biden had lost his family in a car accident, and Biden is classless?”

    If you hear Biden “laughed and smiled too much” you say “I laugh at people who lie to me, too.”

    If you hear “Ryan gave specifics” you say “Really? Where’s the Beef?”

    If you hear “Biden has no plan for Medicare, unlike Ryan” you say “Biden’s plan is to keep it. Ryan’s is to kill it. I prefer Biden.”

    If you hear “Biden is a Bad Catholic” you say “What part of I don’t want to impose my religious beliefs on others don’t you understand?”

  4. RalphB's avatar RalphB says:
    October 13, 2012 at 12:24 am

    Cartoon by Chuck Jones from Looney Tunes and produced by the United Auto Workers in support of FDR’s 1944 re-election. Quality political art. h/t Erik Loomis at LG&M

  5. RalphB's avatar RalphB says:
    October 13, 2012 at 12:40 am

    This has SyFy movie of the week oozing from it 😉

    Mysterious giant eyeball washes up on Florida beach

    A softball-sized eyeball from an unknown creature has washed up on a beach in Florida. According to the Orlando Sentinel, Gino Covacci was taking a morning walk along Pompano Beach when he spotted the blue orb bobbing in the tide.

    Placing it in a plastic bag, he walked home and put it into the refrigerator, figuring that it was something unusual.

    “It was very, very fresh,” he told the Sentinel. “It was still bleeding when I put it in the plastic bag.”

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