Bubblings from the Fermenter
Mark Tumarkin
May was a really full month for beer events. We started out with the First Round of the AHA National Homebrew Competition in Tallahassee. As usual, the North Florida Brewers League put on a well-run show and made all the judges feel at home. We had a good turnout of HB judges -- Ray, Sue, George, Gregg, Robert, and myself. We represented about a quarter of the 20 or so judges called upon to evaluate over 400 entries in two days. It was a big job; we were at it till after six on Saturday, and well into the afternoon on Sunday. As they say, it was a dirty job but somebody had to do it.
After one weekend to rest our tired palates (except for Ray and Robert, who went down that in-between weekend to help with the preliminary judging), we headed down to Orlando for the Sunshine Challenge. This is one of the premier national-caliber contests and one of the biggest beer parties of the year. They had over 600 entries this year. And it wasn't just a beer competition; Greg Noonan and Ray Daniels were the guest speakers. On Friday, there was a reception hosted by brewers of the Florida Brewers Guild with many beers from some of the better Florida brewpubs and microbreweries. Saturday featured more judging, a pub-crawl with two buses (this got pretty rowdy but a good time was had by all), a dinner around the pool with music provided by the Barleywines (a band consisting of members of the CFHB), and finally a room-crawl that went on into the wee wee hours of the night. One room had a keg of Bigfoot Barleywine, reportedly one of only six such kegs that made it to Florida. Sunday featured a pool/piazza party and then the award ceremony and raffle. Oh, I've somehow neglected to mention the beer trailer that was parked behind the pool to keep the brew flowing the entire weekend. (See Sue's article for more info on these two competitions)
We had a very good turnout for the May meeting hosted by Dr. Bob in his lab. We had a number of out-of-town guests (including Erin's mom), and we also got to meet Bruce's wife, Joan. Bob's lab is an incredible place, full of all kinds of brewing equipment and toys. It featured a trio of steam-jacketed brew kettles that can bring wort to a boil NOW or maintain a select temperature exactly for specific rests. Plus a grain mill that started out life as an A&P coffee grinder, hot water hoses to wash everything down into a major series of floor drains, an industrial-vibrating sparge device, and a series of temp-controlled cooling rooms containing a plethora of fermenting beverages. Guess we'll have to schedule a boil party there to work out a yeast flavor experiment similar to the Monster Mash. Bob had a couple of his students doing a brew to demonstrate the use of his toys. Needless to say, everyone was very impressed.
After a brief business meeting, we moved on to George's beer evaluation session. Bradley wasn't here to help with this one, but George did a great job on his own. He used Miller Genuine Draft as a base beer and added various flavorings to it for us to try to identify. This gave us some good experience in picking out the flavors and flaws that we often find in our homebrews or in commercial beers. I was pretty pleased by the number of correct identifications. Our palates are getting more discriminating, and everyone seemed to enjoy the presentation.
We have made a procedural change for the monthly style contests. We will collect the beers to be judged at the meeting, but the actual judging will take place at a later time. Doing the judging at the meeting itself meant that at least three people missed the meeting, presentations, and tastings. We will also be able to have more judges (and thus more informed opinions on your beer) as well as better a better judging environment. We will announce the date, time and location of the judging via the brewer's list and you are all welcome to come and join in if you like. The winner will be announced at the next meeting (or in the newsletter or on the brewer's list, depending on when we hold the judging). Anyhow, we'll give this new plan a try and see how it flies. We can always go back to the old way if we don't like how this works. Next month the style for the club competition will be Pale Ale, hope you've got one ready or in the fermenter. July will be an open style contest (anything goes) and then August will be milds and brown ales. Sue and Wayne will host the June meeting. So until then, keep those fermenters bubbling.