Thursday, January 18, 2007
Coming of War
... of the Worts XII on Feb 17th. I have been looking at my bottled beer inventory (as well as those that I could quickly put into bottles with my counter-pressure filler) and trying to decide what to send into this Feb 17th competition. I have a couple that I know will be dogged by the judges, but I think the $5 entry fee is probably worth it to get feedback. Here are my considerations:
I entered My Wife's Nutty in the 2006 Buzz-Off competition and got comments that it didn't have enough hop character to balance it in the Northern category, and would be better as a Southern Brown - However this is a new batch and I feel that it *IS* hoppier, so I am torn between putting it in the same category where it only got 31/50 last time or trying a different one entirely - namely the American Brown. It doesn't have American hops, so that is probably a bad idea (used Bullion and Kent Golding, I think) which probably means I should stick to English Northern or Southern.
I am entering my dad's bourbon porter in two categories, both the wood aged and robust porter, because I don't know how best to categorize it. The oak and bourbon flavors only come through in the aftertaste, and it grows slowly as you sip your way through the beer - so the judges are likely not to get much of it with only 2oz. It may end up having too much oak & bourbon for just robust porter, but not enough for the wood-aged category - that would suck.
So if I enter things as listed above, I am looking at losing basically 16 beers and $41 to entry fees, but that's cool with me. Hopefully I'll walk away with a ribbon or two for it, and I'll definitely get lots of good feedback... hopefully constructive and informative, although that isn't always the case.
I think the next competition that has a firm date on the schedule is this year's Buzz-Off in summer, so I'll have several months to build my bottle inventory back up... and I'll have a whole new batch of beers to try out in that competition.
| Sirius Black Honey Ale | 12B - Robust Porter |
| Ed's Special Reserve Porter | 12B - Robust Porter |
| Ed's Special Reserve Porter | 22C - Wood-aged beer |
| Choking Sun Stout | 13D - Foreign Extra Stout |
| My Wife's Nutty Brown | (Undecided - American brown or English Northern?) |
| Nightmare Stout | 21A - Spice, Herb, or Veg Beer |
| The Beer Formerly Known As Hopocalypse | 14C - Imperial IPA |
| Saison du Sevier | 16C - Saison |
I entered My Wife's Nutty in the 2006 Buzz-Off competition and got comments that it didn't have enough hop character to balance it in the Northern category, and would be better as a Southern Brown - However this is a new batch and I feel that it *IS* hoppier, so I am torn between putting it in the same category where it only got 31/50 last time or trying a different one entirely - namely the American Brown. It doesn't have American hops, so that is probably a bad idea (used Bullion and Kent Golding, I think) which probably means I should stick to English Northern or Southern.
I am entering my dad's bourbon porter in two categories, both the wood aged and robust porter, because I don't know how best to categorize it. The oak and bourbon flavors only come through in the aftertaste, and it grows slowly as you sip your way through the beer - so the judges are likely not to get much of it with only 2oz. It may end up having too much oak & bourbon for just robust porter, but not enough for the wood-aged category - that would suck.
So if I enter things as listed above, I am looking at losing basically 16 beers and $41 to entry fees, but that's cool with me. Hopefully I'll walk away with a ribbon or two for it, and I'll definitely get lots of good feedback... hopefully constructive and informative, although that isn't always the case.
I think the next competition that has a firm date on the schedule is this year's Buzz-Off in summer, so I'll have several months to build my bottle inventory back up... and I'll have a whole new batch of beers to try out in that competition.
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Hey Garrett,
I haven't forgotten about the DFH competition that we discussed previously....just been busy with home improvement stuff. Will drop you a note soon to try and get the ball rolling....again. DT
I haven't forgotten about the DFH competition that we discussed previously....just been busy with home improvement stuff. Will drop you a note soon to try and get the ball rolling....again. DT
No worries, Terry. Quite honestly, I've had tons of stuff going on as well. When things start letting up, we'll get together and figure out something... maybe we should try to plan a DUH / FSB event sometime in the next few months and use it as a means to hammer out some ideas.
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