Canberra Brewers June 2016 Meeting Preview

Greetings brewers! After an action packed month for the club in May, a few of us at the club have just gotten over our lingering GABS and IHBD exhaustion (read as: hangovers) just in time for getting our June meeting together this week. All the action kicks off at the Harmonie German Club in Narrabundah Thursday June 2 at 7.30pm (in the bierkeller) with an education session run by our Education Officer Patrick Baggoley. For this  session we’ll be covering all things carbonation – for both the keggers and bottlers amongst us. Got any questions you’d like answered on the night? Email education@canberrabrewers.com.au and we’ll try to cover it at the meeting.

We’ll also have four of the beers brewed at International Home Brew Day on tap and will ask a few experienced judges to take us through a guided tasting.

Competition 2 – Calling for judges, stewards and entries!

Competition 2 is happening in July. That’s a long way off, right? Wrong! This means that entries will be opening from the 18th of June, and that’s only 3 weeks away!

More information will be available on the forums on or just before the 18th, but until then here’s what matters most:

• Entries open June 18th 2016
• Entries close July 16th 2016
• Judging day July 24th 2016

Entries are being accepted in the following AABC categories:

• Pale Lager
• Pilsener
• Amber & Dark Lager
• Strong Lager (>6% ABV)
• Bitter Ale
• Stout
• Belgian Strong Ale (>6% ABV)
• Wheat & Rye Beer
• Specialty Beer
• Mead
• Cider

It’s not really that far away, so get your brewing caps on!

International Home Brew Day Beers & Wrap Up

As you may have seen on the forum our recent International Home Brew Day (IHBD) event was a great success, with plenty of fun to had by the home brewers and members of the public. We received good feedback on the range of demos held on the day, with everyone especially enjoying the visual spectacle of the cider making/apple pressing with Doug’s hydropress from 3 Sons Cider. Check out the photographs from the event here.   

We will have a range of Altbier’s and ciders made as part of IHBD for everyone to taste at meetings over the course of the next 3 months.

Be in it to win it

For this month’s raffle we’ve got a bit of a Winter brewing theme going, with: A fermentation belt and temperature controller; two pre-mixed sweet chocolate stout all-grain kits with everything you need (if you’re not brewing all-grain yet, we’ll help get you started); a spunding valve, stainless steel hop balls and some 500mL beer steins courtesy of Transit Bar in Civic. Don’t forget that for every three tickets you buy, you get an entry in our end of year N.O.O.K.I.E. prize!

Get your brewing books

We are continuting every other month to add some of the best new home brew related materials to our library collection, so be sure to head to the club’s online library catalogue at https://canberrabrewers.librarika.com/ to peruse this great resource. You can reserve a copy of something and we’ll deliver it at the meeting. If the book is currently on loan, email education@canberrabrewers.com.au and we’ll arrange to have it brought back for you to borrow. Don’t have access to the library? Email us and we’ll hook you up.

Memberships sign up online

By now the 2016 Club Memberships have started rolling in as expected. But please sign up at our club meeting this Thursday night if you haven’t had a chance to as yet. For those who haven’t seen it yet, online you can check out our newly created online membership form, Paypal payments and for those without cash we have a new Paypass system available at the meeting. More information is on this renewal page here.