Took my first stab at formally judging homebrew this past Saturday (8/18). Drove out to Hubberston, MA to assist with the FOAM’s annual homebrew competition that they run in conjunction with the Blues n’ Brews festival which occurs the week after (8/25). FOAM is a great club located in central/western MA.
What a great time. I sat in on the Belgian Beer, Dopplebock and English Ale judging sessions (referred to as flights). Overall, most of the beers were really good and a couple were exceptional. [To whom-ever submitted the English Mild…damn I loved the aroma on that beer, if that aroma had carried into the taste…I would have stopped brewing until I found that recipe]
Anyhow, I learned a lot about the tasting and judging process. Got a chance to really exercise the palate. The basic process is to smell, look and taste… all the while converting your observations into words. Then comparing those experiences with the BJCP guidelines and seeing how close to style each beer had come. And talking to other judges and brewers in the room really teaches you what phenolic means or malty and grainy really tastes like… and how it can differ beer to beer.
Judging is a great way to advance your skills as a brewer. Once you learn how to taste the way ingredients work together you can better dial in your own recipes. Tasting and judging others work really helps you decide what is “good” and what is “great”. Often when tasting our own beers I think we can lose impartiality.
Fully recommend that anyone with brewing experience, volunteer at the next local competition to judge. It’s a great way to get yourself moving towards the next level of experience as a true brewer.
Thanks to the folks at FOAM and all the judges. I had a great time helping out and hope do do it again next year. By then I will hopefully have judged a few more comps.
Kevin
Don’t leave us hanging with neither meat, nor fish here. What does phenolic mean?
Mike
Phenols range in odor from cloves and black pepper, to medicinal or plastic like.
Stick your nose in a freshly opened box of band-aids and you’ll get a blast of phenols.
A common source for this flavor is often wild yeast or residual sanitizers in the beer equipment. Oversparging of your grains or over crushing of grains can lead to increased phenol levels (in the form of polyphenols, i.e. tannins).
Undesireable phenols are often a sign of contamination by wild microbes. However, many belgian yeast strains and several Weizen/Weissbier yeasts are selected specifically for those clove and banana like phenols relavent to the wheat beer style.