View from the Top of the Tun

Well we did it! We set out to break 300 entries for this year’s Aurora Brewing Challenge. Not only did we break 300 but we also passed the 400 mark, 401 to be exact. It could have been more! There were some 30 entries from The Houston Foam Rangers that didn’t make it to Alley Kat in time for the competition. At the time of this writing I’m still not sure where they all are other than some of the Foam Rangers have been tracking their shipment. Last year’s competition received a total of 238 entries that were judged in two days plus the BOS round on the Saturday. This year we added only one extra night on the Wednesday for a total of three nights plus the BOS round and we were able to give constructive evaluations on all 401 entries from our qualified judges and reliable stewards. This kind of commitment and effort typifies the quality of our membership in the Edmonton Home Brewers Guild. You should all be proud of your accomplishments this year.

Our club president, Roxy Hastings deserves a huge congrats for creating the competition/conference concept to celebrate our fifth year as an MCAB qualifier. Without Roxy’s persistence on turning an idea to reality this never would have happened. Neil Herbst did an outstanding job once again in serving as head judge and was also responsible for all the administration of the entries. Once the competition was over and the results were known there I was standing by Neil’s printer while Neil was spitting out all the results. Neil also was a major speaker at the conference held immediately after the competition. I didn’t know until a week later that Neil and his wife Lavonne were going through major renovations at their home during the week of the competition and conference. Talk about stressful and he never showed it for one minute. Bruce Sample, Richard Bruins and Mark Nesdoly did an excellent job in maintaining and recruiting new sponsors. We had some heavy- duty prizes to hand out this year thanks to their efforts.

It was great seeing so many of our fellow club members win and place at the competition. People who have never placed in the past received medals this year. Kudos goes to Roxy and Neil and other members for sharing their knowledge and training us so well. I for one have learned a great deal of knowledge from the two of you and I find the science of home brewing exciting as well as challenging.

The Hot Break Conference was fantastic. For those of you who missed it I feel sorry for you. New club member and fine arts student Loren Letourneau had his art works on display. His exhibit was impressive and I believe he sold some of his work that night.

We had four major talks starting with our club president Roxy and Mark Nesdoly addressing how to prepare for the BJCP exam which is a very time consuming, demanding test in your knowledge of brewing. Believe me you have to prove to the exam graders that you know your stuff!

Neil took the stage shortly after and presented major beer faults you’ll encounter during the BJCP exam. He doctored up a bunch of beers for all to sample – a totally interactive seminar that everyone appreciated. A good introduction for when Neil and Roxy conduct another BJCP course starting in September.

Club VP Kevin Zaychuk and EHG Editor Bob Boufford showed us how to turn Brew House kit beers into medal winners by tweaking the wort ingredients by adding steeped grains, liquid yeast and dry hopping. With a little time to spare Kevin shared his recent trip to Europe with a slide presentation on breweries. I only got to see a portion of it but judging from what I saw I have to go there one day.

Graham Monda of Johnson Diversey made a presentation on sanitation. I’m sure everyone is aware how sanitation plays a major role in the success or failure depending on how you look at it in brewing.

Our Keynote speaker was Greg Evans of Brewer’s Gold based in Victoria, BC who presented a one-hour slide show titled “From Bar to Heaven – the Evolution of Saloons in Victoria.” He showed us the lighter side of brewing – quite a rich history. A special thanks goes to Jim Whittome for arranging this.

Rose Oberhoffner put together a fantastic dinner for us. I don’t think anyone left hungry. Frank Kuzemski cooked the steaks to perfection on the grill. With help from Linda Hannah and Sarah Foster-Stubbs the dinner was awesome. Thanks everyone!

Now let's check out the awards. It was great to see so many of our fellow club members place at the competition. This shows that the quality of home brews coming from our club is getting better and better. The 1st place Best of Show went to Gary Falkenstein of the ALES Club - Regina for his Berliner Weisse, 2nd place BOS went to Kelvin Kundert of Marquis de Suds - Calgary for his “Catherine” in the Specialty Class and 3rd place BOS to our own Bob Boufford for his “Dante's Mixed up Lambic”. Brewer of the year went to Boyd Oberhoffner who tallied up 17 pts from the 30 entries submitted in the competition. An honourable mention goes to Frank Kuzemski who sent in 24 entries and Bruce Sample with 20.

Brewer of the Year, Boyd Oberhoffner (l) and ABC Competition Chair, Glen Hannah

Fellow members Bruce Sample and Mark Nesdoly assembled a great raffle prize - a beer fridge and programmable thermostat won by Kevin Zaychuk. Kevin’s on a roll, having won the grand prize at last year’s competition. The money raised from Boyd’s ticket sales went to the club for future functions. Rose Oberhoffner won the grand door prize – a home kegging system donated by Bruce Sample and Ernie Koban. Looks like we’ll be sampling many of Boyd’s draft beers later this year, right Boyd?

Six members from ALES Club from Regina came up armed with 3 kegs. Bob Boufford, Mark Nesdoly and I also donated kegs for the conference. That along with some 350 bottles of home brew was on hand for all to sample. The beer was flowing and needless to say we never ran short.

In club points the EHG took 1st with 88 pts, Ales Club 2nd - 42 pts and Foam Rangers/Marquis de Suds 3rd - 8 pts. Full details of the ABC winners can be seen on our website, http://www.ehg.ca.

Thank you to all helped out and made this year’s event the best one yet. If I forgot anyone I’m sorry.

See you in September.

From the Bottom of the Mash

It’s been fun and very educational time! Instead of waiting until September after the summer rains and sun have bleached away the memories, we thought a short "Best of Show" issue would be enjoyable summer reading. As Glen has noted, it was the best Aurora Brewing Challenge to date. And topped off with a wonderful Hot Break 2004 conference. It's not often one can sit through conference sessions while sipping beer at the same time.

For most homebrewers, summer is the time to relax and enjoy the beers made this past winter, even though many members continue to brew. While you may not brew during the summer, it's a good time to evaluate your beers, review the score sheets from the past competitions and plan for next seasons brewing along with the upcoming competitions. Don't forget our club mini-competitions starting off with smoked beers for September and IPAs for October.

See you in September after Labour Day…

Upcoming Events and Competitions

First EHG meeting of the 2004-2005 season

The club meetings are held on the first non-holiday Monday of each month. And since Labour Day falls on the first Monday in September, the first Edmonton Homebrewers Guild meeting will be September 13, 2004 starting at 7:30 PM at Alley Kat Brewing.

The theme and mini-competition for the meeting will be Smoked Beers. If you have any smoked beers, bring them along to the first meeting. There is still plenty of time to brew up a batch.

Foam Rangers Dixie Cup 2004

The Foam Ranger's Dixie Cup 2004 competition will be held in early October 2004. Besides being one of the largest homebrew competitions in North America, they always have a unique speciality category. Last year's category was "Beer that gets you Lei'd", a strong but smooth beer with a minimum OG of 1.080 but alcohol must not be detectable.

The year's planned special category is "2 for 1" by brewing a combination of previous Dixie Cup special categories. Those of you who brewed in the BURRP! 2 club competition may have an opportunity to re-enter your BURRP! beer as one of the previous Dixie Cup categories was Breakfast Cereal. The Cocoa Puffs Porter has a good chance since it had an OG of 1.086 and over 1 box of cereal. Current information on the competition can be found in the Foam Ranger's June newsletter, http://www.foamrangers.com/PDFs/tbu_200406.pdf and a listing of prior special categories at Dixie Cup homepage, http://www.crunchyfrog.net/dixiecup/index.phtml.

Beer Summit competition

This looks to be interesting as this BJCP sanctioned competition appears to be hosted by a commercial venture in the Boston area instead of a club. Entries are due in late October with judging in mid-November. Details can be found at http://beersummit.com

Other upcoming competition

There are many upcoming competitions listed on the BJCP web site, http://www.bjcp.org.