I brought my AeroPress on vacation with me, along with a big bag of Wellsley Farms Breakfast Blend pre-ground coffee, in hopes of using most of it up before its “best before” date in early August. After a few rather unsuccessful attempts to brew a good hot cup with the equipment available to me here, I decided to try the cold brew recipe from the AeroPress web site. I’ve tried making regular cold brew in a French press, which takes 24 hours and requires a coarse grind. I’ve also tried making pour-over iced coffee, also with the Wellsley Farms pre-ground beans. Both turned out pretty good, but I think the cold brew was slightly better. The AeroPress recipe produced a decent cup more quickly than the French Press and with less work than making pour-over iced coffee. I’ll probably experiment with this recipe a few more times this week. One thing that I noticed is that the long stir time allows more water than usual to drip through the filter before pressing. I might eventually try brewing this with the AP inverted (which would avoid the dripping) and see if it makes any noticeable difference.
Author: lpaulriddle
Biking Notes
Today, I took an out-and-back trip from Bethany Beach to Isle of Wight Park near Ocean City, MD. It was the first of (hopefully) 2 or 3 rides at the shore this week. My round trip distance was just under 34 miles. I rode my Masi single speed bike, which is my favorite bike to ride in coastal areas, as the flat terrain makes multiple gears mostly unnecessary. It was a really nice day for July on the east coast, but traffic has really picked up along this route in the post-COVID years, particularly near the town of Bayard. Once I crossed the border into Maryland, the roads quieted down, and I was able to enjoy the ride a little bit more. My main reason for visiting Isle of Wight park was to find a “Cache Across Maryland” geocache, plus a bonus cache. I skipped a few other caches in the area because they were back in the woods, and I forgot to bring bug repellent, which is a necessity around here this time of year, unless you really like ticks and mosquito bites.
This was likely my longest ride of the week. The next time I get out, I’m planning on riding east to Frankford, which is about a 20-25 mile round trip. If I can get out a third time, I’ll either head north toward Holt’s Landing, or south to Fenwick Island.
Run Notes
I’m at the shore this week, and hope to get 2 or 3 runs in while I’m here. Today, I ran 8.75 miles, which is farther than I had run in almost a month. It’s typically slightly more humid, but slightly cooler, at the shore than at home this time of year, and today was par for the course. I got out at 7:00am, when the temperature was still near the nighttime low of 70°F, with a dewpoint of 69 — higher than it presently is back home, but lower than it was when I last ran at home. It was the best weather I’ve had for a run in about two weeks, and my energy and form felt pretty good throughout. Everything is flat here, without much variation in terrain, so you can get into a groove and just kind of zone out, although there are a couple of spots along my route where I have to look out for traffic. I am kind of hoping to get a 10-miler in this week, but only if circumstances permit, so we’ll see if it ends up happening.
Pool Notes
I had to add acid to the pool this morning for the first time this season. I think this is the latest it has ever gone before needing acid. The season started off cool, and we have yet to have a big heat wave with multiple days in the 90s (though it has been plenty humid) and as a result, the water has stayed cool as well. It finally edged over 82 yesterday, and the pH has been stable at 7.8 up until today.
I forgot to turn the SWG back on after draining a bunch of water out of the pool yesterday morning (crazy amount of rain over the past several days) and as a result, the pool dropped from 5-6ppm Chlorine to 3ppm yesterday, which is a little bit lower than I like to keep it. I have a bucket of 73% Calcium Hypochlorite that I keep around for “emergency” chlorination, because it has a much longer shelf life than liquid Chlorine. I had not used the Cal-Hypo in over a year, and it has been sitting out in my shed the entire time. I added around 2 pounds yesterday evening, and this morning, the pool was at 8ppm free Chlorine. So, I’d say the stuff is still good. I left it indoors overnight, and by morning, the room smelled like a pool store, so I think the shed is still the right place for it. It definitely needs ventilation, as the container seems to out-gas a lot, and I know from experience that the fumes are corrosive. I’m happy to have the Cal-Hypo on hand when I need it, but for the future, I probably don’t need 50 pounds of it. A 25-pound bucket should be plenty, and is easier to handle.
Today’s Brew Recipe
- Beans: Lost Dog Coffee “Mocha Sidamo” Organic Dark Roast (Ethiopia)
- 17 grams coffee, 200 grams brew water
- 85°C water
- JX 1 rotation plus 6 clicks, or 36 total clicks (fine)
- 2 pre-moistened paper filters
- 20 second pour
- 1 minute steep (no bloom or agitation)
- 30 second press
This is basically a simplified version of V60 Style Aeropress (dark roast) that uses less water and eliminates the bypass. It brewed a better cup than the recipe I used yesterday, but still not the best cup I’ve gotten out of these beans. I’m still trying to figure out what I did that time and how to replicate it, but I guess I’m getting closer. Previously, I brewed the recipe at the same ratio, but used 160 grams of brew water and 40 grams of bypass. I’m curious if the bypass makes any real difference in the taste. Maybe I should brew two cups and do a blind taste test. Unfortunately, I’m starting to run low on these beans… 😀
Today’s Run Notes
It’s pretty miserable out there today. Not overly hot, but very humid. I didn’t get out for my run until 9:00, and by then, it was 80°F with a dewpoint of 72°, with bright sunshine (in contrast to recent days, which have been mostly cloudy to overcast in the mornings). My first note to myself is that I really, really have to get out of the house earlier on days when it is this humid. Before 7:00am would be ideal. My chosen route had less shade than usual, because the sun had already reached a lot of areas which typically have shade earlier in the morning. I only made it 4 miles before I had to stop to avoid overheating. My splits tell the story: mile 1 was 10:47/mile, mile 2 was 11:24/mile, mile 3 was 12:22/mile, and mile 4 was 13:49/mile. I walked another 1.3 miles to get home, so my total distance on the morning was 5.3 miles. In spite of the poor weather, it felt like an OK run form-wise. I’m getting better at maintaining a high cadence in varying conditions, even though, similar to Wednesday, my average cadence (177 steps per minute) was slightly slower than ideal.
Noteworthy today was that I ran with my new Xero HFS shoes instead of my usual Vibram V-Runs. I ordered a size 11.5 because the web site says they run small, but I probably would have been fine with size 11, as this pair feels a tiny bit large. Ironically, my Xero Terraflex trail shoes were too small at size 11, but perfect at 11.5. Go figure. Today’s run went just fine. The shoes didn’t feel like they were getting in the way, although they definitely felt “larger” than my Vibrams. I suspect that the HFS will make better winter running shoes than the Vibrams, as I’ll be able to wear warmer wool socks with them. Looking forward to testing that theory out in several months.
No huge issues with my right ankle/foot today. It bothers me more while walking than running, I guess because of the different biomechanics involved. I did some foam rolling, light stretching, and warm-ups before going out. My right calf seems less tight today than yesterday. I’m going to keep trying to improve my ankle mobility. In particular, I’ve been doing more heel walking to try to work my tibialis anterior muscles, which oppose the calf muscles. We’ll see how this goes over time.
Brew Notes
I brewed my Lost Dog Mocha Sidamo dark roast beans today using this exact recipe, just as an experiment, as it produces great results with my other bag of medium/medium-dark beans. I had brewed a variation of the same recipe with the Mocha Sidamo beans recently, and noted that it seemed a little under-extracted, so it seemed logical to try upping the temperature a little bit and using a tiny bit finer grind size. It turned out… okay, but a little bit weak tasting. Flavor-wise, it seemed fine, so maybe I need more coffee to get the richer taste I’m looking for. Or, maybe this just isn’t the ideal recipe to be using with dark roast. I seemed to get better results using a different recipe that calls for a finer grind and shorter brew time. I found this article, which has some good info about brewing dark roasted beans, and it seems to support the theory that shorter brew times are better. It’s worth noting that I preferred the other recipe at around a 1:12 ratio, while today’s was 1:13.3. I should try brewing both recipes at 1:12, and see which one turns out better. That would mean 17 grams of coffee to 200 grams of water (actually around 1:11.8).
Afternoon notes
Something is definitely up with my right foot and calf, as I’ve been getting some discomfort in the rear of the foot towards the heel while walking on my treadmill desk. My right calf also seems really tight, which is an issue I’ve dealt with a lot over the years. As I wrote yesterday, I suspect that it is an ankle mobility issue. It has gotten a little bit worse since I started swimming backstroke a few days ago, and I do think my kicking technique needs a lot of work. For the time being, I am going to stop doing backstroke and probably cut down a bit on freestyle, focusing more on breaststroke and butterfly, and see if it calms down. I’m also going to focus a little bit more on exercises to improve ankle mobility. I found this page, which seems like a pretty good resource.
I tried making some iced coffee this afternoon. I have a fair amount of pre-ground Wellsley Farms (BJ’s store brand) breakfast blend coffee with a “best by” date of August 2023, so I’m looking for creative ways to use it up. Since it’s ground fine for drip machines, it’s not ideal to use for cold brew, so I decided to try this recipe for iced coffee. I followed the recipe to the letter, using my electric kettle and measuring everything out with a scale. It’s the closest I’ve come to doing pour-over coffee. I don’t (yet) have a pour-over dripper, so I used a strainer and a regular coffee filter, and dripped the coffee into a Pyrex 2 quart measuring cup. Ideally, I need something a little bit deeper for this, as I had to lift the strainer up at the end to keep it out of the brewed coffee. But other than that, it turned out fine, and made about 24 ounces of iced coffee. It wasn’t all that strong, but good for a summer afternoon. I tried mixing some with a little bit of chocolate almond milk, which was tasty, but the almond milk doesn’t mix well with the water, and I had to keep stirring it to keep it from settling. Real dairy milk might fare better. At any rate, I’ll probably try doing this again.
Last Cup
I brewed my last full cup of coffee with my Starbucks medium roast beans this morning, which is noteworthy only because this was my first foray into grinding beans myself. I’ve had the bag since last winter, and started out using a blade grinder and a drip coffee maker. Needless to say, the results were inconsistent — some cups were good, and others were not so good! I soon switched to a good quality burr grinder and a French press, which produced much better results. Somewhere along the way, I started measuring beans and water by weight rather than volume. Then, I upgraded from a cheap electric kettle to an expensive one that lets me heat water to a specific temperature, and I added an Aeropress. I now brew most of my cups with the electric kettle, burr grinder, scale, and either Aeropress or French press. But the point is, these beans have been with me through the entire progression.
I brewed this recipe with the Starbucks beans yesterday and today. Yesterday’s cup turned out pretty good, but ever so slightly bitter. Today’s was great. The difference: yesterday, I dumped the beans into the grinder directly from the jar, and a lot of “fines”, husks, and other smaller fragments from the bottom of the bag got mixed in there, which I suspect imparted a little bit of bitterness. Today, I made sure that only whole beans got into the grinder, and the result was a better cup.
There are still a few beans left at the bottom of the jar, which I’ll probably grind up along with the fragments and use for cold brew. I guess it won’t be too long before I’ll be looking to buy some new beans.
Pillar Climbing
I drove up to Pennsylvania yesterday to find a geocache at the top of a 30′ pillar. This is the third like this I’ve found, and a popular type of “extreme” cache hide. Most of these old pillars carried railroad tracks “back in the day”, which have since been abandoned, but the pillars (built to stand the test of time) remain, usually alongside or in the middle of rivers. Many of them have caches on top. These caches typically aren’t found very often — while there are a large number of people with the skills and equipment to ascend pillars, and also a large number of geocachers, the intersection of those two sets is relatively small. The cache we found yesterday had not been found in 4.5 years.
Typically, to climb these, you need to shoot a line over the top of the pillar, use it to pull a rope over, anchor the rope, ascend the rope using appropriate gear, and then rappel back down. Sounds deceptively simple, but throw in a fast-moving stream or river, trees to snag the line, nooks and crannies at the top where the rope can get stuck, etc., and setting the rope can get tricky. Ascending up can be physically challenging, and the technique takes some practice to master. Getting up over the edge takes upper-body strength, and rappelling back down can be scary. But it’s a great adrenaline rush, and a real feeling of accomplishment when you succeed.
I’ve used a different rappelling technique with each of the 3 pillars I’ve climbed. The tricky thing about these is that the rope is typically very low — most often running across the top of the pillar, at foot level as you start. The first technique was shown to me by someone with a lot of rope experience. You start by standing up, legs straight, with a low center of gravity, and slowly pivoting backwards until you “pop” onto the wall. It’s really cool, but really scary. With method two, you sit on top, legs dangling off the side, and then kind of roll yourself over into rappel position. Less scary, but fewer style points.
The third method, which I used yesterday, worked out well. We put an ascender on the rope above the rope protector, attached a rope (actually webbing) ladder, and dangled it over the side. I got into position by grabbing the ascender and stepping down onto the ladder to get below the rope. Not sure it will always be possible to rig this, but I felt more confident with this method than with the other two.
Anyhow, every time I do one of these, it whets my appetite to more. I hope to get a group together to tackle another one of these in the not-too-distant future.