.

[IMAGE]

The WIZARDs' Homebrew News
Worcester Incorporated Zymurgists Advancing Real Draughts

January, 1998

*** Happy New Year! ***

[IMAGE]

Upcoming Meetings:

January 14 -- 7:00 p.m. Vinotheque, 420 Northboro Rd., Marlboro, MA
February 11 -- 7:00 p.m. Vinotheque, 420 Northboro Rd., Marlboro, MA

For more information: Call Phil at (508) 839-2320, send e-mail to WizBrew@aol.com, or check out our website at http://www.home-brew.com/wizards (ed. note - original text changed to current web site address).

News:

Permanent Meeting Location
Our wait for a permanent meeting location is over. Our new meeting place is Vinotheque, located at 420 Northboro Road in Marlboro, MA. Vinotheque is a homebrew and wine making wholesaler that supplies products to homebrew shops across the country. Many thanks to our good friend Bruce Susel for the use of his meeting room. We have been meeting at Vinotheque since August and it has worked out well, providing a hassle free location for us to sample our homebrew.

If you haven't made it to a meeting at our new location, please put the next meeting on your calendar. To get to Vinotheque, Northboro Road is located off U.S. Route 20, approximately 1 mile west of I-495, and approximately 0.5 mile east of the Marlboro/Northboro town line. Turn south (left coming from I-495 or right coming from Northboro) onto Northboro Road. The now closed Sea Breeze restaurant is located on the corner. Northboro Road will bear to the right immediately. You will then need to turn left to stay on Northboro Road (there is a Do Not Enter sign straight ahead). After you turn left, pass one building, and then turn left. Vinotheque will be on your right, and is the rear portion of the building. Look for the Vinotheque sign near the door

Main Street Brewing Co.
The Main Street Brewing Company is officially history. The Irish Times opened in December at the 244 Main Street location formerly occupied by Main Street. At present the brewing equipment is sitting idle while Guinness, Bass, and Budweiser are served at the bar. The Irish Times is looking for a brewer to fire up the brew kettle and compliment their existing line of brews.

1998 Calendar Of Events
We are putting together a calendar of events for the New Year! Our first event is scheduled for February 28 to visit McNeill's Brewery in Brattleboro, VT. McNeill's is a first class micro-brewery that brews some excellent beers. For the second time in three years their Altbier has won a silver medal at the Great American Beer Festival. On our trip last year we also tasted an excellent two year old barley wine, in addition to McNeill's regular line of beers. In addition to visiting McNeill's, we will also grab a bite to eat at the Windham Bar & Grille, another Brattleboro brewpub. We will meet at O'Connor's restaurant in Worcester at noon. O'Connor's is located on route 12, at exit 4 off I-190. The rest of the spring schedule will be determined at the January meeting, at which time we will also be looking for a social coordinator.

Zymurgy
The club receives a complimentary subscription to Zymurgy from the AHA. These belong to the club and should be circulated among interested members. The 1997 Special and Winter Issues will be available at the next meeting for anyone interested to take one home for a month. The Special Issue is dedicated to hops, and the Winter Issue features articles on barley wine, beer of the month clubs, seasonal beers, and winners from the Great American Beer Festival. We are looking for a volunteer to serve as club librarian and take care of circulating this and other information to club.

AHA Club Only Competition
It is time for the 1998 American Homebrew Association club only competition. This competition consists of six individual competitions scheduled throughout the year. Each competition features a different beer style. A schedule is provided below to help you plan your brewing. Each AHA club is limited to one entry per style. The month before each entry deadline listed below, club members will bring in their homebrew for a club tasting. A portion of the club meeting will be reserved for a short discussion of the subject beer style, and a blind tasting and judging. The winning brew will be sent to the AHA as our club entry. This project will give everyone a chance to learn about the various beer styles, get practice tasting and critiquing beers, and will allow direct feedback from the club to those brewers who bring in an entry.

Hail To Ale -- January 26 -- English Style Pale Ale: Classic (5a), IPA (15b);
American Style Ale: Pale (6a), Amber (6b), Wheat (6c)

Stout Bout -- March -- Stout: Irish Dry (11a), Foreign (11b), Sweet (11c),
Oatmeal (11d), Imperial (11e)

Classic Pilsener -- May -- Classic Pilsener: German (15a), Bohemian (15b), American (15c)

Weiss Is Nice -- August -- German Style Wheat: Berliner Weiss (19a),
Weizen/Weissbeer (19b), Dunkelweizen (19c), Weizenbock (19d)

Best Of Fest -- October -- Vienna/Marzen/Oktoberfest: Vienna (17a),
Marzen/Oktoberfest (17b)

If It's Not Scottish -- December -- Scottish Ale: Light (8a), Heavy (8b), Export (8c)
English and Scottish Strong Ale: Strong Scotch Ale (10b)

The beer styles listed used for this competition are the official AHA style categories. A full listing is available at the meetings, or look in the Winter 1997 Zymurgy.

Anyone interested in participating in the first event should bring their English Style pale Ale or American Style Ale to the January meeting.

AHA 1998 National Homebrew Contest
The East Coast region has been modified for 1998 to include Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine (believe it or not these states were part of the Great Lakes region in 1997) in addition to Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, and Pennsylvania. More important for us, the first round drop off point has been moved from Brew-Ha-Ha in Pennsylvania to Mill City Brewing Company, on Cabot Street in Lowell, MA. Entries are due May 4-15, and the entry fee is 8$ per entry. We will look into scheduling a tour at Mill City for our meeting on May 13 so entries can be dropped off in person at the brewery.

Homebrew Contest Schedule

March 22 -- 7th Annual New York City Spring Regional Homebrew Competition, Staten Island, NY. Entries due March 19. Contact Ken Johnsen at (718) 982-7202 or KBJohns@PeakAccess.net.

April 25 -- U.S. Open, Charlotte, NC. Entries due April 20. Contact John Mitchell at (704) 864-3450, or jlmitch@charlotte.infi,net.

May 2 -- Green Mountain Homebrew Competition, Burlington, VT. Entries due April 17. Contact Dave Gannon at (802) 879-1304 or dgannon@zoo.uvm.edu.

May 23-31 -- AHA 1998 National Homebrew Competition. Entries due May 4-15. Check out Zymurgy, see Phil at the next meeting, or contact the AHA for more information.

Great American Beer Festival

Many local brewers took home medals at the 1997 Great American Beer Festival, the most I can remember in recent times. Congratulations to:

Back Bay Brewing Company, Boston, MA: Bronze in the Doppelbock category for BBBC Wheat Bock

The Boston Beer Company, Boston, MA: Gold in the Marzen/Oktoberfest category for Samuel Adams Octoberfest and Gold in the Doppelbock category for Samuel Adams Double Bock

Boston Beer Works, Boston, MA: Bronze in the IPA category for Back Bay IPA

Castle Springs Brewing Co., Moultonborough, NH: Silver in the IPA category for Lucknow India Pale and Silver in the American Style Wheat Ale or Lager category for Lucknow American Wheat

Fort Hill Brew House, Boston, MA: Gold in the Imperial Stout category for Russian Imperial Stout

John Harvard's Brew House, Cambridge, MA: Silver in the Scottish Style Ale category for Loch Lanier Ale

John Harvard's Brew House, Framingham, MA: Gold in the Altbier category for Manchester Alt

McNeill's Brewery, Brattleboro, VT: Silver in the Altbier category for Alle Tage Altbier

Northeast Brewing Company, Boston, MA: Bronze in the German Style Schwarzbier category for Nor'easter Schwarzbier

Salem Beer Works, Salem, MA: Gold in The ESB category for Bay State ESB

Stark Mill Brewery & Restaurant, Manchester, NH: Bronze in the American Style Lager/Ale or Cream Ale category for Uncanoonuc Golden Cream Ale

Meeting Minutes - December:

The WIZARDs met on December 10 at Vinotheque in Marlboro. Five members attended. The main topic of discussion was planning our spring calendar of events. The schedule will be finalized at the January meeting. We also discussed the EasYeast experiment. This experiment involves samples of a new brand of yeast provided by Bruce at our last meeting in exchange for our comments. The yeast is advertised to be ready to pitch, but experience to date shows long lag times using the yeast as directed without a starter. More comments should be available at the next meeting after the rest of the members have had a chance to brew, and of course at future meetings when we sample the beer. Our beer sampling included Robert's Marzen, Bill's Mild, Phil's I.P.A., the now infamous club Red, and some McEwans Tartan Scotch Ale and Pyramid Snowcap Ale brought in by Russ.

[IMAGE]

The WIZARDs Homebrew Club
c/o 16 Potter Hill Road
Grafton, MA 101519-1116


This HTML document was created by GT_HTML 6.0d 04/07/97 09:36.

Liberty Hops background provided courtesy of Hopunion USA