Pages: 1
first contest
I just got my score sheets back from my first homebrew competition entry. I entered 3 beers, the coffee and cream porter from the community brew, an American lager, and an American Pale ale. Scored a 29, 30.5, and 26 on them. I really thought my pale ale would do better, but I think I might have gotten some infection, based on the feedback on that one. That and the first bottle I tasted of that batch was mind blowing good, and since then, they haven't been quite as good. Overall, I think my scores were decent, and I got some feedback to try and improve with. By the way, the main complaint on the coffee and cream porter was the coffee was too strong and over powered the rest of the beer flavors, so if anyone is going to brew that recipe, they might want to take that into consideration.
That is a great start. Compettions are great to compare your beer to a baseline, and balance within the style is what scores well. We can all taste our own beers and say Wow- that tastes good! But realistically does it taste right? Off flavors are not welcome in any beer, and most judges are really hunting to find them, so if you get feedback that includes off flavors, a process review and temp control may be a good start.
Congratulations on your entries!
Great job!!!
I just had a batch of Irish Red that did that to me. It started off super great and then the end of the bottles were just meh. I wonder if it got an infection too. (?)
I'm sure you are on your way to brewing greatness!! 
)
Fist of all competitions suck, they can make you feel like king shit, or make you feel like a shit King. I havn't entered one in about a year, but I think I got it down. Make it as close to style as you can, even if the beer is freakin fantastic, but not exactly to style, you will get a 25 on it. I made a Thirsty Brewchez ESB so friggin fantastic, that people keep asking for this beer a year later, it scored a 44, and didn't even place. That shows that it's tough to win those popular catagories, because someone out there will always have a better one.
Now, i'm not saying they are not fun, and informative, they are indeed another way to see how the pro's feel about your beer, and if they don't like it, F em
I know about trying to make your brew to the style guidelines kinda sucks. Sorta feels like they should give everybody a recipe and everyone brews the same beer and then see whose comes out best would be the way to do it. My American lager I used San Fran lager yeast on, I think that might have dropped it a few points. Although I thought it tasted pretty well to style, based on drinking commercial varieties. The one that disappointed me was the pale ale. I will make it again, and hopefully get the contamination issue worked out. If they had tasted the first one I drank of that batch, my score would have been a lot higher. It's been going downhill since the first one though.
How does one enter in a compatetion. I got an idea for an imperial that I will be trying this week and wanted some feed back when its done.
try going to the AHA website and look at the competition page. they have a calender of comps from around the country, and Canada. http://www.homebrewersassociation.org/p … mpetitions There will be contact info for the competition listed, so you can get all the info you need to enter.
www.bjcp.org is another great source for competition calendar and entry information. the site also provides style guidelines so you can see per style exactly what we read when we judge the beer. If properly packaged, this time of year is good to ship beer to distant comps, so no need to wait for something local.
keep in mind judging feedback is not designed to determine if your beer is delicious or not- it is designed to determine its style accuracy, point out any flaws, and if it is a close match, then overall flavor is considered.
it has been in my experience that most competitions have 90% of beers scoring under 35. It is difficult to get a beer to score higher than that. but just keep in mind, if a comp has 600 beers we do not just sit around and look blindly for the most enjoyable beer, but instead those closest to classic examples. Once a winner in each category is determined, then they all go to a best of show which they then compete again for the accuracy, but now the delicious and enjoyable to drink factor enters the picture.
many best of show beers are actually so good, there are no commercial examples that can compare. those are the ones we hope there are still extra bottles of, so we can enjoy after judgement. 
I am also available to judge any beer for anyone here if you send me a bottle. it would of course not be in any competitive atmosphere, however if you are looking for a score evaluation, I would be happy to judge it, fill out an official score sheet with all of the breakdown of score and feedback, then i can mail or email back.
Anyone interested just PM me.
I am also available to Judge your beer. Unfortunately My judging equipment is broken, so you would have to at least send a 12 pack of your best beer so I can pass it around to my friends and see how they like it. The beers that usually score the highest are the ones that send a full case, Ha ha.
Yeah, hitting style guidelines is what I was talking about when I said I might have lost a few points on my lager by using the steam beer yeast. The yeast may have given it a different flavor profile than if I had used a yeast more commonly used for standard American lager. The beer still tastes very good, but maybe not exactly to style. I have heard the steam beer yeast is supposed to play up the malt flavor and down play the hop contribution, and the comments from the judges were that it was a little too malty, not quite bitter enough. next time I'd add an extra 1/2 oz of bittering hops, if I'm going to send it to a comp.
Pages: 1
Search Home Brewing Knowledge Base
Custom Search
|