Tennet's

Here's a little riddle:

What happens when you turn out little 2 hectolitre brew-lab at school into a multi hundred-thousand hectolitre brewery like Tennet's Caledonian Brewery in Glasgow???

Gi-normous mash filters... ours at school holds 42 kg of mash, you can see it in the last post. These HUGE buggers (and bigger exist) both hole 18 tonnes of mash!

Gah! That's nuts! And guess what??? Only ONE guy runs this brew house at a time!







AND...


Fermenters so big you can park a highway coach inside them! Ha ha, these weren't their biggest but they were still huge. Don't remember their capacity but it's in the upper hundreds on hl.

Imagine one rupturing! You'd drown a yeasty death!

Gonna steal more pics from Amanda, if there's something I think you'd all be interestd in I'll post it foschizzle. :P

Bye bye for now!

Dave

School

No vikings yet...



But pics of our labs at school.

This is the brewing lab, works in up to 2hl batches. The big square thing in front is the mash filter, the tall white thing is the lauter tun, the two smaller vessels to the left of the lauter tun are the mash mixer and cereal cooker and the turquoise thing on the far left is the mashing unit with a mono pump below it. You can't see any of the fermenters in this photo but they're all just to the left of the photo.

Not a lot else to say about these unless you've got specific questions. Feel free to ask, I like explaining how it all works.
















This below is the distilling lab. We've got two stills, these are both pot stills made mostly of pyrex type glass (some copper in the stills). The copper you see, lots of it, doesn't actually contact the spirit inside. If it did the ratio of wash to copper would be incorrect. There are several copper rings that contact the spirit to replicate an appropriate spirit:copper ratio. Again, if you've got questions either post them below or get in touch with me however you usually would.




















Alrighty, I'm off for now.

Dave

Tomorrow Vikings Invade my Flat

Not Norwegian Vikings but Shetland Vikings, the deadlier of the two. Everybody knows that...

Tomorrow is Up Helly Aa, a Shetlander's favourite night of the year to get drunk and run around with HUGE torches, so, obviously the girls here are holding an Edinburger Up Helly Aa.

Sounds sweet to me.

Anyways, gonna be pics, we have a ship being built in our living room and lots of Shetland food a cooking in the kitchen. And I have to share my bed with that guy up above... scary thoughts racing through my head... like what if he rolls over???

Ooo, I also made muffins today using spent grains from the mash filter at school. I used the stuff as a partial substitue for flour. Guess what? The girls like them... me, I can't decide.

Hey, Lauren, THANK YOU SO MUCH for the cook book! There's now a copy of "Now We're Cookin'" in Scotland. ;) Lookin forward to Cam visiting this weekend too, gonna head on out to the Whisky Society to make sure he enjoys his first night in Edi!

Alrighty, I gotta write more, lots to do, lots to do... and all I can think about is... well two things, going back to see ya Sharon and all the work I have to do. Ha ha, not really work here, I enjoy almost everything, even writing reports. Ha ha, I visit Tennet's in Glasgow on Weds too!

Alright, I should go... but blogging is fun.

Have some lime:

Nice drink Scott!

Yum, yummy, yum yum. Lime. A fuck load of it. And vodka, beer, So Co, wine, lime, more beer... I liked it.

Ugh, going to be a little productive... won't be tomorrow!

Later.

Daryl the Fruit,

Swashbuckling Pirate.

PS. Gonna need pirate backup tomorrow.

And here are the promised pics ;)

Alrighty, I'm back, I've woke up and I've almost pushed my way through my little hang-over.

Oooo, just realized the Rome marathon starts/finishes at the Colosseum. Cooooolllllll.....

Anyways, the reason I'm back and blogging this fine morning is to post a couple pics from Israel. Damn good time, really had fun and can't wait to go back. Ok, ok, so... some pics.

This here is an Orthodox church, located right on the Sea of Galilee. We got there, the outside was full of gardens, all full of chickens, cats, peacocks and a sleepy dog. Oh yeah, there was a donkey somewhere too, you could here it making donkey sounds; anyways...

Ok so this is main "room" of the church, we got there during a small service of some kind and snuck into the back of the room to watch. Nice people, no one cared that we were obviously there to take pics. Really have to say that this place made me decide that Orthodox churches are cooler.

Ok, what else...

Here's the Western Wall or Wailing Wall, you choose the name you like... Cool place, never went up and touched it though, we stood back and watched the people there for a little while. Normally this place would have been crazy busy but we got there on an "off-day" I suppose.

The Old City of Jerusalem was cool, so much more there and in the rest of the city I'll have to go back and see. We went to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher (where the J-man was supposedly crucified, got a pic, see later), walked around the city walls, saw lots of cats, wandered through the souk (a bit smelly), oooooo, and I had my first Turkish coffee! I liked it, gonna see where I can get one here in Edinburgh. :)

You can't see it in this photo but right above the wall is the Dome of the Rock, a Muslim holy site, supposedly their 3rd holiest. It is very "golden" lets say, big dome, lots of gold. Shiny too. I've got it on my desktop at the moment.

So, moving on...

Here we have the very place (supposedly, according to an American tourist we asked) the many a Christian believes Jesus was crucified. Lots of art all over the walls, lots of silver, lots of shrines, very crowded compared to other parts of the church. This place was big, some of the downstairs parts were more like caves though. Surprisingly, for its size it's really hard to find! We walked by it and then got sent back to what seemed like a little alleyway full of shops. Never would have thought that a church of this size and significance would have been down this little alleyway.

Ok, hmmm, I also really liked Akko, going to put a pic from Akko up next. :) Ok, also really like the Golan Heights and the Kinneret (Sea of Galilee) so I'll put a pic of the lake itself too.

Here comes Akko (Acre) is first place, followed by the Kinneret from the Golan Heights in

second...

I have so many pics from Akko, it was hard to choose a favourite, and they're all so different... Oh well you'll all have to see them next time I visit Canada. But... this is from the wall at Akko, looking in towards the Old City there. Big mosque, went there, me and Ariel (Sharon's friend, and a cool guy) were gonna go in for a peek but it was Friday... there was a service and well... we just didn't feel right popping in at that moment. But, Akko was great, went to the souk, had wicked hummus, saw all the Crusader ruins was great. I can talk about all this stuff for far too long so I'll cut myself off here.

Ok, last pic, the Kinneret aka the Sea of Galilee. As seen from the Golan Heights.

The view from up here were great, you could probably see north to Lebanon and then I think just about to Syria too. South of us was Jordan and to the west was the Sea of Galilee with Tiberias (the town in the pic) across the lake. Had a crazy lunch there in Tiberias. :) Sooo much food.

Beautiful weather, as you can see; didn't ever really have a bad day. Rained once I think... yeah, it did, but not even for long.

So in conclusion... ha ha ha, sounds like a poorly written lab report... I will go back there again. :) Not only was the place beautiful but Sharon's there; can't wait to go back and spend LOTS more time with ya Beautiful! :) Ok, well, I should get on with my day, lots to do!

Ooooo, just to show off before I go, my phone number in my made up

Engbrew words is: esef-sheva-sheva-shtiim-shesh-arba-arba-ehad-hamesh-shmone-hamesh.

Ok, I'm a nerd, I know it, and I really gotta go...

Later!

Dave

Gonna sweep out the cob webs!

Hello everyone, I'm not dead! I am in fact alive! I am also enjoying this fact... very much so!

I'm back from Haifa, had a wicked time, will post one or two pics tomorrow (going out in a couple min), I will also let every one know that I am now officially registered in the Maratona della Citta di Roma!

I am Atlete (not a typo) #3410. :) Look for that number to W-I-N!!!

Also, started my MSc research project, much excitement over that... also... began talking to profs concerning PhD work. :) Friggin sweet!!!

Ok, well seeing as I need to pee and I have to get ready for the lovely Caley Sample Room, I will leave you with my new found Hebrew vocabulary...

Et otsa te? - Would you like a tea? Ha ha ha, I know the numbers good now too.

Ok, gonna go, pints and friends await me down the road. :) Y'all have a great night ye hear!

Posting to you again tomorrow,

Dave "now safely returned to Scotland" Sopko

In London again...

Can't seem to stay here for very long, every time I get here I'm here for a few hours or, like today, for a night.


Should be lots and lots of pics for everyone once I eventually, way before I'll ever want to leave, get back from Haifa. Going to get to Jerusalem and out of Haifa to visit Sharon's kibbutz too! There'll be lots of pics everybody! Sooooo dying to get there and see you Sharon! Can't wait!


Well I hope everybody had a great New Year's Eve, me and Stu did but wouldn't ya know it, the events in Edinburgh got cancelled!!!! That's what happens when you try to hold outdoor concerts/a beer fest/fireworks when you got 60 mile an hour winds and crazy rain. Like I said, still had a good time, we got drunk with school buddies, went out to see if we could still get into the Hogmany part of town (see my pic!) and then just got drunk in pub and got the whoel upstairs singing with us. :)

Anyways, gotta get off the comp soon, got an hour of internet and I think it's up in a few min!

Here's the pic! Me and two of the coppers at the Hogmanay gate just off the Royal Mile.





Later! Have a great next week! I'll blog again!

Dave

PS, was seriously so great to see everyone at X-mas (friends, family and... hmm... pets?) :P

Later.

Dave