Skip to main content

Monterey Beer Festival Brewing Demo

I have to say it was a totally different and exciting experience attending a beer festival from behind the booth rather than lining up to be served a sample. Having said that, I want to also say that I won't include here the down side of attending a beer festival from behind the booth. It would be to ugly.


Along with fellow Zymurgeeks, I rolled out the brew sculpture to brew up 10 gallons of Rye IPA to demonstrate our homebrewing skills and field questions about the art of homebrewing beer to the curious observers. What better a place to exhibit the process than at a beer festival in our own back yard, the Monterey Beer Festival. On hand to serve up samplings of their finest beverages were many west coast breweries. Right next to us was Santa Cruz's own , Uncommon Brewers serving a delicious Baltic Porter and Belgian ale. Conveniently located right next door to our booth, we could simply hand our glass over for refills, avoiding the extensive line.
The fairgrounds filled quickly with thirsty 20 somethings looking for quality beer and the longest line formed at the Deschutes beer barrel dispensing wagon with several beers on tap including one of my favorites 'Mirror Pond Pale Ale'.


On the opposite side of the grassy field, Jason, the head brewer from Seabright Brewing of Santa Cruz, was on site personally handing out samples of his IPA. With our brewing fully underway, Dave, my brewing partner for the day, and I headed over to be interviewed by The Brewing Network as they broadcast a live feed of the event. They talked to us about our local homebrew club and about how we were getting along with our demonstration. I was a little nervous but don't feel like I came across too weird. Creepy maybe, but not weird. I got the chance to plug my homebrewing classes at Cabrillo College. Thanks guys. You can listen to the entire postcast. here

As we proceeded with the demonstration, people kept coming over to get beer samples.


"We don't have beer." we would tell them, "We're making beer".



Of course their next question was..



"when will it be done?, should I come back later?"



"Yeah, much later."



Naturally, the frequency of this request increased as the day progressed. I started to lose my sense of humor and found myself hiding behind the brew sculpture sipping quietly on my beer. At one point, I set my 'special' beer glass down for a second,(a coveted glass I got at a Bay Area Mashers event several years ago)to soon realize that someone had walked off with it. Fortunately, I caught a glimpse of it clutched in someones sticky hands and rushed to snatch it back. The culprit feigned ignorance and I couldn't argue with that.

As the day drew to a close, we chilled our freshly brewed beer into fermenters for the ride home. It was a good day, we hit our gravity and look forward to enjoying our Monterey Beer Festival Rye India Pale Ale.



Did you attend the Monterey Beer fest? Leave a comment about your experience.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Duvel Clone or Belgian Golden Strong

 O ne of my favorite styles of beer is the Belgian Golden Strong, and the classic commercial example is Duvel. 
Post a Comment
Read more

Top Three Priorities For Homebrew Success

From the very first day that I took my initial tentative steps down the homebrewing path I've been cautioned repeatedly about the importance of sanitation. Whether it came from the opening chapters of brew books, leaders in the homebrewing association or from well intentioned homebrewers, the message has always been the same, " be very afraid of infection " . Sure, relax and don't worry except when it comes to sanitation. This fear runs deep in the homebrewing community and definitely deserves serious consideration especially if you're in the habit of producing spoiled beer, but I'm not that concerned about it and because of my take it with a pinch of salt  attitude, I feel that my enjoyment of the hobby is that much more satisfying. For the sake of all those just beginning their personal home brewing journey, I'm here to help take the edge off of your sanitation fears. I have discovered through the course of many years of homebrewing experienc...
9 comments
Read more

Bottle In A Bag

Improvising with Style: A Homebrew Hack Worth Keeping  I ran into a bit of a special needs situation last week, and figured it was worth sharing—not for sympathy, but because this is what I love about homebrewing. No matter how many batches you’ve clocked, something will always go sideways. A missing part, a busted seal, or in this case a completely disgusting bottling bucket. The unexpected shows up, uninvited, and dares you to stay creative. So here's the scene, I'm in my element puttering around the brew cave and I'm needing to bottle a batch of porter. Easy enough—except the only bottling buckets I had looked like they’d been dragged through a gravel lot and left to soak in dirty dishwater for a few years. Discolored, scratched to hell, and definitely not the sterile environment you’d want for your pristine, freshly fermented beer. Unless, of course, you're into doctoring your brew with unknown bacteria strains and suggesting that it's a Belgian such or such....
2 comments
Read more