Banana chocolate malted milkshake

No ice cream was harmed in the production of this milkshake. It's just banana and milk mixed with Nestle Nesquik® mixed with malt extract picked up from Stomp Them Grapes, the new brewery store that's closer than the old brewery store both of which are fantastic places to visit because the shops are stuffed with interesting things. If you ever have the chance to drop in on a home brewery shop I recommend doing so, they have everything known to home brewery of beer and wine, kits, basic elements, equipment, scales, tubing, stoppers, valves, grain, fermentation starters and such, plus what I'm interested in, different types of malt extracts in varying degrees of depth and various forms. It all gets so very scientific, so they're like science shops.

I usually add fiber to this but when you do that then you have to drink it quickly or else it coagulates. As it turns out, I drank this quickly anyway so I might as well have put it in.

Malt

CoBrew disappeared from the shop directly below my apartment so now I must buy wheat grain and malt elsewhere. 

The brew-shops around here were a total drag to visit. Although, there was one not too far off Spear on the other side of 1-25 on the hill. Stomp Them Grapes. Flickr album. 

So I bought malted whole wheat grain and malt from Amazon. This arrived in a brittle plastic bag with a hole and the powder is incredibly sticky. It makes a mess of everything that it touches. I  repaired the tear but it still leaked scant powder and I just don't want to deal with the bag.

The wheat grain is already malted. This is to enhance it if necessary. It's also great in chocolate milk and other things besides bread. It adds a very nice dimension to lots of things. Pancakes and waffles for examples, oatmeal for another. 

Malted barley

I find the broadest misunderstanding about malt is that it is a process and not a thing. Any grain can be malted, but usually barley is the grain of choice because barley is the least expensive. As you will have already learned by your tour of a brewery, and who hasn't done that?, beer brewers spread barley across a malting floor, spray it with water, and with warmth bring it to germination with a gentleness and kindness that is truly touching, carefully turning it continuously so the grain stays aerated, fresh, warm, and comfortably damp. Then, just as the roots develop from the radicle and the plumule develops into the hypocotyl in anticipation of becoming an adult shoot, and has reached a length that equals the length of the seed, the brewers abruptly and chillingly murder the tiny shoots by turning up the heat and toasting them en masse. That is called malting. It is an act of plant infanticide on a commercial scale.

As seeds germinate they're particularly susceptible to attack by yeast and bacteria. Because of this, germinating grain and malted grain have long been associated with natural culture bread, so-called sourdough, and with beer.

Bread and beer grew up together. Beer is liquid bread. It's been imagined the early Egyptians developed their own mad beer-making skillz by tossing chunks of cooked bread into containers of water. Wall paintings depict this activity and the contents of ancient amphorae have been examined and confirm this, but I do not believe that was necessary. Water dousing a container of grain and neglected in the North African heat to ferment, even for a single day, would be sufficient to start off beer, likewise, so would a measure of grain spilled into a container of water and similarly left to ferment. Some atmospheres are just that yeasty. And being young and a little bit stupid, and always curious, and with the thing there foaming, who wouldn't take a sip? Perhaps on a dare, or just for fun.

My own experiments with malting barley have failed. By that failure I did learn what pearled barley is. I'm still on the lookout for non-pearled barley and I continue to see plenty of smashed barley, just as they do with oats.

I found a new home-brewery shop that carries various malted barleys for the purpose of making beer. It's called Stomp Them Grapes and it's much closer to my apartment than the old place I was going. The young fellow there showed an interest in my camera. He was intrigued and rather knowledgeable about Nikon models and features so I handed it to him and let him snap away. We bonded.

I'm convinced I could make great beer, but I don't drink it that much so it would be just for the novelty or to give it away. I'd go for an ale, with Newcastle as my target ale. But I was there for the malt, which you can see up there in the second picture, bottom right in clustered bags divided by type.

South River miso

This is the best miso available in the United States that I know about.

South River miso is the real deal, made the way miso was made for centuries in Japan. It might seem a little bit ridiculous to don specialized cotton socks and stomp through fermented azuki beans but that's exactly what they do.

The texture is different. It's lumpy. Regular commercial miso is likened to peanut butter in consistency. South River miso is not. This has little chunks, the texture is lighter, less compressed, less homogenous, altogether more pleasant.

Cost: More than ordinary miso, plus shipping. It's worth it. Lasts forever in the refrigerator. South River offers no discount for volume and no break on shipping.

Bottom line: $8.50 per 1LB jar (one-year miso) + shipping.

shrimp with tomato, cucumber and celery

Doesn't that sound innocuous?

In addition to the ingredients in the title, this also has: 

* onion

* clam juice

* flavor from shrimp shells

* catsup

* jalapeño

* habanero sauce

* generous cilantro

* salt and pepper

But no avocado even though there is one just sitting there.

And it is not innocuous. 

These are the ingredients presented on YouTube by member FoodWishes for Mexican shrimp cocktail. Except these ingredients are not diced finely. They're all kept to large chunks. It was a good idea, and it does taste incredible, but today they lead to an unhappy experience.

Today I made a  series of food-related critical mistakes one after another in grazing mode involving this leftover combination and other of my all-time favorite things. This is spicy and hot. 

I don't know why the liquid thickens but so far, all four times, I think, it has. The host of Food Wishes tells his viewers to expect the liquid to thin as it chills due to the salt drawing out moisture. But mine does not. I like the sauce becoming thicker than when I left it to chill, but that is unique in the world of Mexican shrimp cocktails. Outside of my kitchen the liquid is always like water.

I ate all that's left all at once. That was for breakfast. And it was delicious.

But it's light and I was not satisfied. 

So I cut off a very thick disc of watermelon. About three inches. More than you ever get at a picnic. Standing there the whole time spitting out seeds into the sink. It was a lot of watermelon and I ate the whole thing all at once. And it was super delicious.

But that's mostly water and I was a bit full but still not satisfied. Not hungry, but not satisfied. So I mixed a Mason jar of milk and Ovaltine. A lot of milk and whole lot of Ovaltine. A full quart size wide-mouth jar. It was very dark with malted chocolate and I drank the whole thing all at once. And it was delicious. Finally I was satisfied.

But then I felt a bit weird. My stomach was heavy with liquids.

These three things all at once were not a good combination.

So I learned.

The hard way.

My stomach grumbled. I could feel things moving around inside my body. I became very uncomfortable. I laid on the sofa and I could feel pressure building inside my internal organs. Moving around down there inside my stomach that made me feel like a cow, and inside all the tubes down inside there in darkness. Moving around and grumbling. And moving and rumbling. My body was complaining. My body was active. It wouldn't shut up. My body was processing all I had just delivered it. And it was processing quickly. The liquids were fermenting.

I became flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. Parf. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. Ffffffft. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. Parf. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. This is insane. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. And flatulent. It's not going to stop. And flatulent. And flatulent. It's getting worse.

I'm telling you it was bad.

Grind, gurgle, bubblebubblebubblebubblebubblebubble, drain, shift, pffffffffff, gargle, boil, bubble, fizz, shift, pour, drain, foam, inflate, shunt, roll, roil, stir, rise, agitate, puff, deflate, bulge, pour, cook, ferment, grow, inflate, change, infuriate, bubblebubblebubblebubble, growl, rumble, roar, hiss, whine, squeal, yelp, snarl, wail, gnar, murmur, warble, expand, cackle, squawk, scowl, mewl, rasp, warble, quaver, croon, caterwaul, throb, stomp, caw, shrill, bark, burble, bray, whirr, pump.

I'm telling you it was horrible.

And a good thing I live by myself.

The mumbling and grumbling and noises and expulsions were terribly uncomfortable. This combination of liquid food was perfect material for fermentation. And the whole thing was impressively fast. 

Then finally painfully too uncomfortable to bear. I'm in real trouble. I sat up. And that really did it.

And finally explosive.

I hastened to the bathroom and whipped off my clothes and sat there on the toilet with gushes of liquid exploding out through my bottom. With my butt covering the entire seat as a cap I passed liquid material out my back end in gushes, loudly, explosively. Shooting out of me like a firehose and splashing back up onto my butt. An ugly sick disgusting firehose. I could actually feel my whole body draining, becoming thinner, and lighter as I sat there containing the toilet with my draining butt.

I kept flushing the obscene accumulation I was imagining down there.

In series these miserable floods passed out my body as my lower internal tubing continued re-pressurizing repeatedly, the expulsions becoming less violent as time passed. I sat there experiencing this evacuation for at least half an hour and realizing the pauses between explosions were lengthening and the expulsions were lessening to my tremendous relief. Actual physical relief, I laughed.

I laughed like a loon.

Because the obscene mess and the noise really was insanely funny.

Were anyone else around they'd be laughing too. At me. At the situation I caused for myself to endure.  Finally the drainage ended. Or at least seemed to. I knew I could sit there longer and still have more come out of me. I knew that was not the full end of it. The pauses had lengthened comfortably but that didn't mean the whole thing was done. There was still some fermenting material inside of me.

I stepped into the shower and rinsed my filthy body. I messed the floor with disgusting drips just getting into the shower. I saw the mess of very dark Ovaltine concentrations rinse off my backside and drain down the bathtub. I soaped up my whole body and properly showered. Then set to cleaning and decontaminating the bathroom, a full job itself. 

But still unhappily frighteningly flatulent. And this went on for hours. All day. 

By the time it all ended and the remnant nutrition absorbed and my body had cleared itself so rudely so messily I was hungry all over again. Really hungry. But wary of eating.

This wonderfully delicious shrimp combination is all gone now. 

And I look askance at the rest of the watermelon, quite a lot, actually, even though I still love it so.

And I have second thoughts about Ovaltine, still a favorite of mine since childhood. Even after all that dissuasive mess and ridiculous noise.

Maybe there's a lesson somewhere in here for me.  Maybe something about having my favorite things in combination and quantity all at once. Maybe I shouldn't do this for  breakfast. Maybe don't do this in morning. Maybe avoid eating in a darkened room. Maybe don't eat things during an historic eclipse. After all, the path across the U.S. was a mere one state north of here. They were both unusual things. That must be it. Maybe don't do this while watching a show about witches, Salem on Netflix was on t.v. I don't know. I'm confused. I haven't figured it out and I'm terribly slow on the uptake.