first timer- homebrew competition

[RedRoss]

Hi Lads,

I've set myself a few goals for 2017 and one of them is to enter a homebrew competition.
Is there any competitions for first timers or which competition would be best?

I would really like to see where I am from, brewing wise.

Cheers in advance.
Hoppy Christmas

[Leann ull]

Save your money and bring beer to a local meet they should give you honest feedback
Need to be a member to enter comps organised by NHC and or sometimes local clubs

[mr hoppy]

should

I think this remains challenging outside of Greater Dublin, absent adequate training in analytic tasting.

[johnrm]

The only way to become a better judge is to judge.
There's nothing stopping anyone organising something outside Dublin, as we did with off flavors in Cork previously.
I think what CH is getting at is that better brewing starts at club level.

[mr hoppy]

johnrm there's nothing "stopping someone" - and fair play to you for investing the time in getting the qualification -  but I've not seen anyone running BJCP training outside of Dublin yet. It requires time, effort and commitment and I'm not surprised it's been easier to generate that in a city of 1m+ than, for example, Cork.

I've the greatest of respect for the folks who've made this happen in Dublin, but I've a young family, and a demanding job so I don't think the "so why don't you do something about it" tone is fair. If I was living in Dublin I could tag along to the BJCP classes with the other 30+ participants rather than having to organise something myself without the expertise to actually make it meaningful.

Hopefully RedRoss will be ok in Dundalk, but absent judge training those further outside the Pale are largely entering the Nationals blind, and personally I've learnt a lot more from the snarky remarks of judges at the Nationals than at any meet-up I've ever attended. Yet, after last year many commenter were very direct in stating that we should only enter the Nationals to win, and not to solicit feedback.

Easy to say if you've a gaggle of BJCP qualified judges on hand at every meet up. Not so, outside of the greater Dublin region: I've brought beers to meet ups that received negligible negative feedback -even when explicitly solicited - which were subsequently (rightly) traduced by National judges.

I doubt I'm alone in this.

[Will_D]

I don't think John in any way meant "organize a BJCP" course.

Training starts at club meets:

Talk about styles/flavours and off flavours!
Drink beers and talk,
Bring bad beers for feedback

Before you consider a Siebel kit (€100 plus) get a bag of Lidl jelly beans and try blind tasting them. They are amazingly consistent flavour refserences.

Ok not a lot to do with beer but if will show you all who can distinguish Vanilla from Strawberry to Bubblegum etc

[Slev]

Tell us more about the jelly bean thing.  Sounds interesting. What should one look for in the tastes
I often would drink juice on the morning and have a sense of the flovour still after an hour or so,  and recognise that flavour in a beer but i don't have rhe vocabulary to describe it.  And i am very aware that what i taste is not what others pick up in flavours.  So the jelly bean thing sounds interesting

[johnrm]

It's always a question of numbers.
The number of hobbyists in Cork is far below Dublin despite the local population.
We have a nice group in Midleton and may do Siebel, but not BJCP.
It's not all about BJCP, even though it is a fantastic resource.
I have scored beers at home, although solo scoring is not as beneficial as joint scoring.

Cork meets are infrequent and very disorganised due to the large catchment area, other commitments, family etc.
Why not start a thread and kick start something?
Rather than set your sights on BJCP aim for life long learning.

[Leann ull]

johnrm there's nothing "stopping someone" - and fair play to you for investing the time in getting the qualification -  but I've not seen anyone running BJCP training outside of Dublin yet. It requires time, effort and commitment and I'm not surprised it's been easier to generate that in a city of 1m+ than, for example, Cork.

I've the greatest of respect for the folks who've made this happen in Dublin, but I've a young family, and a demanding job so I don't think the "so why don't you do something about it" tone is fair. If I was living in Dublin I could tag along to the BJCP classes with the other 30+ participants rather than having to organise something myself without the expertise to actually make it meaningful.

Hopefully RedRoss will be ok in Dundalk, but absent judge training those further outside the Pale are largely entering the Nationals blind, and personally I've learnt a lot more from the snarky remarks of judges at the Nationals than at any meet-up I've ever attended. Yet, after last year many commenter were very direct in stating that we should only enter the Nationals to win, and not to solicit feedback.

Easy to say if you've a gaggle of BJCP qualified judges on hand at every meet up. Not so, outside of the greater Dublin region: I've brought beers to meet ups that received negligible negative feedback -even when explicitly solicited - which were subsequently (rightly) traduced by National judges.

I doubt I'm alone in this.

I have a lot of issues to take up here but the one I have biggest the biggest exception to is "we should only enter the Nationals to win, and not to solicit feedback." who what where?, as that's simply not true, the nationals are no different than any local comp you enter to improve your beer and a good judge, bjcp or otherwise will provide that on your scoresheet.

I feel your frustration you are right about the whole Dublin centric thing but like I've said to others today if you want to change that, make suggestions come forward with ideas.

If you have time constraints or family commitments well then that's a different story but folks will only get out of the NHC what they put into it.
The NHC does try and put itself around the country with legs of the nationals in Cork, Galway, Belfast and Kildare this year.
From my perspective what I see is John trying very hard to get people to go to meets and 4-5 showing up for which I am confused about for the second largest city in the Republic . I appreciate Cork is a huge County but you really are under represented.


The feedback at your meets is more serious problem, sure I used to go to meets in the early days where piss was served and folks were being pleasant, I haven't been to one of them in ages. At our last meet we had a "bike conditioned beers" and we all had a good laugh about it, you don't need bjcp bods to judge beer we have 1 BJCP judge in GCB with 10-15 attending meets and Pob is rarely called upon when we can't put our finger on something, tasting shit beer is pretty obvious, the fun is trying to detect sometimes how many off flavours there are and what are they or better still if somebody brews an ok beer, how could it be made into a great beer.
Look at the novices we had tasting that beer in the Review in the members area, we were all of very similar opinion as to what the issue in improving and making a better beer from it.

Glad to see you were exposed to the reality of judging at the nationals, and I'm hoping as well as the comments they let you taste the stuff to confirm what they were tasting if they were that scary. Snarky comments are alright, but I hope those judges made recommendations on the score sheets to the entrants.

[Bubbles]

Yet, after last year many commenter were very direct in stating that we should only enter the Nationals to win, and not to solicit feedback.

I think the message was that the local meets should be the first port of call for feedback, if possible, but not to enter infected/rubbish beer in a competition just to get a scoresheet back. If a beer tastes like vinegar or nail polish remover, the brewer (or his friends/family) should surely be able to recognise that it's bad. They don't need a competition scoresheet or a BJCP judge in attendance to do that.

[cruiscinlan]

I think the message was that the local meets should be the first port of call for feedback, if possible, but not to enter infected/rubbish beer in a competition just to get a scoresheet back. If a beer tastes like vinegar or nail polish remover, the brewer (or his friends/family) should surely be able to recognise that it's bad. They don't need a competition scoresheet or a BJCP judge in attendance to do that.

Well you say that but groups of people can wildly differing views on the same beer. Ive often had completely opposing views from folk over the one beer.

[Bubbles]

I think the message was that the local meets should be the first port of call for feedback, if possible, but not to enter infected/rubbish beer in a competition just to get a scoresheet back. If a beer tastes like vinegar or nail polish remover, the brewer (or his friends/family) should surely be able to recognise that it's bad. They don't need a competition scoresheet or a BJCP judge in attendance to do that.

Well you say that but groups of people can wildly differing views on the same beer. Ive often had completely opposing views from folk over the one beer.

Of course. And so can beer judges, even the good ones. There's no authority out there who is going to certify a beer as "good". It's all subjective.

If you're not happy with the opinions of the people who have tasted your beer already, get some different opinions. Bring the beer to a friendly local craft brewery and ask for an opinion, attend a meet in a different locality, get a "gargle motel" going with other brewers, or simply give your beer to non-brewing, craft beer drinker that you know. Or drink your home brew alongside a couple of well-regarded commercial examples.

[molc]

Having gone through learning how to judge, the isn't some special knowledge learned while doing the course, but more how to describe what you taste and how to communicate it along with helpful information for the brewer to address any issues you may perceive.

If a beer is woefully infected, you won't get a good scoresheet as the judge won't be able to taste anything past the injection. Also your screwing up the judges palette so they can't give the next beers the feedback they deserve.

For all other beers, it's fair game and a good judge will try to give you helpful feedback on how to improve.

Heres some pointers for anyone that wants to critically analyse their beer, even without going to a meet.

1. Find somewhere quiet, Clear a space, get a sheet of paper and set aside 15 minutes. You need to really concentrate to analyse a beer and you won't pick up much sipping it on the couch.
2. On the sheet put down headings for aroma, appearance, flavour and mouthfeel.
3. Pop your beer and pour about 1/5 into a tall glass.
4.Take a sniff. Write down the first thing you pick up. Is it hops, malt, flowers, bread, sewage, sweaty socks? Trust your gut here, you've been tasting food and beer for years and you know what's good and bad.
4. Do the same with each heading until your done and/or bored. Now enjoy the rest of your beer.

If you didn't like any of the things you detected, post on the forums with your descriptors and people will weigh in with their thoughts. Also, as Bubbles said, get a commercial example of the style and compare the two side by side. It's something I do with almost every new recipe I try, as a side by side tasting highlights the differences very clearly.

Those differences are also what a judge will notice in a competition and are what make great beers stand out.

[delzep]

First thing they should teach you on that course is to write in block capitals on the feedback sheets

[johnrm]

Yes they do, but habits of a lifetime.