Parkway Pro-Am

Great results from the Parkway Pro-Am competition with golds for Halley's Comet and Meatsitck Smoked Porter, plus Meatstick was picked as one of the "Best to Brew" beers.  So a bigger batch will be brewed at the Station U-Brew in the next few months and it will be on draft at one of the Parkway Tavern Pro-Am events on either June 27th or October 24th!!  

I want to thank everyone who participated in the 2012 Parkway Am-Pro Homebrew Competition.  I want to send a special thanks out to the Parkway and it's staff for helping us put on this great event.  I also want to thank all the judges who came down on Sunday and helped judge the 75 entries. Your time and expertise is much appreciated.

And now for the results...

Light Beer Category

• Gold - Ben Bottoms for Halley's Comet
  
• Silver - Casey Williams for Cream of the Hop
• Silver - Ryan Meyer for Boo Juice

English Ales Category

• Gold - Mike White for Mudd Puddle Ale
• Silver - Heather Erickson for Irish I Was
• Bronze - KC Graham for Boyd's Imperial Wee Heavy

American Ales Category

• Gold - Jiri Zatloukal for Populuxe Pale
• Silver - Johnathan Sherwin for Cutthroat Amber
• Bronze - Adam Sannes for House Pale

Porters and Stouts Category

• Gold - Ben Bottoms for Meatstick
• Silver - Aaron Johnson for Tall Order Porter
• Bronze - Scott Sannes for Chocolate Milk Stout

IPA Category

• Gold - Chad Wallin for Feral Dog Brewery-IPA
• Silver - Bryan Copeland for Moving Day IPA
• Bronze - Brian Tetreault and Ben Satterthwaite for Bloody Fingers IPA

Belgian Category

• Gold - Brian Tetreault and Ben Satterthwaite for Belgian Dark Strong
• Silver - Mike Braaten for 11 Belgian Stout
• Bronze - Jim Witwer for Down on the Farm
• Bronze - Matt Burns for Saelens Belgian Ale

Strong Ales Category

• Gold - Bryan Kramer for First Attempt
• Silver - Matt Lacroix for 28th Strong
• Bronze - Ryan Shdo for Bona Nox

Specialty Category

• Gold - Tim Kordik for Northwest Backwoods Brown Ale
• Silver - Tim Kordik for Rainy Days Rye CDA
• Bronze - Travis Nye for Sorta Sumpin

Results for the Best to Brew Beers

• Howard Hawley's Habanero Alt Amber
• Tim Kordik's Rainy Days Rye CDA
• Travis Nye's Sorta Sumpin' American Wheat IPA
• Brian & Ben's Belgian Dark Strong
• Mike Braaten's 11 Belgian Stout
• Jim Witwer's Down on the Farm Saison
• Brian & Ben's Bloody Fingers IPA
• Ben Bottoms’ Meatstick Porter
  
• Bryan Copeland's Tumble Down Brown
• Jiri Zatloukal's Populuxe Pale Ale
• KC Graham's Boyd's Imperial Wee Heavy
• Ryan Meyer's Boo Juice Blond

Congratulations to Everybody who won.  For the Best to Brew winners I will be sending out information later this week on how to get your beer brewed. The awards ceremonies will take place on June 27th for the beers styles that take less time to finish and October 24th for the big beer styles.

A little Saison tasting :)

Got together with some friends for the long-awaited and much discussed Saison blowout tasting.  Lots of tasty interpretations of the best beer style on earth.  Standouts for me were the Saison Dupont Dry-Hopping, Hill Farmstead Anna & Florence, Au Baron Cuvée des Jonquilles and Fantôme Saison of course!!

Here's a mostly complete list:

• Au Baron Cuvée des Jonquilles
• Southampton Saison Faucille
• Fantôme Hiver (Winter) – 2008
• Boulevard Saison with Brett – Batch 1
• Blaugies Bière Darbyste
• The Commons Oat Saison
• Fantôme Saison – 2008
• Saison Dupont Dry Hopping (magnum)
• Saison Dupont
• Logsdon Seizoen
• Logsdon Seizoen Bretta
• Fantôme Chocolat
• Fantôme Brise-BonBons!
• Hill Farmstead Anna
• Hill Farmstead Flora
• Hill Farmstead Florence 
• Blaugies La Moneuse
• Fantôme La Dalmatienne
• Pelican Saison du Pelican
• Upright Flora Rustica
• Lebbe l’Amalthée
• Saison de Pipaix
• Géants Saison Voisin
• Southampton Cuvee des Fleurs
• Fantôme BBB Dark White

Batch #50 - MamaLou's in Shantytown

MamaLou's in Shantytown

Brewed - April 13, 2012

Style - Shantytown-style Czech Lager

Ingredients:

• 16.0 lbs. Pilsner
• 2.0 lbs.Vienna
• 1.0 lbs. CaraPils/Dextrine
• 0.75 lbs.Munich

• 2.00 oz. Perle (60)
• 2.00 oz. Saaz (15)
• 1.00 oz. Saaz (0)

• Wyeast #2001 Pilsner Urquell (800 ml starter / 2 packs)
• Wyeast #2278 Czech Pilsner (800 ml starter / 2 packs)

OG – 1.054
Primary – 48 days
Secondary - ?? days

Kegged - ??

Wyeast #2001 - Pilsner Urquell:
FG - 1.009 
Attenuation - 83.3%
ABV - 5.9%

Wyeast #2278 - Czech:
FG - 1.009
Attenuation - 83.3%
ABV - 5.9%

Notes:

• Batch #50!!!!!!!!!!!
• Hooverville - Seattle's Shantytown roots in SODO
• Trying out two different lager yeasts again
• Mash at 150° and 60 min boil
• Pitched at 55° and started fermentation temp at 43° in my chest freezer
• Planning on dry-hopping one keg with some Saaz

Batch #49 - Finders Keepers Biere de Garde

Finders Keepers

Brewed - April 13, 2012

Style - Biere de Garde (Beer for Keeping)

Ingredients:

• 20.0 lbs. Pilsner
• 4.0 lbs. Munich
• 1.3 lbs. Special Aromatic
• 1.0 lbs. CaraVienna
• 0.35 lbs.Amber/Biscuit
• 0.08 lbs.Black Barley

• 1.20 oz. Perle (60)
• 1.00 oz. Saaz (15)
• 1.00 oz. Saaz (5)

• Wyeast #2565 Kolsch (1200 ml starter / 3 packs)

OG – 1.068
Primary – 22 days
Secondary - ?? days

Kegged - ??

FG - 1.012 
Attenuation - 82.4%
ABV - 7.3%

Notes:

• RIP Merl
• Biere de Garde is a style I've long wanted to take a stab at
• Mash at 148° for 75 mins and 60 min boil
• Pitched at 55° and started fermentation temp at 62° 
• Starters was almost too big with the added liquid yeast and very active
• After fermentation, lagering for a few months in the mid 30's

Puget Sound Pro-Am Results - Squashed :)

GABF Pro-Am Qualifying Selections

Elliott Bay Brewing Company – Matt Smith's Cascadian Brown Ale, American Brown Ale

Elliott Bay Brewing Company – Keith Bradley's RIP Stout, Russian Imperial Stout – 2013 GABF Selection

Elysian Brewing Company – Ben Bottoms' Squashes Me with Fear, Spice, Herb, Smoked Squash Brown Ale

Harmon Brewing Company – Jim Dunlap's Imperial India Rye Ale

Naked City Brewing Company – Mike Ritzer's Thorny Gose, Blackberry Gose

Silver City Brewery - Jonathan Permen's Denise's Kolsch

So the Smoked Squash strikes again!! And really it shouldn't be much of a surprise that if any brewer was going to choose it, Elysian would be the one.  They've been brewing a wide variety of pumpkin beers for years and put on the annual Great Pumpkin Beer Festival, which has become the premier pumpkin festival featuring creative beers from around the country.  

Details yet to be figured out, but Brandon and I will get to brew a scaled up recipe at one of the Elysian locations.  It will be on draft a few times around town at local Pro-Am events and then submitted to the Great American Beer Festival in Denver in October as part of the National Pro-Am Competition.  Woot!!!

And three cheers for Colin and his impressive 3rd place finish in the Bert Grant Competition!!

Complete Results:
http://www.wahomebrewers.org/competitions/388-2012-joint-cascade-brewers-cup-and-puget-sound-pro-am

Yard City Cask Festival

Last Saturday was the annual Yard City Cask Festival put on by the West Sound Brewers over in Bremerton.  The morning started with a nice ferry ride across the sound and a yummy breakfast at the Hi-Lo 15th Street Cafe where one table is located in an old VW bus.  Sadly we did not get to sit in that table :(

The Cask Fest featured nine cask conditioned beers and were all under 5% ABV.  My beer engine box worked great though I was a little jealous of the three-headed monster and the one decorated with lights.  My beer turned out pretty good especially with the less than 2 week turnaround and it had a great centennial hop aroma from the dry hops.

The whole Wayward crew was in attendance with a beer each and Jerome had made some Wayward buttons and some great banners too with the logo.  Overall a great day of drinking a unique and varied collection of session beers and meeting some new brewers.  Big thanks to Matt and the West Sound crew for being such great hosts.  I look forward to next year!!

Credit to Russ for the last four photos.   

Homemade Beer Engine

Homemade Beer Engine

I built a simple Beer Engine last week so I could dispense beer at the Yard City Cask Festival.  I followed the basic procedure from Brew Your Own and it's essentially an 8" x 8" box made of plywood with a hole in the top for the RV rocket pump and tubing connecting to your keg.  At the last minute I ended up making the sprayer and I think it made a big difference.  The "cask conditioned" beer has a low level of natural carbonation and the sprayer helped aerate the beer a bit and form a nice head, which was good for my IPA aromas.  Pics of the actual festival to follow soon!!