SOBA NHC 2010

This weekend the judging of the 2010 SOBA National Homebrew Competition takes place. I will be flying to Hamilton to help judge over 300 beers in two days. This is a pretty staggering task, at the pro brewing competitions I have judged at we would usually do 60-80 beers a day , even with three tables working independently we will have to be knocking off far more than that a day.
I always look forward to judging the NHC (even if I didn’t really want to this year as I wanted to enter!) as the range of beers on offer is always far more interesting than in pro comps. The overall standard might be lower but the standard rises each year. Several years ago the most common fault was bacterial infection with some absolutely intense infections still featuring in some judges nightmares, however more recently it has been the more subtle faults of the sort you find at commercial competition. The best beers are always absolutely fantastic and a tribute to the standard of homebrewing culture that is developing in this country.

Good luck to all who have entered and wish us judges luck in the task ahead!

BrewNZ Judging 2010 - part one

It’s the first day of beer judging for BrewNZ. Judges from around the world and NZ have assembled in the grandiose surroundings of the Edwardian/Art Deco masterpiece that was once Wellington’s Museum. There are many familiar faces, Derek Walsh the passionate beer style specialist from the Netherlands, Swedish brewer Jessica Heidrich, Brad Rodgers from Stone and Wood, and the quietly considered Mark Goldman from Lion among others. There are some new faces to and new stewards. From the gloriously misnamed Tea Garden I can look out south to the hills behind my family home where I first drank beer as a teen, I can also look to the hills that my house and home brewery is nestled between and I reflect on how far things have come. The stewards are mostly new, nervous and hesitant, they are put through their paces as we warm up our palates with doctored sensory samples, V.D.K, D.M.S , Amyl Acetate, they sound like prescriptions to the uninitiated. And then it’s on, the first beer of 460. The job has begun.

Always the Bridesmaid never the Bride...

It’s early July and Greig from SOBA contacts me asking if I would be interested in judging the National Homebrew comp. I have been looking forward to the competition being held in Hamilton this year as I was sure this would mean that unlike the past two years I would be excused from the judging table and able to enter my own beers. I have been brewing away furiously and unusually I have been going through the rigours of bottling so that I have beers to enter. I say ‘put me on the back up list I want to compete.’ A month later and the ominous email comes , a judge has stepped down and I’m off the bench. Always the bridesmaid and never the bride...at least I will be able to check out the two beer bars of Hamilton.