The other Wednesday, for the second straight year, I competed in the Homebrewing Showcase at Little Havanas as a part of Baltimore Beer Week. I am sad to say that this was the only event that I visited during BBW 2011 but, I think, if you are going to go to just one event, this is not the worst you could do.
The event works like this: a bunch of homebrewers bring kegs (or bottles) of their beer to Little Havanas and anyone who is feeling adventurous comes and donates $5 to BARCS to try as many of the beers as they would like. Last year I entered two beers, a hoppy red and a coffee stout. Those beers placed last and third to last in voting. This year the event seemed to be a little bigger. There were more beers and more people there to taste them.
As you may know, I was planning on bringing a chai-flavored beer to this event but none of my trials went that well. Instead, I brewed the last beer I made that turned out good: the green pepper pale ale. Although I brewed and kegged on a procrastinators schedule, the beer turned out great. More importantly, people at the event seemed to really like it. Responses ranged from disbelief that you could but bell peppers in a beer to astonishment at the aroma and taste of the beer. As the night went on, more and more people came up to try the beer or tell me that they had heard good things about it or that they were planning on voting on it. A friend in the crowd even told me that she heard from Reagan of Jojo & Reagan (never heard of them) who was in attendance that night, that my beer was one of the most “buzzed about” beers of the evening. I was pleased by all of this and even more pleased when, at the end of the night, my beer won fourth place (out of 30 or so beers). As my prize I selected a $50 gift certificate to Maryland Homebrew.
I think I can say that I have learned a few things from my two years doing this competition. This is one of those things. In the crowd you have those who are into it, i.e. brewers, enthusiasts, or others who can more or less distinguish between well and poorly brewed classic styles of beer, those who are there to have a good time, i.e. people who like the event or trying new things or just happened to be at Little Havanas, and those who are in your pocket, i.e. the people who you invited who will most likely vote for your beer no mater how bad it tastes. To have the best chance of winning you need to brew something that will impress the most people. I found that the second group contains the largest number of people, followed by the first group and (unless you are very popular) then the third group. In this type of competition you should try to impress those groups in that order. If you can impress the first two groups equally, you will probably win. I think the winner, a super-delicious saison brewed by the guy next to me was able to impress the first two groups because a good saison is a good beer. Anyone can tell that. On the other hand, you shouldn’t underestimate group three. I won fourth place by one point. I invited three people who voted for my beer as a first place beer. If they weren’t there, I would have gotten sixth or seventh. Although you have to assume that every brewer there had at least one person voting for them regardless so it kind of evens out.
They are already talking about next Baltimore Beer Week and I am already thinking about what I can bring to Havanas that will be able to impress the critical and intrigue the skeptics and what I can do get more people that I know to come to the event. See you next year.
