Club competition - W J Kavanagh's - September 24th

[Shane Phelan]

This is our club competition for the "Summer Session Beer Finals".

Location:
W J Kavanaghs, Dorset Street, Dublin 1

Date:
Tuesday 24th September

Start time:
7.00pm (Entrants should aim to have their beers registered before this time)

Protocol:
All new members welcome
If you have some brews for tasting, bring along ~1 Litre of each, as this is a competition this month, we will be tasting any "non competition" beers after the competition around 9/10pm.
To show some thanks to our hosts for allowing us to drink homebrewed beers in their pub, it is customary to buy some drinks from the house. Not difficult given the great selection on offer!

We are going to get someone who isn't entering on the night to give each of the beers a number in the fridge where they are stored, only they will know what number corresponds to which beer and who owns it. As each beer is served, they will be very gently decanted into a pitcher first to ensure that the bottles can't be identified and that no one is left with dregs of yeast either.

We will hand out a couple of score sheets to everyone there, which should be enough for all the entries. Once the flight is done the numbers will go into an excel document which will take an average score for each entrant. The top beers will be selected to go though to the next round.

In terms of entry form, the steward on the night will only need two things from entrants, name and ABV. We will talk about recipes/styles/thoughts after the initial tasting which should only take two hours max. The main thing I want to avoid is people going "Oh this is XXXXX's beer so it must be good/bad etc.." which would skew the results.

Cost:
Free

Organiser/Contact:
Shiny (Shane),  Dr. Jacoby (Peter)

Note this is not the normal beer tasting procedure and is only happening this month for the competition. We will go back to our regular format for future tastings.
 
Entrant Responsibilities
•   This competition is for full members only, you can become a full member by following the information in this link
•   Your beer must be below 4% ABV before bottling to qualify for entry
•   You need two 500ml or three 330ml bottles of beer to enter this round
•   Upon arrival find the steward and get your beer registered
•   Inform the steward of your name and the ABV of your beer(s)
•   Ensure you have an additional two 500ml or three 330ml bottles of beer should you progress to the final (Set these aside at home just in case!)

Judge Responsibilities (Further clarification on the night)
•   Record Beer number and ABV for each beer as it is distributed by pitcher
•   Consult the theme and score the beer appropriately
•   The "Fit theme" will allow the judge to express how well they feel the beer fits the theme
•   After scoring the judge should add the scores and double check their values
•   Please keep feedback constructive and don't slate anyone's pride and joy!
•   If the water is low or dregs bucket full, take the initiative and fill/empty them yourself

Steward Responsibilities
•   Assign numbers randomly, name and ABV to beers as they are received onto a laptop
•   Put all beers in fridge assigned by Kavanagh's staff
•   Gently fill pitcher with two bottles of each
•   Affix masking tape with current beer number and ABV to pitcher
•   Empty and rinse pitcher between each beer
•   Only the main steward is allowed behind the bar to get the beers [Kavanagh's will be strict about this]
•   Assistant Stewards: Your main opportunity to help will be adding up all the scores at the end


Miscellaneous Preparation
•   Empty pitcher (Supplied by Kavanagh's)
•   10 - 15 Empty glasses (Supplied by Kavanagh's)
•   2 or 3  bottles of water (Supplied by Kavanagh's)
•   Two empty mayonnaise buckets (Supplied by Kavanagh's)
•   Space in fridge for 20-30 bottles
•   Masking tape & Markers to affix "Current" number onto pitcher
•   Print outs of score sheets
•   Laptop with Excell Sheet for scoring, names, ABV and number
•   Bottle opener for steward
•   Talk to CARA about beer fridge location or if it's necessary at all
•   Crackers
•   Tables, sizes, chairs, and a final number on the amount of people attending

[Padraic]

Great work lads!

I'll be there on the night, I have a beer that I will taste between now and then before i decide wether I'm enterng it or not!

[Shane Phelan]

If you don't end up entering it, would you like to be a Steward?

[Damien M]

As a Midlander-blow-in (from the last meet) it would be a bit cheeky for me to enter, but if all were agreeable and to keep it impartial . I don't mind stewarding. I think can even bring a co-steward!

Damun

[irish_goat]

•   Your beer must be equal to or below 4% ABV after bottling to qualify for entry

I think it was decided that it had to be <4% before bottling so that people didn't need to worry about calculating extra ABV from priming.

[Padraic]

As a Midlander-blow-in (from the last meet) it would be a bit cheeky for me to enter, but if all were agreeable and to keep it impartial . I don't mind stewarding. I think can even bring a co-steward!

Damun

I say enter away, we'll have someone floating around who hasn't entered.

I have no problem stewarding if I don't enter! (Most likely won't be entering!)

[Shane Phelan]

Cool thanks Tom I have now fixed it above to reflect that.

Yeah Damien, that's fine. If you are entering a beer then you wouldn't have to do any stewarding. I'm hoping to avoid the situation where a steward has also entered a beer to keep it as impartial as possible. That said, if we don't get any non entrant volunteers for the position then we could be forced to do it.  :

[CARA]

I won't be entering as my beer suffered the effects of a high fermentation temp. Shiny please PM me details of organisationally duties from the pubs point of view please. I'm happy to volunteer as one of the judges on the night.

[Shane Phelan]

No problem CARA, I have modified the list now to reflect that. I have tried to limit the amount of stuff we need from Kavanagh's to be the least amount of burden as possible but I will PM you either way with my concerns.

BTW I was going to suggest that anyone who wants to judge, can be a judge regardless if they have entered their own beer.

[Hop Bomb]

Cool thanks Tom I have now fixed it above to reflect that.

Yeah Damien, that's fine. If you are entering a beer then you wouldn't have to do any stewarding. I'm hoping to avoid the situation where a steward has also entered a beer to keep it as impartial as possible. That said, if we don't get any non entrant volunteers for the position then we could be forced to do it.  :

That correction on the sub 4% never saved on your edit Shiny. Galway comp thread now has the incorrect abv guidelines on it too as it was a copy & paste.

Cheers for setting the template for the comp. It all looks great. fair play!

[Shane Phelan]

It did save....."4% before bottling" is correct isn't it? Because after bottling it could technically be as high as 4.3%?

[Hop Bomb]

It still reads " Your beer must be equal to or below 4% ABV before bottling to qualify for entry" 
It was sub 4% I thought before bottling?

[Shane Phelan]

Oh I wasn't even looking at the "equal to" to be honest. I will remove it to prevent any confusion in that case.

I want to make sure to get it right as we are going to use this as a template for any single style competitions in the future.

[Hop Bomb]

Its perfect man. Again, fair play for setting that template.

[Shane Phelan]

No problem dude! Enjoyed the process to be honest.