Beerfest 2011 - Presented By The Melbourne Brewers

[brendo]

Quite a few beers I'm considering entering although some I may reconsider and some may not be ready.

All could be a bit outside style too - my ESB/IPA* is too strong for an esb and possibly slightly too dark for an IPA. Have another esb finishing off so might be ready in time. My saison was accidentally brewed with Marris Otter (nice result) instead of dingeman's pilsner so has that characteristic british ale feel despite being mashed at 63 and despite hitting 1002.

I also may have a specialty beer ready - cherry ripe porter. Would this go in spec/fruit or spec/other?

*Apologies to Terry Foster but what can I do?

Sorry Manticle - VicBrew is still the only competition to have a specialty category at this stage. We considered adding it to Beerfest this year, but logistically it wasn't going to be possible.

Both beers sound awesome though...

 

[rich_lamb]

Hmmm, long time since I've posted on AHB!

Some good clarification there Brendo, and I might just add a couple of things from my experience judging and watching other judges.

During the first minutes of judging a beer while the other judges are hopefully silent (it's good to see Mark Hibberd has started expicitly giving this instruction to judges) you will get a few things coming to mind about the beer. DON'T BE AFRAID TO WRITE THEM DOWN!
Lots of judges will hesitate about writing their own thoughts as they are afraid they will look silly if the other judges don't agree, but the fact is you can't be wrong in judging beer so just write it down. It's quite often the case that one judge will pick out one fact about a beer the others miss, and everything is potentially helpful to the brewer.

Don't be lazy - I've seen judges who are happy to talk about what they smelled or tasted but don't write it down. You don't have to write a thesis; even a few words is enough. I find the pen doesn't always do what I want after a while, so my writing gets a bit crap but I'm still putting down everything I thought.

As to the distribution of judges, we always try to make sure there's no more than one novice judge out of three. Last year we had enough judges to rotate the longer flights and have the novice as a fourth judge. This all depends on how many people volunteer their precious time for free to do all this work of course...

 

[Siborg]

WOW!

...should be an interesting meeting next month!

 

[Andyd]

During the first minutes of judging a beer while the other judges are hopefully silent (it's good to see Mark Hibberd has started expicitly giving this instruction to judges) you will get a few things coming to mind about the beer. DON'T BE AFRAID TO WRITE THEM DOWN!

Nicely picked Bitter! I am a really big believer in writing down a "stream of conciousness" with everything you're experiencing, when you experience it. I don't think you should necessarily be locked into stepping through the typical "aroma, appearance..." phases either.

This is something I've built into my "repertoire" when running BJCP study sessions ... it was really well received. Feel free to use it (Siborg - we'll talk more about this)...

Run a session of commercial beer tastings toward the end of the series - say 8 beers, all quite different. Then using the BJCP scoresheet have the judges follow the following protocol:

1) Present the beer. Do not name the style, Do not say anything about it. Just present the beer and have them spend 5 minutes writing everything they experience.

2) Come back 5 minutes later, and give them the style to which they should judge the beer. It doesn't need to be the correct style, in fact it can be helpful to make it an "out of style" example.

3) After another 5 minutes they stop writing, and you reveal the beer's true nature and briefly discuss how the evaluation of that beer went for everyone.

Makes for a long session, but really gets people to stop working with preconceptions of what the beer should be before they even see of smell it. Instead the scoresheet should end up as a record of what was experienced, and then a commentary of those experiences balanced against the style in which it was presented, resulting in its final score.

One of (hopefully) many Gems that will find its way into the BJA website in due course...

Andy

 

[Siborg]

Nicely picked Bitter! I am a really big believer in writing down a "stream of conciousness" with everything you're experiencing, when you experience it. I don't think you should necessarily be locked into stepping through the typical "aroma, appearance..." phases either.

This is something I've built into my "repertoire" when running BJCP study sessions ... it was really well received. Feel free to use it (Siborg - we'll talk more about this)...

Run a session of commercial beer tastings toward the end of the series - say 8 beers, all quite different. Then using the BJCP scoresheet have the judges follow the following protocol:

1) Present the beer. Do not name the style, Do not say anything about it. Just present the beer and have them spend 5 minutes writing everything they experience.

2) Come back 5 minutes later, and give them the style to which they should judge the beer. It doesn't need to be the correct style, in fact it can be helpful to make it an "out of style" example.

3) After another 5 minutes they stop writing, and you reveal the beer's true nature and briefly discuss how the evaluation of that beer went for everyone.

Makes for a long session, but really gets people to stop working with preconceptions of what the beer should be before they even see of smell it. Instead the scoresheet should end up as a record of what was experienced, and then a commentary of those experiences balanced against the style in which it was presented, resulting in its final score.

One of (hopefully) many Gems that will find its way into the BJA website in due course...

Andy

Thanks Andy. Will have to pay close attention to this (any other pointers welcome too) as I'll be judging my first flight at Beerfest. Haysie, I'll try my best to give you (edit: and all entrants) some useful feedback, mate.

 

[brett mccluskey]

Nicely picked Bitter! I am a really big believer in writing down a "stream of conciousness" with everything you're experiencing, when you experience it. I don't think you should necessarily be locked into stepping through the typical "aroma, appearance..." phases either.

This is something I've built into my "repertoire" when running BJCP study sessions ... it was really well received. Feel free to use it (Siborg - we'll talk more about this)...

Run a session of commercial beer tastings toward the end of the series - say 8 beers, all quite different. Then using the BJCP scoresheet have the judges follow the following protocol:

1) Present the beer. Do not name the style, Do not say anything about it. Just present the beer and have them spend 5 minutes writing everything they experience.

2) Come back 5 minutes later, and give them the style to which they should judge the beer. It doesn't need to be the correct style, in fact it can be helpful to make it an "out of style" example.

3) After another 5 minutes they stop writing, and you reveal the beer's true nature and briefly discuss how the evaluation of that beer went for everyone.

Makes for a long session, but really gets people to stop working with preconceptions of what the beer should be before they even see of smell it. Instead the scoresheet should end up as a record of what was experienced, and then a commentary of those experiences balanced against the style in which it was presented, resulting in its final score.

One of (hopefully) many Gems that will find its way into the BJA website in due course...

Andy

Top stuff Andy One suggestion i'd like to make is for the occasional"ringer" to be put in a catagory.A commercial beer ,of that style,served as if it was an entry.Just to keep the judges on their toes

 

[brendo]

Top stuff Andy One suggestion i'd like to make is for the occasional"ringer" to be put in a catagory.A commercial beer ,of that style,served as if it was an entry.Just to keep the judges on their toes

Not sure a ringer is necessarily great - doesn't prove a lot to me as commercial beer (like Homebrew) can be a variable beast given improper handling - even if it is an exemplar taken from the guidelines it might quite correctly score poorly.

However, along those lines... one thing I found quite helpful at both VicBrew and Nationals was the idea of a warm up/calibration beer. Was great for getting the brain primed for evaluation, without it being a competition beer - good to get the first one out of the way without any pressure. Of course saying this - at VicBrew I was provided with a delightful Bud

 

[mxd]

for me the big issue as a noob judge was not being able to get another jug of your bock

But on that I am a noob when it comes to judging, I try to put words down but sometimes I can just say there is something not quite right. I was fortunate enough to judge with CM2 and haysie, so hopefully they could articulate any issues.

Not sure a ringer is necessarily great - doesn't prove a lot to me as commercial beer (like Homebrew) can be a variable beast given improper handling - even if it is an exemplar taken from the guidelines it might quite correctly score poorly.

However, along those lines... one thing I found quite helpful at both VicBrew and Nationals was the idea of a warm up/calibration beer. Was great for getting the brain primed for evaluation, without it being a competition beer - good to get the first one out of the way without any pressure. Of course saying this - at VicBrew I was provided with a delightful Bud

 

[brett mccluskey]

Not sure a ringer is necessarily great - doesn't prove a lot to me as commercial beer (like Homebrew) can be a variable beast given improper handling - even if it is an exemplar taken from the guidelines it might quite correctly score poorly.

However, along those lines... one thing I found quite helpful at both VicBrew and Nationals was the idea of a warm up/calibration beer. Was great for getting the brain primed for evaluation, without it being a competition beer - good to get the first one out of the way without any pressure. Of course saying this - at VicBrew I was provided with a delightful Bud
[/quoteUpon further thought ,very true The calibration beer was a great idea,At least the bud wasn't a "lite" :lol:

 

[haysie]

Some great points have been made and I take them on board. Some examples of my tick n circle sheets would include what I thought to be experienced brewers who judge lots of events. I have stewarded tables for the same, as Fourstar pointed out, some may not have the vocab so maybe after the event organiser having a quick browse of the sheets would be easy to see no ink, when the judging director organise`s his panel/s next time, he would be aware of this.
Being a good brewer doesnt make a good judge I know, but for instance if I wasnt happy with a poor judging sheet/sheets received I dont have any comeback at all, my money is dead and buried. Not happy meaning non descriptive, no commentary, just ticks n circles. I cant asked for it to be judged again. I can demand my money back from the event organisers, under sufferance they may pay up.
It maybe pissing in the ocean for a few, but to others, the words farce,unorganised can come to mind and really deter people from an event or in my case entering further events. I wondered where all the judges were at Vicbrew? Did they drop off or were they Pies n Saints supporters. Huge shortage.

 

[Fourstar]

Did they drop off or were they Pies n Saints supporters. Huge shortage.

From what i was told, this was a big issue.

I think farce and unorganised is going a little too far. This is something thats out of the competition organisers hands. The best an orgnaiser cna do is not allow that judge to judge in any further completitions but where does that leave us? With the already short number of judges who actively put their hand up and those novice judges that are too scared to put their hand up (who would probabaly do an awesome job) we are left with the old problem of 2 judges per table. Which is no good in an ideal judging situation.

 

[haysie]

Maybe the yanks got it all wrong with the judging sheet in the first place
i dont want to be disagreeing but, farcical can hold true i.e amber lagers at Vicbrew2010, 2 judges, the most experienced is running late, the early beers were judged without the experience and received averages, then the experienced judge turned up and away it went.
Unorganised maybe too far but again I simply refer to allocating of judges, I dont think its rocket science for judges to judge a preferred category, instead of being told to judge a cat they may not be familiar with.

 

[brendo]

From what i was told, this was a big issue.

I think farce and unorganised is going a little too far. This is something thats out of the competition organisers hands. The best an orgnaiser cna do is not allow that judge to judge in any further completitions but where does that leave us? With the already short number of judges who actively put their hand up and those novice judges that are too scared to put their hand up (who would probabaly do an awesome job) we are left with the old problem of 2 judges per table. Which is no good in an ideal judging situation.

agreed - however rather say "You can't judge in future", I think we need a more educative approach to help improve a judges experience and bring them up to a more suitable level.

Perhaps by pointing out why it is important to provide an appropriate level of feedback might help the situation - as I said in my earlier post there really isn't much of a feedback loop for judges post an event. Hopefully the BJA may help to address this in the future... but ultimately feedback is critical.

One thing that struck me recently when I read the feedback on my BJCP exam was that generally, the examiner felt that my descriptive ability was really good, however one thing I consistantly failed to do in the exam was tell the brewer in my feedback whether some things were appropriate for that style. This is a critical piece of info and was something I was often missing out - and when I reflected on some of my past judging experience I realised that it had been a weakness of mine - so I have resolved to be more aware of it in the future.

Without that feedback though - I probably would have remained oblivious to it.

As I said in my earlier post - no simple answers. You can't sanction poor performing judges and preclude them from future involvement - numbers are too short already.

 

[brendo]

Maybe the yanks got it all wrong with the judging sheet in the first place

Interrestingly Haysie... our sheet actually has less things for a judge to tick and flick than the BJCP sanctioned sheet does.

I do think however that by having these available on the sheet it does lead to some laziness on the part of some judges. Primarily it is there to assist with vocab - perhaps a better way would be to not have them on the sheet, but provide the judges with a laminated sheet on the table that can be used as a preference - encouraging more writing.

Of course, this presents a problem in that more writing requires more time. At the end of the day, the descriptors on the sheets help to save some time, but they shouldn't be the sole mechanisim of feedback to the brewer.

 

[Fourstar]

agreed - however rather say "You can't judge in future", I think we need a more educative approach to help improve a judges experience and bring them up to a more suitable level.

Sorry, there was a bit of sarcasm with that statement which went unnoticed but i agree wholeheartedly with your response. Lazyness is the biggest issue and by them not even attmepting to write something down, it does nothing for expanding their vocabulary for future compeitions.

 

[haysie]

You guys, Brendo, Fourstar being the new up n coming judges. Whats your take on the "you cant judge if you have an entry".
Isnt this in itself a little antiquated. Judging a flight, you may have tasted that beer at the last meeting last week, in the last case swap, in the last grand final get together. I could pick at least 2 beers in my flight I had drunk in the last 2 weeks. I still judged and scored them how I tasted it, but what`s the difference if it was my beer? The spread of 7 would protect wouldnt it?

 

[brettprevans]

You guys, Brendo, Fourstar being the new up n coming judges. Whats your take on the "you cant judge if you have an entry".
Isnt this in itself a little antiquated. Judging a flight, you may have tasted that beer at the last meeting last week, in the last case swap, in the last grand final get together. I could pick at least 2 beers in my flight I had drunk in the last 2 weeks. I still judged and scored them how I tasted it, but what`s the difference if it was my beer? The spread of 7 would protect wouldnt it?

ill chime in if i may Haysie

I dont mind it as a guiding suggestion. I recon i could pick most of my own beers in a flight. hence why at vicbrew i didnt offer to judge any category that i entered in. but i agree that if your in a club, chances are youve tasted some of the beers your going to judge.

of course i cimpletely agree with it being a firm rule for specialty category. cause hell your going to know if that choc cheery, bird carcass, lemon and kaffir lime dry enzime new world lager with belgian yeast is your beer or not :lol: .

in a large flight like APA (like30 of the bastards) I dont think its so much of an issue.

 

[brendo]

You guys, Brendo, Fourstar being the new up n coming judges. Whats your take on the "you cant judge if you have an entry".
Isnt this in itself a little antiquated. Judging a flight, you may have tasted that beer at the last meeting last week, in the last case swap, in the last grand final get together. I could pick at least 2 beers in my flight I had drunk in the last 2 weeks. I still judged and scored them how I tasted it, but what`s the difference if it was my beer? The spread of 7 would protect wouldnt it?

I think that the biggest problem with it is not so much being able to pick out your beer and up the score accordingly - as you said the 7 point spread works as some insurance policy there, however the perception of bias (real or imagined) makes it too hairy a proposition for me.

I agree that if you are regularly exposed to an entrants beer prior to the event (via a club, at their place, etc) there is a chance you may pick it out of th eflight - particularly if it is quite good - but no system is perfect. Judging your own beer is a little problematic for me in comps though - raises too many questions about the validity of the process, yadda yadda.

As an interesting aside though, about two years ago I judged one of my own beers in a club night comp (not an official VicBrew sanctioned type) and absolutely caned it. Intersting what a bit of blind objectivity can bring to the party...

 

[haysie]

ill chime in if i may Haysie

I dont mind it as a guiding suggestion. I recon i could pick most of my own beers in a flight. hence why at vicbrew i didnt offer to judge any category that i entered in. but i agree that if your in a club, chances are youve tasted some of the beers your going to judge.

of course i cimpletely agree with it being a firm rule for specialty category. cause hell your going to know if that choc cheery, bird carcass, lemon and kaffir lime dry enzime new world lager with belgian yeast is your beer or not :lol: .

in a large flight like APA (like30 of the bastards) I dont think its so much of an issue.

Chime away CM2,
I agree the specialty being a no no, but other categories? sure you can pick your own beer or your mates etc etc, but the threshold of the 7 would protect you and others. The spreads afterall can be boggling at times. So, I would see no problem with an entrant judging any cat besides chicken carcass apricot guenze.

Just throwing it out there.

 

[brettprevans]

your probably both right. but its the perception. just say that you judged a cat with your own beer and it won. say the judges had a spread of only 3 points. you recon people are going to be suss and dirty. let alone if it won BOS.

i think its more to do with preception and removing most if not all potential for cheating/fudging/bias. I know i didnt specifically tell the other boys who were judging what beers i was entering, i and tried to make sure i didnt know what they were entering (mainly), until we found out which cats we were all judging

anyways back to the OP - im just pissed that ill be in sydney with work and miss out on this comp. otherwise id be there with the golf clubs and judging