Summer Session Competition [15th August 2015]

[Shane Phelan]

Its not a BJCP based competition. Judges will be able to use the guidelines if they want but both this and the winter warmer competition are a theme based competition. Judges and staff will still get points if they want though as I have registered it.

[Paul B]

Its not a BJCP based competition. Judges will be able to use the guidelines if they want but both this and the winter warmer competition are a theme based competition. Judges and staff will still get points if they want though as I have registered it.

Is there any special process to collect the points?

[Shane Phelan]

I will be filling out a competition report after the competition is over. I will add all of the judges and staff at that point.

[delzep]

Entry form states a bjcp category

[Shane Phelan]

That is to give the judges some sort of guideline as to what they are judging.
i.e. Is this infected? No its a sour... etc

[Leann ull]

Its not a BJCP based competition. Judges will be able to use the guidelines if they want but both this and the winter warmer competition are a theme based competition. Judges and staff will still get points if they want though as I have registered it.

Is there any special process to collect the points?

I've filled a couple of these now, its important to get your points you give your BJCP registration no. to Shiny or you spell your full name as per the one you intend to register with the BJCP, there are a lot of Bobs in the BJCP.

[Shane Phelan]

Results are in
1st. Bren Murphy
2nd. Cahalbrua
3rd. Bren Murphy
Well done lads!

[bachus]

Congrats!

[pob]

Well done Bren^2 (& Cathal).

What styles were they?

[Leann ull]

Well done guys, any chance you could publish recipes would love to have a proper go at a low abv beer?

[brenmurph]

Theres a lot of benefit to keeping alc low.

1. you can drink a bit more
2. your friends can pop in for a beer and not fear driving home
3. your liver will thanks you in the med-long term
4. lower alcohol beers can help hydrate and have a place in sports nutrition
5. it devellops your skill at brewing
6. High alcohol beverages damage your gut flora and reduce immune function

Some ideas for brewing low abv beers are as follows, keep in mind the prob with lower alcohol is we use less malt so less malt = less malt flavour. Therefore to boost malt flavour there are some tricks that may work. In ways these are basic things found in some homebrew books

*Use great ( fresh) malts with flavour. Munich, vienna, pilsner or maybe maris otter.
*Do very little sparging as this can help the maltiness versus grainyness from sparging too much
*Use flavourful hops but limit them so they dont take over.
*Use long boil and or decoction can help build malty flavour and caramelisation
*Hard boil builds flavour a bit more but may affect head retention.
*Use calcium chloride to enhance malt. ( calcium sulphate can increase hop flavours)
*Some yeasts can boost/ enhance maltiness look them up. Our favorite is mauribrew lager yeast at  ale temps but there are others so go looking up websites.
*Use higher mash temp which gives less alcohol and more sweetness so you can balance out sweetness with salt and other minerals and PH adjustment.

Our lowest beer was 1.9% and 2.2%. Both of them tasted at and around summer sessions last year. Good examples of flavourful beers brewed naturally ( versus distilled)
I recomend a target of 3 to 3.5%  as this is easier to acheive using 3-4kg malt for a homebrew batch and play with some of above tricks. If you push too low you can end up with a slightly watery beer.

Happy Low ABV brewing give it a go!

[Leann ull]

I take it thats a no then

[Shane Phelan]

I take it thats a no then

You can sort out your radon problem with an inline filter surely?

[brenmurph]

Recipe posted already earlier today!!!

[Leann ull]

apologies I'm only at No 25 in "recent posts"