SOBA National Homebrew Competition 2012 - Official Thread

[Greig McGill]

I like writing "official thread". It makes me feel like I can now sue people wanting to use those words in combination a la Rugby World Cup or London Olympics! But no, we at SOBA don't really do evil too well. We do beer though, which brings me to:

 

After a lot of mucking about on my part (for which I humbly apologise) and the fact that most of you already know anyway, I'm officially announcing the SOBA NHC 2012. Head on over to the not-quite-done-yet-but-pretty-sexy website where you can log in using your SOBA login (if you're a member - that's the one you use at http://www.soba.org.nz/member/) or you can use facebook, twitter, or google+ to login. This competition is all cutting edge and social media, and other buzzwords!

One exciting thing about this year's competition is that we have no awards ceremony planned. They are always very regional, and Murphy's Law always dictates that they are as far away as possible from whoever took out Champion Brewer. Instead, we hope to offer value to our sponsors and remove stress from you, our competitors, by announcing the results live to the various social media platforms as they come in! Obviously the "big" winners will still have to wait until everything is tallied up, but medals will be announced as they are judged.

Another change (not yet on the website as we're still working on the points algorithm) is that points will be deducted from non-medal-winning beers. This won't matter to those not competing for the coveted Champion Brewer title, but to those who are, it will mean that entering twenty beers is only a good idea if you're sure they are nearly all of medal winning standard. We think this is a lot more fair to those who enter three beers, and all get gold, versus someone who enters ten beer, gets three silvers, two bronzes, and five drain-pours! ;) Good brewers, nay CHAMPION brewers are consistent brewers, and we want to reward that consistency this year.

A last point is that we've raised the entry fee. I know, I can hear the groaning! To get the top judges we need, we have to be prepared to get them to the competition. Flights ain't cheap, but we thought you'd all prefer judges who really know their beer, and we need to fund that. The good news is that if you are a SOBA member, even if you only join to enter this competition, you'll get a good chunky discount on your entry fee.

Right, that's all from me for now. Remember, you can enter your beers as soon as you like on the website, but official entries open October 13th. We can't accept delivery of beer prior to that date, so if any turns up before then, we'll just drink it! So, feel free to enter now, but don't send any bottles until the 13th!

Cheers,

Greig McGill

Organiser

SOBA NHC 2012

[Kelly Milligan]

Really interested in hearing what the verdict is on these too ;) Cheers for organizing Greig! legend

[Greig McGill]

Phil (doing the webby side of things) has the list and we're doing the NZ style variations. Suffice to say if you have a style which requires US hop character, there will be an NZ variant of it. You may wish to hold off entering until these are live. Phil will also be moving the style guide to the main / unauthenticated part of the site.

[Greig McGill]

Right, as promised, the NZ style variants are now live: http://nhc.soba.org.nz/styles

[Kelly Milligan]

Sick! Cheers Greig

[JumpR]

A newbie question regarding style classification..  If a style calls for a base malt like pale ale, is the origin of the base malt critical?  e.g. NZ IPA and US IPA are quite similar, but don't specify the origin of the malt.  I can't seem to find an answer via google, so any help would be appreictaed.  Thanks! 

[Kelly Milligan]

Hey JumpR, I don't believe the origin of the base malt is a critical part of a recipe, more the flavour profile it gives the beer. E.g. Maris Otter's flavour profile would probably be a little out of place in a west coast style IPA since the base malt of choice for those is pretty bland American 2-row. 

[JumpR]

Cheers.  Along the lines of what I was thinking, but wasn't quite sure.

[Greig McGill]

And yet... it's been done! ;) The best way is to drink your beer (with friends with good palates) and compare what you taste against the style guide before entering it. If it matches, that's what it is, whether it's brewed with out-of-the-ordinary ingredients, is out of spec, or whatever. It's all about how it TASTES. The judges don't know how you brewed it, what the abv is, what's in it, etc. Only what it tastes like.

[Tilt]

I just wanted to add my congrats and thanks to Greig and the NHC 2012 organisers. 

Mate, what a tricked up website and entry system!

I was mighty impressed as I packed up my entries, logged them and paid in the space of half an hour all due to the schmick new setup

There's a whole level of professionalism that sets the scene for the comp to come and ramps this SOBA event up as the one to be in!  Cheers fellas - let the games begin!

[Greig McGill]

I can't take much if any credit for that. Most of it goes to my business partner in Brewaucracy, and downright Good Cunt, Phil Murray. He's worked really hard on the site and it is pretty awesome. For those interested, entries only officially opened yesterday and already we have over 100 entries! It's gonna be a biggie! Get amongst it.

[Fairlane]

don't know if it's just me or what but I can't even read this site today.

 

it looks like this....

 

[Greig McGill]

Looks like a cache issue. Phil put up the sponsor logos and added a blog. Do a shift-reload in your browser so it fetches cleanly again. I can confirm it's fine for me (tested on Firefox, Chrome, IE, Safari), Windows, Linux, and iOS via iPad. No mac, sorry.