We were hosts at the latest Hombrew Group meeting, which if we say so ourselves, was pretty successful :)
The Homebrew crew formed almost a year ago after a bunch of us found that we weren’t quite able to find a community of like-minded craft brewers elsewhere. This was also about the time that the ex-Homebrew Club rebranded itself as the Craft Beer Appreciation Club and this group given us a chance to grow as brewers, share tips and occasionally trade hops and equipment.
The group runs monthly themes and this month, we were given free reign to brew whatever we felt like! We unfortunately, through a series of miscalculations and just general busy-ness, wasn’t quite able to brew anything to the even-so-flexible theme that we just ended up submitting our old 5AM Saint clone that was pretty well-received the last time we had some beer business people around, and our single hopped Amarillo APA.
One thing we particularly like about the meetings is the judging session, which we try to take as seriously as possible. We usually try to refer to the Beer Judge Certification Program style sheets (they’re quite the authority on most established beer styles) for style guidelines, and over time, the group’s modified a score sheet that allows us to judge standard criteria like appearance, aroma, mouthfeel, taste, as well as how creative or how it adheres to the theme of the month.
After some light debate and friendly banter on how some brews went wrong, a few sad sods usually put their heads together to tally up scores and announce the winners.
The one that stole the show this month was an Evil Twin clone made by the group’s talented Russian brewer, Denis – good on him, it was his second time attending our meet up, and he’s been brewing for just six months. :)
Our beers fared pretty okay, coming in third and fourth respectively. One taster even remarked that the 2am Saint (our Brewdog clone) was ‘pretty fierce’ on aroma – a compliment if I ever heard one!
With the judging out of the way, the night descended into a controlled mayhem as we drank more commercial examples (craft brews only!), then went down the dark path of whiskeys. Nat’s a big fan of smokey whiskeys (Nick used to be, then decided to turn pansy and drink the sweeter ones) and we hung out in our living room until the last glassy-eyed brewer left our flat.
Until next time, homies!
