Best of Brew NZ and Beervana

[Steph]

Thought I'd start a thread to give some "mad props" to my favs from Brew NZ and Beervana. Here goes:
- The great guys from stewarding. It was much harder work than I thought but I had a great time hanging out with Martin, Stu, Craig, Chris and the gang.
- Smelling how good one particular beer was in the pouring judge, looking up its number and then finding out it was Armegeddon and realising how privileged we all are.
- Being privileged enough to score some fantastic beer, including an awarding winning and delicious His Majestys in the bottle and being given one by the Yeastie Boys in the rigger.
- Meeting some of the awesome judges. Dave Logsdon was just fantastic and it was great chatting with Shane (from Steam) and Richard from Wig and Pen (among others).
- Hanging out with the guys from Renaissance Brewery. Brian is a legend for buying me coffee on the Saturday morning session of Beervana. Along with Andy and Soren that lot are the nicest brewers around.
- Meeting all the volunteers, including all you lot from RealBeer. There were some super cool people who let me boss them round a fair bit and didn't seem to mind too much.
- Laughing when Daniel from the beerstore introduced himself and said "you seem to drink a lot". And, explaining to lots of poeple that that is how I managed to get involved with BrewNZ and Beervana!!
-Almost forgot....Awarding best shirt to Matt from Harringtons for two awesome shirts on mash-in and at the awards. Big ups to Stu's shirt and pant combo and Paul Mecurio's hilarious beer shirt at Beervana.

Phew, and sure I've missed a bit out....Like the beer. I'll have to get back to it.

[Reviled]

Speaking from a home brewers perspective here, but im sure it goes for both home and commercial comps...

Totally see what youre saying re styles Luke, personally that was the hardest part for me when I entered the Soba NHC, what do I enter my beer under??? It took alot of thinking, and drinking ;o) For me to figure it out, and if I entered it under a different style, would I still have got a silver medal?

[Steve Nally]

I disagree, in my years as tray a carrier, beers were judged against each other.

[Father]

All interesting contributions on the Beer Awards - the more discussion we have the better. After entering beer awards for 15 years from the World Beer Cup, AIBA, BrewNZ, Nelson Beer Awards whether it was for Limburg, Roosters or Emersons you never never stop learning how to select a category that matches any beer you brew. Sometimes your pallete lies and sometimes your heart gets in the way and the beer gets entered where it shouldnt - but one thing I learnt its always my fault not the judges. In fact many times I have had judging notes back saying - great beer but wrong category - excellent - so maybe my porter wasnt a robust porter..... maybe it is more a brown porter....

Luke you'll remember us spending hours going over judging notes with Dave Logsdon and analysing why we didnt get a medal - tasting those beers that did score medals side by side with ours..... it was hard work but someone had to do it. I'll never forget the day we tasted Bridgeport IPA, Hopsmacker was inspired by that beer ! Wow it was stunning. Hopsmacker was brewed with 100% NZ Saaz - truly a kiwi version of an American style - buts thats the point - learn from every result as a brewer and make decisions about where you want to take the recipe - if you are happy with the beer as it is - cool. If you are inspired to take it up a notch like my experiences then all power to you too. Look where its taken Luke - brewing a NZ American IPA in England for gawds sakes.

Each year Geoff Griggs got a selection of my beers 6 months out from any competition and each time I learnt from Geoffs comments. In addition I drained every bit of knowledge Dave Logsdon had and used it wherever I could (ahem I am still doing this - thats why Dave has become a great friend.....we saw so much of each other in the early days !) The picture I am trying to get across is that I used competitions to improve my knowledge of beer, brewing and in the end the beer won out. Geoff being local is still there to assist with beer assessment - he'll even advise on category placement - he's brilliant and impartial and I cant thank him enough for his help over the years. I implore you to utilise his knowledge whenever you can - and pay the bugger too - it will pay back tenfold. Josh - he's local and no doubt you've utilised him already but there might be others out there who might benefit?

And dont forget you can make the best beer in NZ/the world and still go out of business - I experienced that - so maybe competitions arent all they are cracked up to be after all !? But maybe we should use them as another measure of our brewing businesses rather than the only measure?

I am passionate about good beer and the NZ beer scene, there are so many ways of expressing that passion - from the awesome unique styles that Moa brew that might not be easily classified styles through to Lukes non American American Armageddon I2PA, through to Carls non German German Hefeweizen.

Whilst I didnt make it up to Welly I have ordered a case of Armageddon IPA and a case of Tuatara Hefe for the weekend. Josh I tried seeking out your Moa Dark Reserve but to no avail (where can I get it?) - I'll have to be satisfied with Carls and Luke's efforts. Can't wait - damn good research I say.

Back to the mash runoff before I get pinged for wasting my employers time.....

Chris

[nzbrewer]

Nice post Chris. And some great points.

We need more discussion, the industry needs to set the direction. The guild isn't there to make decisions for you. They are there to represent the industry, they are there to do the things we want to achieve as an industry, we need to collectively discuss and decide what direction we want things to go. If we aren't happy about the awards process then we need a discussion to work out what needs to change.

I have said for years to many brewers that get upset about not winning awards the feedback you get is an opportunity to improve, if there are technical faults. Or to fine tune your category selection. Or to just get recognition that what the judges are experiencing is exactly what you intended.

Last year the feedback I got from the judges on Epic Lager was too much hop aroma and too much hop flavour. Which was the best I could do as there was no category for my hybrid style beer. The feedback I got showed exactly the beer I was making and that was what I was happy with. So I posted the tasting notes on my blog, to let people know it got no medal because it was too hoppy. http://epicbeer.com/blog/2008_09_01_archive.html

Cheers Chris. Look forward to catching up for a beer someday.

[666 Brewing]

Well done Chris, for the post and writing it while supervising a run-off!

Could there be a 'weighted' system where more emphasis is put on 'quality' and less on 'style'? No questions on how it would work, ive only just thought of it!

[josh scott]

"great beer but wrong category"

This is my point. These are old guidelines, old rules, that get tinkered with, lets get something new and relevent.
When I see the above comment, it frustrates me further.

We don't want to be pinned down copying old world styles but celebrate and push our unique differences (from our malt, hops and water). Not chnage our beers to fit catergorys

Yes medals certainly don't garenntee a winning formulare but they go a very long way in helping sales, esp in Supermarkets?Traditional liqour where most of New Zealands craft is sold

I agree with 666, why not a comp weighted on quality rather than style.

[Steph]

Totally agree that terrior can effect hops etc, one of the key things that makes NZ hops so different I suppose. My feeling was, though, that there are tonnes of categories and that lots of bers were judge in the wrong ones.

[Soren]

I agree with most of what have been said here, both sides of the story: I think the main purpose of BrewNZ is to promote the New Zealand beer industry (read craft beer) and as such it sends a wrong message to the public when so many international breweries are awarded medals over the kiwis. On the other hand I think it's important to keep the level of competition high and therefore keep the international breweries in the loop, and we dont want some inflated competition were medals are being awarded to every one who enters...

Another thing that puzzles me is some of the trophy classes, the European Ales for example. Without having the numbers I am guessing that this category recieved by far the most entries and yet only one trophy... It doesn't make sense to me that Belgians are judged in the same category as English, german, scottish and Irish ales. When one of the goals is to educate the public on diversity in beer styles I think this category should be split up in at least 3 separate trophies.

The NZ, US and international ales is, as far as I'm aware, just a modification of the american "US and international ales" category where NZ beers (read hops) have been included. I think for the purpose of a NZ competition it would be appropriate to split this up into a completly separate "NZ ales" category.

Even though the individual beers are not judged against each other and therefore can receive medal no matter the international competition, it looks bad that so many international beers beat the kiwis (with exceptions obv), it sends the message that NZ beers are substandard. which may or may not be true but unless we promote the local industry we will never get the chance to make it better.....

Phew... back to work...

[Sam Possenniskie (TGM)]

Apart from the obvious memories from last week, I thought I'd add some other more quirky ones...

1. At the start of the Friday night session, the guy who came in complaining that he had to pay for his beer on top of the $27 ticket. Told him to forget about that, have fun, and come back and let me know whether he had enjoyed the night. Served him a couple of times and he certainly looked like he was having a good time. He came back and all he had to say about his night was "awesome". So great to see that people are learning that "enjoying beer" does not require "cheap beer".

2. Also on Friday night, the buy I served who when I asked him for the $4 he just turned his back and walked off. It was really busy at the time and couldn't chase him. Spent the next 30 minutes cursing him. But then 10 minutes later he returned profusely apologising that he realised he had forgotten to pay. Just confirmed to me that beer people and the best people.

3. At the end of the Saturday night, a guy rushed up wanting to buy a glass of His Majesty. I had to inform him that the second keg had just gone and he was out of luck. He said that it was the talk of the urinal and he had speed out to get some. You can't get a bigger compliment than for your beer to have made it to the urinals...

Plenty more good memories. Hard work for someone who spends most of their time behind a desk during the day, but you can't beat the experience of seeing so many people enjoying great NZ beer. I just wish I had more time to taste some of it myself!

Looking forward to next year already.
Yeastie Sam

[Greig McGill]

You did a great job Sam. Looking cheery all day! I'll second the "talk of the urinal" call. It was on Saturday afternoon also.

[Father]

In my extremely long post resided a very important question Josh regarding Moa Dark Reserve "Where do I get it?"

Lets get this straight medals are not I repeat not awarded to beers 'over' other beers. This type of comment demonstrates a lack of knowledge of beer judging to a great extent - apologies to that individual - its not a personal criticism but something I know many others have a similar view on. The way BrewNZ is setup is a beer is awarded a medal if it is deemed to have met bronze, silver, gold standard in that category. In fact they shouldnt be called medals they should be called 'Standards'. This might help the confusion with the public thinking gold silver bronze is equiv to 1st 2nd and 3rd. So if the judges are doing their jobs properly (and this is where mediation from the chief judge and senior judges comes in) any beer achieving that standard gets a medal - no beer is bumped out because one was be better than the other. One time this might happen is if there is a borderline case and the judges use the flight of beers in front of them to assist their decision making. And yes a border line beer might drop out if a beer that was only marginally bronze medal standard helped make the decision. The only other time that happens is at trophy selection time - and boy oh boy is that tough for the judging panel. Imagine having to decide between a gold medal I2PA and a gold medal American Pale Ale for the trophy! I have seen discussion go on for a long time at the judges table over something like this.

How can we make 'the local industry better' if we dont judge ourselves against some form of standard or international competition? Oh hang on there's an idea - we could have a NZ only olympics or maybe tell all of our musicians/comedians that because their local kiwi music/comedy is not like overseas music/comedy that there's no point in being judged against international acts. If we hadnt gone out there and compared ourselves with international beers and standards with OUR beer industry/awards we'd still be drinking NZ Draught. If craft brewers hadnt set themselves up against a german hefeweizen how would we ever get fresh examples like Tuatara hefe tasting as good as it does ? Or
Armageddon blowing the yanks away. Luke the challenge now is to make an all kiwi Armageddon!

I think the answer lies in the way the beers are judged against international standards. Allowance for local hops has now been made in many categories and its up to the judges discretion as to whether the beer has been brewed to a good standard or not.

One final thing - the best way to appreciate how the judging and awards work is to volunteer your services as a steward or trainee judge. Ask Steve Nally what happened after he did this. He was at his wits end vowing never to enter any more beers in BrewNZ - he stewarded one year, talked to judges, listened and came back the following year with a trophy for his Pitch Black - that beer went from zero to hero - same category, just improved stout! and man what a beer it was that year and still is. I swear he was going to hug every judge he could get his greasy mutton bird fingers on when the trophy was announced. He's never looked back. Its as much about the brewer edcuating himself more than anything. Steve, can you offer anything to this?

Chris

[666 Brewing]

Brewing a better beer (ie to 'standard') is different than brewing a better beer (ie to 'style') they are two different things. Personally (and shoot me down if you like im used to it!)..I dont drink a beer because its a good IPA (for instance), I drink a beer because I like it and its good quality, it just may happen to be a good IPA. I brew beer the same way and dont win 'trophies' because of that...