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As cool as WordPress and Safari are, they don’t play well together. I have to keep changing browsers in order to post to my blogs. In an effort to make my life easier, I’m trying out the Mozilla based browser called Flock. If it works well, I may just ditch Safari and FireFox. Flock’s built-in blogging tool seems pretty cool.

On a recent trip to northern California, I dropped by a couple of saloons that are worth mentioning. The day we arrived in San Francisco we visited the 21st Amendment Brewery where the annual Strong Beer Month was in full swing. Most beers on the menu registered at least 8 percent and some were as high as 12!

I tried the Hendrik’s Russian Imperial Espresso Stout and loved every sip. If Guinness got Starbucks knocked up, this would be the offspring. What an amazing beer!

My wife sampled the Watermelon Wheat Wine which is really just a light, filtered wheat beer with a refreshing essence of watermelon. Superb!

The 21st Amendment has pretty good food and a loud, lively atmosphere. Trying to slog from the front door to the dining room on a Friday night reminded me of a college keg party. It was packed with all kinds of people enjoying a beer and a laugh. This would be a good place to hang with a bunch of friends.

A couple of days into the trip I was ready to visit the bar that some people say is San Francisco’s beer Mecca. The Toronado Bar on Haight Street is nirvana for beer nerds. With a huge selection of regional drafts and a splash of other fine beers from around the world, Toronado ranks as maybe the best beer bar you’ll ever visit. And they have $2.50 pints daily from 11:30am to 6pm!

As I sat at the bar, staring at the big board of brews trying to decide which to try first, I was greeted by a stereotypical baby boomer hippie from the Haight. He was all about peace, love and beer. At first I tried to ignore the guy and settle on a beer to drink. However, it quickly became clear that this guy wanted to talk and so I figured if I was cornered then I would at least choose the subject of discussion…beer.

He explained that he had found the last beer he would ever drink. “Pliny the Elder,” he said with a slur and a sip. Pliny the Elder. It’s that good. He was right. It’s a creation of Russian River Brewing Company and it’s a remarkable beer. It’s a double IPA that’s a little more hoppy than most and it has incredible honey and citrus flavors that go perfectly together. It’s kind of like the Dogfish Head 90 minute IPA only better.

Russian River sends some of their beers to the east coast so I’m now on a mission to get a keg installed in my favorite local tap room. Al from The Druid’s Keep promises to keep an eye out for it and let me know when he can get it. Don’t worry, I’ll call ya.

Have you tried to use the credit card machine in a Philadelphia cab lately? I have tried several times and the overwhelming resistance I got from the cab drivers was very telling. These guys don’t want you to use the credit card machine. And they’re so determined to have you pay cash that they’ll argue with you for the entire length of your trip. They bitch and moan about losing money but the fact is that when you DO use the credit card machine you get an option to give them a 20 percent tip or enter another value. I’m sure that they’re still getting their tips so why the hostility?

All I am left to assume is that they’ve been skimming money and scamming their bosses for decades and now the credit card machines are cutting into those margins. They fought them from the start and they’ve now turned that fight to the consumer. It’s extremely uncomfortable to have a cab driver ridicule you for taking money from his pocket. The customer shouldn’t be subjected to this. It’s someone else’s fight.

Mark my words. The day will come when we hear a news story about how cab riding customers prove that they don’t want to pay with a credit card because they aren’t doing so. The machines will be removed or disabled. I guarantee that it’s coming and I guarantee that it’ll be because of the intimidation tactics of the Philadelphia cab driver. Most people will just bow to them instead of arguing. Why should you have to have that fight when you’re just trying to get where you’re going?

From this day forward I will absolutely insist on using the credit card machine if that’s what works for me and if I have to get out of one cab and get into another then that’s what I’ll do. Philadelphia cab rates are some of the highest in the country and we as consumers don’t need attitude from the driver on top of that.

I got several requests for my turkey chili recipe so here it is, sans DRM. Feel free to distribute. Just a quick note about some of the ingredients…I’m not one of these purists who thinks you have to grow your own organic tomatoes and gind your own mixture of spices. Unless you’re a hobbyist, who has time for that? I’ve listed a few “over the counter” items. If you prefer to substitute these items for your own home grown varieties, I’m sure your version of this chili will taste even better.

Ingredients

1 green bell pepper (cut into bite size chunks)

1 red bell pepper (cut into bite size chunks)

2 medium sweet onions (choppd <–very web 2.0, don’t you think?)

4 medium jalapeño peppers

2 jars Newman’s Own Sockarooni Sauce

1 16 oz can frijoles negros (with juice)

1 16 oz can butter beans (drained)

1 16 oz can red kidney beans (with juice)

2 1/2 lbs. ground turkey (browned)

2 packs McCormick regular chili seasoning

Cut the jalapeño peppers into slices and add them and their seeds to a large pan with 2 tablespoons of butter. Remove the seeds from two of the peppers if you want the chili to be a little less spicy. It’s the seeds what carry the heat!

Sauté the peppers and onions in the pan with the butter and jalapeños until they’re soft. If they’re too raw when you add them to the crock pot, they’ll make the chili watery.

Add everything else to the crock put and let her simmer for a few hours. Allow it to cool overnight. Then turn it on again in the morning and give it a couple of hours to get nice and hot again.

Garnish with shredded sharp cheddar and sour cream. This’ll feed about 10 people.

I possess a deep-seeded hatred for the chowdah heads from the northeast that goes back several years. It comes from personal experiences where, while working in a professional capacity, I have been treated with utter disdain and disrespect. I have seen cops, team and stadium security, fans and players treat so many working people in such an abhorent manner that I want to stay as far away as possible. It is really depressing to be a part of.

If you want to see an example of this kind of shenanigan, roll your TiVo back to the point where Belichick is running off the field and take note of how his bald security guy treats a referee, an actual league employee. This incident was mild compared to the kind of crap that goes on with these creeps every day. It’s disgusting.

On this night, good defeated evil. Goliath fell. It was like Buster Douglas bangin’ on iron Mike. I have never liked the Giants, but tonight I became a fan.

Thanks, Eli and Co. for saving the world.

On a recent run to my favorite beer distributor I came across something I had never tried before, organic beer. I actually saw a few organic brands but settled on a Maine brewery called Peak Organic simply because they offer a mixed case of some of my favorite brew types. They only make three beers so it’s nice to be able to try them all in one case.

Organic is all about clean soil and Peak claims to use no pesticides and no chemical fertilizers on the grains that they use to produce their really delicious beer. I’ve never really been into the organic scene but I understand why some people are and I don’t knock them for it.

So does organic really make for better tasting beer? I don’t think so. There are so many factors that go into a good beer that something like soil quality isn’t going to jump right out at you. Some of the finest tasting beers on the planet are not organic. Good beer needs a brewmaster who cares. Organic is more of an attitude or philosophy than a huge contributing factor to taste.

That said, Peak beers are really, really tasty. It’s clear that they care about what they’re doing. I had the pale ale and the amber ale and both were among the best I have ever tasted. The amber was hoppier than I expected, almost like an IPA, but it was really good.

If you’re looking for something new to try and don’t mind spending $30 on a case, go organic with a Peak.

One of the few joys of traveling by air these days is finding a great place to eat dinner once you’ve arrived. While working in Dallas this week I had a hankering for good TexMex and a margarita so I started Googling. I found an amazing place just northeast of downtown Dallas, not far from the Cotton Bowl. Matt’s Rancho Martinez turned out to be one great find.

Tucked into an alcove near the historic, art deco Lakewood Theater, Matt’s serves outstanding, cheap TexMex grub and 23 varieties of margarita. I went with the standard house version - frozen, no salt. Perfect.

Many of the reviews I read raved about the Bob Armstrong appetizer (guacamole and ground beef smothered in queso) but I didn’t think I could eat that much food. I would up getting the beef enchiladas with rice and beans. Quick, cheap and delicious.

I sampled a colleague’s beef fajitas and the meat just melted like butter. I can’t say enough good things about the place. If you’re in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area it is absolutely worth the trip.

Matt’s Rancho Martinez
6332 La Vista Dr
Dallas, TX 75214
Phone: (214) 823-5517

Hey, jackass. Don’t walk around wearing your Bluetooth headset all day. You look stoopit.  Thank you. 

Hey, motion picture industry. You just turned a perfectly honest, hard working American consumer into a raging pirate. You took 10 hours of my life and now it’s “go time.”

All I want to do is hook up my TiVo and DirecTV DVR via HDMI to my friggin’ receiver and see it on my tv. Nope. Can’t do it. See, these fokkers who make movies are so afraid that we’re going to copy their precious stuff that they’ve convinced the manufacturers of electronic equipment to cripple the stuff.

Well, guess what? I used to pay for all of my music and movies. I used to lecture people about doing the same. I used to believe that people deserved to to be compensated for their product. That was before today. Today I was treated like a criminal. Today I spent ten hours trying to get a simple configuration to work because the instruction manual didn’t tell me that it wouldn’t. After doing a ton of internet research I found out that the feature that I had been trying so hard to make work had been intentionally disabled in order to keep me from copying some piece of garbage that Hollywood passes off as entertainment.

You’ll die like a rag doll and I’ll be laughing as I copy and distribute your crappy programming. You brought it on yourselves.

Dicks.

I’m in Las Vegas covering the Consumer Electronics Show for a large cable company based in Philadelphia. Chew on that one. This is my first time in Vegas and I must say that I have been very impressed so far. The city is clean and colorful and really interesting.

I’m shooting XDCAM HD and I can’t stress enough the joy I get from looking like a real professional in an environment like this. I mean, this camera is a real professional camera. That’s the problem with much of today’s  smaller gear. It’s makes you look like an amateur. This honkin’ axe commands instant respect!

There’s a ton of stuff to see and do so I’m sure the days will fly by. I plan to take tons of pictures and will post some here if I can figure out the flickr thing.

I hope to get to the Hoover Dam on Wednesday since it’s only 32 miles from my hotel, the Luxor. I’m told that seeing it produces one of those holy crap moments, kinda like the Grand Canyon. We shall see.

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