This was the second beer I brewed. Ever.

Back in 2014 this was an IPA, not so much anymore. All the hop bitterness and aroma seems to have disappeared and the flavour profile is very much on the malty side. Overall this is still a surprisingly drinkable beer, despite it’s age and my lack of experience back in 2014.

It’s definitely better than the Ilves IPA I cracked open at the beginning of last year… Come to think of it, there’s a fairly strong possibility that this last bottle of Ahma Ale has been sitting in my fridge for the best part of a year at this point since I’ve been really lazy about writing it up.

Lastly, I’d like to point out that my labels are better designed these days, or at least I like to think so…

In the vein of my 2013 and 2014 lists, here are a few of my favourite books of 2015 (in no particular order). That is, books that that I read in 2015, not books that were necessarily published in 2015.

Digital Apollo: Human and Machine in Spaceflight

Digital Apollo by David Mindell tells the story of the amazing technology behind the Apollo lunar missions. It also delves into the debate (or even fight) between engineers and astronauts at NASA at the dawn of the space age. The full books is definitely worth reading, but the gist of it is that the engineers wanted to automate as much as possible of the flights and the astronauts wanted as much control as possible.

A Man on the Moon

Recommended to me on Reddit by Brady Haran, A Man on the Moon by Andrew Chaikin is possibly the single accounting of the Apollo lunar missions that you’ll find within a single set of covers. Based on interviews with 23 of the 24 Apollo astronauts.

The “Imperial Radch” series

At the beginning of the year I stumbled across the first book of the Imperial Radch series, Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie. Originally published all the way back in 2013, I found Ancillary Justice to be a totally engrossing take on a science fiction space opera.

The perspective of the protagonist, a not entirely human, kind of ex-spaceship, ex-soldier Breq is really interesting. Breq is also from a culture which doesn’t distinguish between gender which adds an interesting extra twist to the storytelling.

If you enjoy Ancillary Justice, you should definitely go on to read the next two novels in the series too (Ancillary Sword and Ancillary Mercy)

The Martian

If you haven’t heard of The Martian (by Andy Weir) until now then I think that counts as a minor miracle of some kind. I’m pretty sure I devoured the entire book over three nights or so (usually reading until it was way too late for a work night). Even if you saw the movie, I think it might be worth reading the book (at least if you’re at all a geeky or nerdy type of person).

Double Cross: The True Story of the D-Day Spies

Ben Macintyre’s Double Cross is about the German and Allied spies of the second World War and about how the allies (and especially the British) managed to turn almost all German spies into double agents. It’s an amazing story and at times even hard to believe since the facts read a bit too much like a le Carré novel.

This is the second version of my What What Wit (originally based on a recipe in Randy Mosher’s Radical Brewing).

The biggest changes were to the boil additions and my choice of yeast. The first version my my recipe used White Labs WLP575 (Belgian Style Ale Yeast Blend), largely out of necessity as that was the only wit yeast in stock at my brewshop when I was ordering my ingredients for it. This version used Wyeast 3944 (Belgian Witbier) instead.

The recipe also gained some fresh grapefruit peel in addition to the fresh orange peel that I used originally. I ended up using a bit less orange peel than I intended to since I failed to buy enough oranges.

Impressions

The colour is a nice straw yellow and it has a nice bit of haze (as is expected in a Wit). Overall this is a very pleasant beer and rather good, even if I say so myself.

In future versions I think I’ll add even more orange or grapefruit peel as I don’t think it comes through quite enough yet, otherwise the other spices (coriander and chamomile) seem to be nicely balanced. I’m not sure if using dried orange peel would be better or worse than using the fresh orange peel I’ve used so far…

In any case, I’ll definitely make this beer again (or some slightly modified version of it)…

At Kisko Labs we were lucky enough to receive an Apple TV developer kit from Apple (two actually, because I got one for my personal Apple developer account too). Motivated by the free hardware, I took some time to learn how to develop for the new Apple TV (one TVML app and one “native” app). In this post I’ll walkthrough creating a TVML app with Middleman.

→ Read more…

Piranhas for iOS version 1.1 is now available on the App Store.

In addition to native book cover previews this release also contains some minor bug fixes.

Piranhas helps you save money by comparing prices between Amazon stores, the Book Depository, and Wordery. It’s super easy because we calculate the shipping costs and currency conversions for you.

Or, alternatively, go to www.piranhas.co to use Piranhas in your browser.

Last weekend I took a trip to nostalgia land and cracked open a bottle of one of the first beers I ever made: Saukko Stout.

Saukko Stout was my third beer, brewed all the way back in February 2014 (bottled on March 2014). This means that it had been bottle conditioning for about 18 months at this point (and not in any particularly optimal setting).

Considering its age and storage conditions (and the fact that it was one of my first beers), it was actually pretty decent. I’m not sure I’ll be rushing off to brew another gyle of it, but it was eminently drinkable and enjoyable. Definitely far better than the bottle of Ilves IPA I had back in January at any rate…

PS. Check out my free iOS apps Beer Styles 2 and Piranhas for iOS

Beer Styles 2 has been available in the App Store for a few days now. Beer Styles 2 is a big update and has several swell improvements, especially for iOS 9 devices.

BJCP 2015 and 2008 guidelines

Just like the previous version this includes both the 2008 and 2015 guidelines (and quite a few small formatting and typo corrections).

Slide Over and Split View

On iOS 9 you can use Slide Over and Split View on iPads to multitask while browsing style guidelines. Very handy if you’re trying to build a recipe in one app while referring to the style guideline!

Spotlight search integration

Beer Styles now has Spotlight integration so you can search for style guidelines without having to first launch the app. Just swipe down on the home screen…

Nicer sharing

Sharing individual styles is now nicer because your friends can now see the same view as you do, even if they don’t have Beer Styles installed or if they don’t even have an iOS device.

Still free

There’s still one thing that hasn’t changed: Beer Styles is still completely free!

PS. If you like Beer Styles (or even if you don’t), you might like to try my latest iOS app: Piranhas for iOS. Piranhas is a free book price comparison tool for the web and iOS.

Oh, and if you like using Beer Styles, a review on the App Store would be highly appreciated…

I’m very excited to announce that there’s now a native iOS app for Piranhas and it’s available on the App Store for free! It has all the features of the web version plus barcode scanning.

Features:

• Scan ISBN barcodes from books
• Supports Split View and Slide Over on iOS 9 iPads
• Supports iOS 9’s new in-app browser
• Shipping charge estimates
• Automatic currency conversions

Supported stores:

• Amazon.com (United States)
• Amazon.co.uk (United Kingdom)
• Amazon.ca (Canada)
• Amazon.de (Germany)
• Amazon.es (Spain)
• Amazon.fr (France)
• Book Depository
• Wordery

Version 1.1.0 of Beer Styles just hit the iOS App Store. The biggest new feature is that the BJCP 2015 Style Guidelines are now included!

The 2015 and 2008 beer, cider, and mead style guidelines from the Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP).

The style guidelines describe what each style of beer, cider, and mead should taste, look, and smell like.

The guidelines include vital stats such as OG (original gravity), FG (final gravity), IBU (bitterness), SRM (colour), and ABV readings as well as descriptions for aroma, appearance, flavour, and mouth feel.

In Beer Styles all the vital stats have been given a visual representation to make it easier to fathom how differences in styles.

Bad Tidings is a beer made from a bunch of leftover malts I had accumulated. I decided to try for a Belgian style beer largely because the Belgians seem to have a pretty relaxed attitude about what adjuncts they use, plus it gave me a chance to try out the Fermentis T-58 yeast.

I chose the name Bad Tidings because I wanted to invoke a certain sense of dread or foreboding with the name (as it was unsure whether the beer would turn out to be any good at all).

For this label I went with a bit of a literary theme because Bad Tidings sounds like the title of an 18^th or 19^th century novel in my head. The sole typeface is Adobe Caslon Pro, chosen mostly of how it looks but also because Caslon seemed to be historically accurate for the 18^th century.

“Practically all American and English printing from 1735 to 1800 was done using the Caslon font.” (source)

As for the beer itself, the small sample I tasted while bottling seemed pretty good but I’ll have to wait a couple of weeks for it to bottle condition before rendering a final verdict.