BJCP

Finally! I’ve been looking forward to taking this class for 3 years now! It’s the Beer Judge Certification Program or BJCP.

Life in general (that means kids) prevented me from the opportunity, but classes start tonight and run for 15 weeks. We run through every style of beer there is, drink samples (5-7 a night), talk about them… what’s right, what’s not… discuss variations, etc. Yep… tough thing to do… especially for all 80 styles of beer! Yeah, I said 80! 

Tonight I’ll do something I haven’t done in a VERY LONG TIME… I’ll be drinking Light Lagers! That means Bud Light, Budweiser, MGD and hopefully a good Dortmunder or two to wash them all down.

Studying throughout this class is going to be a real bitch!

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Update to post:

Last night’s class was fun, but wowwo wowwee was it overwhelming! Probably by design but the first thing we did after 5-6 large handouts of booklets/study guides was a freaking Quiz! Straight off the bat… damn! Of course I had read through the first couple of pages, but I wasn’t “studying” it by any means. My expectations were shot down immediately, and then he hands us all a beer and says to judge it as a German Pilsner. Of course it was a trick but the format was very frustrating. One person got up and damn near gave up but we talked her into staying. 

That said… I will actually have to study and remember descriptions, values and specs for every style… whoa…..

What’s This? A New Post!!

well then, since our last episode not much has happened beer wise… just a few incidents of brewing mixed with many incidences of drinking!  Let’s start with the brewing portion… Over the last 4 months I’ve made 12 gallons of Robust Porter + 3 gallons of a Mild Porter with the second runnings; 3 gallons of Double IPA (10%!); and just recently did 8 gallons of an experimental beer using a single new hop variety called Nelson Sauvin. The latter is still in the fermenter and from some samples it has a very smooth grape flavor, which is a characteristic of this New Zealand hop. It’s a strong hop too with 12% alpha acids so it will be bitter and very aromatic. Alcohol is a mere 4% so this should be interesting to say the least. Of the other two beers (Porter and DIPA) I’ve nearly drank them both dry and need to pull the taps so that I can save some for the club’s competition in May. That will be tough as I have little homebrew to drink on if I do that! All that means is I need to get my but in gear and starting brewing a few utility beers. 

As for drinking incidents, well they have been quite good. Gebs was in town a couple times and that always means it’s party time. We did some backpacking and shared a Bigfoot 2008 in the woods of Shawnee State Forest (an area known for it’s Bigfoot sightings). We did some partying with the gang and even managed to hit a few bars (like the great Dilly Deli). 

Till next time!