Creative Comp Results, Discount Card, and April Meeting

Thanks to all members who attended last night’s meeting. It was a great turnout with 25 people judging and evaluating the beers. Overall there were 14 beers judged.

The winners are:

1st Place: Hazelnut Espresso Stout, brewed by Steve Couch

2nd Place: Smoothie Sour (with mango and tamarind), brewed by Steve Shaw

3rd Place: Ail Ale (cream ale with garlic), brewed by Dan Molinski

Congratulations to the winners, and great work from all the brewers who participated. If you entered a beer you’ll get your score sheets emailed to you soon. Winners will be contacted directly to determine their prize selections – which were generously provided by the guys at Grape & Grain, and Grain to Glass.

Accurate Fire & Safety Discount Cards:

The folks at Accurate Fire & Safety have partnered with the club and are providing all registered club members with a discount card that give you 20% off CO2 refills!

You need to actually show the physical card, which has your name on it, in order to get the discount. To make distribution of the cards easier, they’ll be available for pick up from Devil May Care. If your card isn’t there, or if you’re a newly registered member, please let one of the club exec’s know.

April Meeting

The next club meeting is April 2nd and will be at CMBTC, (the Canadian Malting Barley Technical Centre, at 303 Main St)

Cheers!

March Meeting, Creative Comp, Club Kits

Hi Brewers!  We have some great updates for you!

March 5th Meeting & Creative Competition:

Our next meeting will be at Oxus. 

If you brewed something for the Supermarket Sweep, please arrive at 6:30pm with enough to go around because we have a permit! This means we will be able to sample and evaluate the beers during the meeting.  Not only that, but we’ve also registered the competition with BJCP, so if you’re pursuing points be sure to attend and participate. 
There are prizes from our fantastic local homebrew suppliers to be awarded for the top three beers – 1st place gets first choice, 2nd place gets second choice, 3rd place gets what’s left.

  • Either a 5 Gallon ball-lock keg, or a 25kg bag of Pale malt from Grape & Grain
  • $125 gift certificate from Grain to Glass
  • $75 gift certificate from Grain to Glass

The 1st place winner will also get to help craft the recipe for the Big Brew.

Club Kit

The order has been placed and should be delivered by the end of the week. Once the ingredients arrive we’ll need some some volunteers to meet up and help split everything up into the individual kits.

The recipe itself is posted and available here

April Meeting

Our April 2nd meeting will take place at the CMBTC.  It’ll be our first time there since before the pandemic, so hopefully you all can make it.

LAST CALL for Club Kits

Hi Brewers!

We have 52 full members who are technically entitled to a club kit, but only 27 people have responded to the All-Grain vs. Extract survey.

We don’t want to order 52 kits if that means 25 of them aren’t going to be picked up.  That said, we will only be ordering kits for those members who have completed the survey, and therefore this is the last reminder before we place the order.

EDIT:
The survey is now closed. If you missed it, just let us know. We’ll be ordering few extra kits.

January/February Updates

Hi Brewers!

We’d like to welcome Steph Barten as the new Pro/Am Coordinator! Thanks for stepping up, Steph! She’ll be working alongside Dave Cole. They’ve already got the 2024 competition site up on Beer Awards Platform!
An important note for everyone is that the Pro/Am is back to being operated at arms-length from the club, so going forward any inquiries regarding the competition should now be directed to proambrewchallenge@gmail.com rather than the WBB executives.

For the Supermarket Sweep creative competition, we’ve decided to shift it to March. A number of people have said that an extra month would help them get their beer ready. We have some cool prizes for the comp: Grain to Glass has graciously donated two gift cards ($125 and $75), and Grape and Grain has offered either a new corny keg or a bag of grain. First place gets first pick, second chooses second, etc. The 1st place winner will also get to work with the Exec and the brewery involved in the Big Brew to make a recipe for the Big Brew. So, hopefully this pushes more of you to get something in the works for March 5th. We’re still working on getting us a permit for judging the creative competition.

An update on the club kit! Big thank you Scott Parker for sharing his Dark Mild recipe. As a reminder to everyone if you want to receive a club kit, take a couple minutes to confirm your membership is paid and up to date.

Just so everyone is aware, these are the things currently up the planning pipeline.

  1. CMBTC Visit – hopefully March/April-ish.
  2. Big Brew – in talks with Nonsuch. There will likely be additional cost for members who want to participate.

Usual reminders:

Club Merch – the product listings have been updated, check it out!
Anonymous member feedback – share ideas / comments / concerns about the club.
New Facebook Group – interact with members there, because emails can be annoying.

Pro/Am, Creative Competition, January Meeting, and other Updates

Hey brewers!

We have some big updates, most of which were shared at the last meeting.  There’s a lot of information here, so please read everything!

Pro/Am Awards night was a great success.  Thanks to those who showed up to support the event, and the competition.  We live streamed the awards for the first time ever, so if you’re interested you can watch that here.  If you placed in any of the categories, we’re still waiting on a few items to be delivered before we can divvy up and ship out prizes. There will be a central pickup point for local winners – stand by for a separate update email on that.

Also regarding the Pro/Am, planning for 2024 is already under way with Dave Cole leading as Competition Director, and Steph Barten as Competition Coordinator.  If you’re interested in pitching in with planning or executing the competition in any way, or if you have any questions about the Pro/Am, please reach out to them directly.

The Club Kit style for this season has been chosen.  We’ll be making a Dark Mild.  We’re working on a recipe now and may be brewing a test batch, but if you’ve got a recipe you think is good, or if you have any ideas or suggestions, please share!

The final details of the Club Creative Competition, aka “Supermarket Sweep” have been decided and posted here.

We’ve decided to bring back the snack potluck to club meetings! Starting with the January meeting. The list of active club members has been sorted alphabetically by last name and split into three groups. Check your email to see if you’re in the first group. If you’re on the list and you’re coming to the meeting on January 9th, please do your part and bring a snack to share with everyone. It can be anything from cookies, crackers, and chips to vegetables, fruit, and meats.

January’s meeting, unlike other meetings, is the second Tuesday of the month. It will be an Off-Flavours seminar! This is historically one of our more popular meetings so we’re scoping out a meeting location that can suit more attendees. Keep an eye on the Club Calendar for info. We’ll also send a reminder leading up to the meeting.

Finally, we’ve set up a new Member Feedback page on the website accessible to active registered members, which allows you to submit confidential, anonymous messages to the club executives. We recognize that many members have thoughts and ideas about the club but don’t always feel comfortable sharing directly with the club executives, so we wanted to provide this as an alternate channel of communication. Your input is important to us and we want to hear what you have to say so that we can make sure the club is heading in the right direction.

“Now Hiring” Pro/Am 2024 Coordinator

Planning for the 2024 Pro/Am Brew Challenge is already under way, however the Winnipeg Brew Bombers require a volunteer to step up and fill the role of Competition Coordinator.

This person will:

  • Work alongside the Competition Director
  • Be responsible for procuring sponsors and prizes
  • Handle competition marketing – social media posts, advertising the competition
  • Solicit beer submissions from professional breweries
  • LGCA Permit application
  • Arranging judging venue, awards venue
  • Planning judge/steward meals

While someone with experience is preferred, don’t let it deter you from putting your name in the hat. This is a great opportunity to learn as you go, with the support of the Competition Director and the WBB club executives. If you’re working on your BJCP certification this is a good way to earn non-judging points as well.

If you’re interested, send an email to executive@winnipegbrewbombers.ca

December Meeting, and Pro/Am Awards

Hi Brewers!

Yes there is a meeting tomorrow. 7pm at Oxus. There’s no presentation, speaker, or topic, but we’ll be sharing a lot of updates, so we hope to see you there. If you can’t make it, updates will be posted on the website after the meeting.

The Pro/Am Award Ceremony will be hosted by Fionn MacCool’s at Grant Park this year. It’ll take place this Wednesday December 6th at 7pm. We also plan to try live-streaming the awards… likely via the proambrewchallenge Instagram account, but if that proves to be a challenge, we may just provide a Google Meet link. Keep an eye on our social channels for that.

Cheers,

Dan,
Secretary

November Meeting & Reminders

Hello Brewers!

We have the most excellent news for our next meeting on November 7th at Oxus.  Because we have a permit for the Pro/Am judging, and the permit dates overlap with the meeting, we’re going to leverage this opportunity to allow sampling each other’s homebrew at the meeting!

  • Everyone who plans to attend the meeting has to sign up in advance, and be sure to arrive early enough to start by 7pm sharp.
  • While everyone is welcome to attend for sampling, we’ve decided to limit only paid members being able to bring their beer for evaluation.
  • Due to limited time, we expect to be able to evaluate at most 16 brews.
  • To be fair, there’s a limit of one brew per person, sign up in advance
  • Try to bring up to 12 bottles or two growlers to ensure enough beer is available for everyone in case we have a full house
  • Everyone attending must review the code of conduct.

This is only possible because Marc had the foresight to align the Pro/Am with the regular club meeting schedule, so give him a high-five next time you see him!

REMINDER: the Pro/Am Drop-off and Mail-in window was extended to November 2nd, so get your entries in!!!

REMINDER: if you’re a paid “club kit” member and haven’t filled in the style survey yet, please do so before the next meeting.  https://winnipegbrewbombers.ca/club-kit-beer-first-round-selection/

Cheers,

Secretary, Dan Molinski

Pro/Am, Field Trip Bus, and Club Kit Styles

Hello Winnipeg Brew Bombers!

The Pro/Am Brew Challenge needs judges and other volunteers.  If you’re willing and able to help out in any way from November 5 to 9 at Oxus, go to the competition page on the new Beer Award Platform, and click on “I want to volunteer”.  The form will walk you through all the options including roles and schedules.  Note, you will need to register an account on BAP in order to submit the form. 
You do not have to be certified in order to judge, but preference will be given to those who are.
Also a quick reminder, we are still looking for people to step up and fill in as the Competition Executive(s) to replace Mandy and Jeff. If you have experience co-0rdinating events and/or soliciting sponsorships, please let us know!

The field trip to Scythe Malting is set for October 28th, but we need to know if there’s enough interest to warrant getting a bus.  If you plan on participating in the field Trip, please fill in the Field Trip Bus survey on the members content page.  

The selection of the beer style for this year’s club kit will be done in multiple rounds through a process of elimination.  If you’re a fully paid member please fill in the Club Kit Beer survey on the members content page with your ranking of the style options proposed at the last club meeting.  The survey results will be shared at the November meeting.

Cheers!

A few things…

Hey gang!

  • Our October meeting will be this coming Tuesday October 3rd at Oxus. We will discuss the styles for the Club Kit, and go over some basics about the malting process, which leads us to…
  • A tour at Scythe Malting is in the works. October 28th works for them. I will create a poll to see how many from the Club can attend, and then we can arrange transportation.
  • The ProAm registration is still open, entries are rolling in. Hoping to see a good representation from the Brew Bombers this year. Head to https://proam.beer to sign up.
  • The Ukrainian Hops project brew day went fairly smoothly. Thanks to everyone who was able to help out. The beer has been dry-hopped, and I’m planning to transfer it to kegs in a few days. Sean Ali has offered to bring his Cannular system in to help with the packaging.
  • Regarding homebrew sampling: we will have a Club sampling night at Oxus as part of the ProAm on Nov 7th (the dates line up with our November meeting.) There will be scoresheets available for judging. Please plan to bring one or two brews for judging. Beyond that, I have a plan for approaching some higher level authorities at the LGCA, and a letter is being drafted to request a meeting with them.
  • As far as the Cereal Bowl beer, I was planning the Oxus cereal beer and figured I’d try to be productive with my time and brew a couple batches at once. I brewed it on Wednesday last week, hoping it will be ready for Oct 6th. It was a very last minute idea. I used grain I had in my personal inventory, some yeast Sean gave me, and some hops for bittering from the Ukrainian Hops project.

See ya on Tuesday!

Cheers,

Marc