FOAM Homebrewer's Challenge

The folks in FOAM (Fitchburg Order of Ale Makers) are holding a Homebrewer's Challenge to benefit charity, and are looking for brewers to participate. Their president, Joe Zadrozny (of Z Street Brewing fame) sent the following invitation:

The Date: April 26, 2008

The Event: 20 brewers will have their beer available for the public to taste and to judge. The winner as judged by a Peoples Choice ballot will receive a handsome plaque, and bragging rights! Tickets will be sold, and proceeds will go to Andrews Helpful Hands and the Dana Farber Cancer Institute.

Requirements: One five gallon batch of your most popular beer, in a corney keg. You may also serve your beer from bottles, along with other beverages for people to sample if you wish.

Name___________________________________

Email___________________________________

Phone___________________________________

Beer You Are Donating_____________________

Will you be available to serve your beer? Y or N

Thank you!! Email info to joez3@verizon.net

There is still room for a half dozen or so brewers. The brewers will get a commemorative glass and the chance to sample the other brewers wares for free. There are going to be raffles and food available. It should be a fun evening!!

Brown Ale Competition

It's almost Spring time and that means brown ales! Okay, that's not really the case, but nonetheless we are having a Brown competition in April. This is BJCP Category 11 under the 2004 Style Guidelines. Brew up a Mild, a Southern English Brown, or a Northern English Brown and don't hop it too much.

The same competition rules apply as always:

The beer must be ready to drink by the April 2008 BFD meeting at Joe and Maureen Moore's house. It must be labelled with the brewer’s name and submitted in one of the following containers: 2 12 oz. bottles, 1 22 oz. bottle, or 1 container with at least 22 ounces of beer (i.e. growler, plastic soda bottle, etc.).

Contact any of the members of the Competition Committee (Todd, Phil, Billy K., Bill R. or Mary) if you have any questions.

2008 Boston Homebrew Competition

Today's Boston Homebrew Competition was a great event. Michael Fairbrother, Dan Hall, David Rosenbaum, Todd and I were all on hand to help the Wort Processors with the judging and stewarding duties. The official results will be posted on the competition site soon. One of the competition organizers was kind enough to share preliminary results with me so I could put them here on our blog right away. Eleven brews made by 5 BFD members placed. (The beer names are based on my notes scribbled on the back of a judging sheet - not the Wort Processors paper work.)

First Place
Jim Prucha - Schwartzbier
Jim Prucha - American Brown
Michael Robinson - Bock
Bill Herlicka - Specialty beer (aged in scotch barrel)
Todd Russell - Porter

Second Place
Lyn Howard - American Pale Ale
Michael Robinson - Kolsch
Michael Robinson - Baltic Porter
Michael Robinson - American Barley Wine

Third Place
Todd Russell - Saison
Michael Robinson - Old Ale

It's all about da mead

Being as passionate about mead as I am about beer, I flew out to judge at the International Mead Festival Home Mead Makers Competition that was held on February 9th in Boulder Colorado. This event attracts a large number of professional judges as well as other very dedicated mead fanatics from across the entire United States and Canada.

While the purpose of the trip was mead related, I did get a chance to go to Avery Brewing Company. I wasn't able to tour the brewery, but was able to go its hospitality suite and enjoy the wonderful beers. My favorite was the "Collaboration not Litigation" ale that was "secretly" on draft, helps to be a beer geek who knows how to ask the right kind of questions. Ended up with a couple of bottles, of batch #2, which aren't officially on sale yet.

After enjoying as much beer as I liked, I was off to check into the hotel room. Where I got to meet some peers in the industry. While Moonlight Meadery is officially, I still have quite a long road ahead of me before we are in production.

Friday night was filled with various seminars, and an abundance of wonderful commercial meads. Jet lag won over and I went to bed fairly early, missed getting to hear Ken Schramm get to talk.

Saturday morning... woke up before dawn, and hit the gym, it was going to be a big day of judging, was planning on evaluating 16 meads over the course of the day... little did I know what the organizers had in mind for me.

Had a big breakfast, and was ready to start judging. I was asked to head one of the three tables of judges who were doing dry meads. One we finished our flight of eight, I was asked to sit on the mini-bos table. All the meads were very well done, the faults were little things like the mead might have been too sweet for style, etc.

Lunch was a nice collection of sandwiches and cookies. I grabbed a Fat Tire on draft.... hmm one of my favorite beers.

After lunch I was tasked with the open category of meads, again I was asked to head the judging, of a flight of 8 meads. We had a range of dry, semi-dry, and sweet meads to evaluate. Again I was asked to judge the 10 more meads in the mini-bos with other great judges like Curt Stock, Petar Bakulic, and Julia Herz.

Now I am thinking with 34 meads under my belt and a beer... the day must be done...

I was asked to be on the BOS (Best of Show) table for the entire competition, an incredible honor, and reward! As the meads at this level are the best of the best! The BOS table consisted of 5 judges, and our job was to pick the best out of the 10 meads.

So I ended up evaluating 44 meads over the course of the day, it was a ton of fun.

Here's the results:

2008 International Mead Festival Home Mead Maker Competition Results 188 Total Entries
Table 1 - 241 - Dry Mead (19 Entries)
Joshua Archer	Traditional Dry - 1		1
Joshua Archer	Traditional Dry - 2		2
Joshua Archer	Traditional Dry - 3		3
Table 2 - 242 - Semi-Sweet Mead (14 Entries)
Jonathan Jordan	Straight Nyssa	Hogtown Brewers	1
Mark Healey	Moose Pond Mead	Southern Maine Homebrewers	2
Rick Reilly, Ron Stroh		Prairie Homebrewing Companions	3
Table 3 - 243 - Sweet Mead (14 Entries)
Rick Spaziani	Liquid Gold		1
Michelle Moyer, James Moyer	Admiral's Gold		2
Edward Walkowski	2006 Orange Blossom Mead		3
Table 4 - 251 - Melomel - Cyser (11 Entries)
Christopher St. Mary	Son of Circum-Cyser	Sultans Of Swig	1
Michelle & James Moyer	Captain Pete's Farewell Kiss		2
Todd Leatherman	Super Cyser		3
Table 5 - 252 - Melomel - Pyment (15 Entries)
Kim Herald	Northern Lights	GotMead International Brewmasters	1
Steve Fletty	Chateau Fletty Gewurtztraminer	St Paul Homebrewers Club	2
Mitchell Omichinski	Valient		3
Table 6 - 253 - Melomel - Other Fruit (24 Entries)
Ron Kloth	Watermelon	Arizona Society Of Homebrewers	1
John Miller	Favored Concubine		2
Curt & Kathy Stock	Cherry Bliss	St Paul Homebrewers Club	3
Table 7 - 254 - Melomel - Berry (22 Entries)
Daniel Hempy	Strawberry Melomel	Brewcommune	1
John Charlesworth, Mark Parsch, Thad Williams			2
Rick Reilly, Ron Stroh		Prairie Homebrewing Companions	3
Table 8 - 261 - Metheglin (23 Entries)
Don Larsen, Bernie Ashe	Smoked Chili Mead		1
Mitchell Omichinski	Prairie Dew		2
Steve Fletty	El Diablo	Saint Paul Homebrewers Club	3
Table 9 - 262 - Braggot (14 Entries)
James Sites	Cerveza de los Muertes		1
Kurt Bormann	Brown Maggot Braggot		2
Sheron Rowland, Pamela McAlpin	2 Old Broads Old Ale Braggot	GotMead International Brewmasters	3
Table 10 - 263 - Open Category Mead (32 Entries)
Rick Spaziani	Agave Gold		1
Edward Silverman	Matt's Memorial Mead		2
Wayne Boncyk	Christmas Spice	GotMead International Brewmasters	3
2008 Best of Show
Don Larsen & Bernie Ashe	Smoked Chili Mead	Congratulations to Don and Bernie!
HONORABLE MENTION
Rick Spaziani	Agave Gold	Another fine Mead!
Special Awards
Best Name	Son of Circum-Cyser - Christopher St. Mary
Farthest Entry	Stepanie Krieger - Hawaii
Best Packaging	Nedra Headen - Foam wrap "Mummy" Madness

Notes from the Orval Office

Back in the day BFD had a newsletter -- which was a pain to get pubished each month, but was excellent for the people who got to read it. One of the features of the newsletter was a column from the President -- from the Orval Office. I decided it would be nice to reinstate this particular BFD tradition and plan to write an Orval Office posting on the blog each month beginning with this one.

We had an excellent meeting last night at Erin & Brian Parda's house in Concord. Lots of great food (thanks to our hosts!) and, as always, a good selection of homebrew. The business meeting took a little less than 30 minutes and then we were on to Bill Herlicka's presentation about barrel aging beers. Bill gets his barrels from Thousand Oaks Barrel Co. and he has been very pleased with the beers he has aged that way. The Imperial Stout aged in a "scotched" barrel that Bill shared with us was certainly excellent!

A few reminders from the meeting:

• The deadline for entering beers in the Boston Homebrew Competition is February 13th. The drop-off location in New Hampshire is Jasper's Homebrew Supply, 4 Temple Street, Nashua, (603) 881-3052, jaspers@boomchugalug.com. This is a BJCP sanctioned competition and will be judged in Boston on March 1, 2008.
  
• If you want to go to the AHA Conference in Cincinnati, you need to book your room and register for the conference while there are still spots available. It is filling up fast.
  
• The club will not be holding a March meeting, but will be gathering at Ebenezer's in Lovell, Maine on March 15th.
  
• Our next official meeting will be April 11 in Merrimack and Bert Bingel will be doing a presentation on Mead.

Second Annual New England Regional Home brew Competition Raises $2000 for American Cancer Society

Manchester, NH • December 20, 2007 — Brew Free or Die (BFD) and Southern Maine Home brewers clubs today donated $2,000, raised at their joint event, the Second Annual New England Regional Home brew Competition. The event was held at Milly’s Tavern in Manchester , NH , on Saturday, November 3^rd, 2007. The donation to the American Cancer Society is made in honor of Don Merkey, a member of BFD who succumbed to cancer in 2005.

"We are grateful that The New England Regional Home brew Competition chose to donate their proceeds to the fight against cancer," said Brigit Ryan of the American Cancer Society. "This money will go toward cancer research, services for patients, and prevention and detection programs."

The New England Regional Home brew Competition, sponsored by Gritty McDuff’s, with 250 entries, is the largest homebrewing competition in New England , and is sanctioned by the Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP). The competition awards gold, silver and bronze medals in 28 beer-style categories. Home brewer, Cidermaker and Meadmaker of the year honors, plus the Best of Show Award, are awarded to the top amateur brewers as determined through the competition. A complete list of winners is available on the competition website, http://www.bfd.org/NERHBC.

Brew Free or Die, New Hampshire’s Oldest Home brew Club, and Southern Maine Home brewers wish to thank all the entrants and sponsors of the event, including Gritty McDuff’s of Maine, Shapleigh Hops, White Labs, Samuel Adams, Sky River Mead, and Giles Apple Farm among many other local and national firms. A complete list of sponsors is available on http://www.bfd.org/NERHBC.

“We are glad to have the opportunity to contribute to this event and the American Cancer Society”, said Eric Sprague of Southern Maine Homebrewers.

"Don was a past president of BFD and was very enthusiastic about the idea of a New Hampshire based national homebrew competition." said Mary Russell, BFD President 2008. "It is wonderful that our brew clubs have been able to put this competition together and I hope that we will be able to build on this year's success and continue this competition as a tribute to Don."

Brew Free or Die (BFD) is New Hampshire 's first, and most active, homebrew club. It was founded in 1991 to foster the brewing and appreciation of craft beer in Central and Southern New Hampshire . Many BFD members have won awards for their brewing. BFD members have served as both judges and stewards at numerous regional and national competitions. Among the BFD membership is a Grand-Master BJCP beer judge.

Southern Maine Home brewers is Maine ’s most active homebrew club. It was founded in 2004 to preserve and promote the time honored tradition of home brewing; to educate members about beer, cider, mead & wine. Southern Maine Home brewers also maintains involvement with the AHA and their competitions through club sponsored entries and activities. Many members have won top honors at some of the most prestigious AHA/BJCP sanctioned events.

Dear New England Homebrew Club,

I have been asked to organize the judging of the Sam Adams Patriot Homebrew Competition. This is a BJCP sanctioned competition to include styles 1 to 23, judging will take place on Saturday January 26th at Gillette Stadium (home to the New England Patriots).

I have setup a on line registration page for judges and stewards. Please see http://www.nhbrewers.com/Patriot/registration.php to register.

More information about lodging etc. will be provided to those that register, once I get the information from Boston Beer Co.

Also I could some help in running the competition, if anyone wants to volunteer please have them contact me.

Michael Fairbrother
Brew Free or Die

In Memory of Don

Brew Free or Die and Southern Maine Homebrewers held it's second annual New England Regional Homebrewers competition on November 3, 2007 in Manchester NH, raising $2000 dollars for the American Cancer Society in memory of Don Merkey.

Don always wanted BFD to get more involved with the running of a big homebrew competition. Well it brings a tear to my eye, but with two successful years of running this competition, it's clear we have finally done it! I think Don would be proud of us, as the NERHBC by all measures was a tremendous success!

Competition stastics:

• 250 entries (including beer, cider, and mead) from 16 states across the entire country.
  
• 36 sponsors including:
  
• Competition level sponsor - Gritty's
  
• Best of Show sponsor - White Labs
  
• Brewer of the Year sponsor - Boston Beer Co.
  
• Meadmaker of the Year sponsor - Sky River Mead
  
• Cidermaker of the Year sponsor - Gile's Family Farm
  
• We raised $2000 for American Cancer Society, in Memory of Don Merkey.

It took a combined effort of many members of both homebrew clubs to organize the competition, raise sponsors, catalog and process all 750 bottles.

Also we couldn't have done it without all the help from the stewards, BJCP (Beer Judge Certification Program) judges, and professional brewers who spent the day processing and judging all 250 entries, so that feedback could be provided to all the entrants.

Here are the top winners:

• Best of Show winner: Mark Healy with his Peach Cider.


• Brewer or the Year: Rick Rocheleau


• Meadmaker of the Year: Michael Fairbrother


• Cidermaker of the Year: Eric Sprague

For a detailed list of all the winners and sponsors vist http://www.bfd.org/NERHBC

A Musical Tour of Dogfish Head Brewery

A friend sent me this video link and I thought others might be interested: Dogfish Head Brewery