From synchro!judge-request at uu6.psi.com Thu Apr 21 13:10:08 1994 Received: from uu6.psi.com by goodman.itn.med.umich.edu with SMTP id AA18425 (5.65b/IDA-1.4.3 for spencer at hendrix.itn.med.umich.edu); Thu, 21 Apr 94 13:08:31 -0400 Received: from synchro.UUCP by uu6.psi.com (5.65b/4.0.071791-PSI/PSINet) via UUCP; id AA03602 for ; Thu, 21 Apr 94 06:46:50 -0400 Received: by synchro.com (smail2.5) id AA10019; 21 Apr 94 05:15:37 EST (Thu) Reply-To: judge at synchro.com (JudgeNet) Errors-To: judge-error at synchro.com Precedence: bulk Message-Id: <9404210515.AA10019 at synchro.com> Status: O X-Status: From: judge-request at synchro.com (JudgeNet Administrator) To: judge-recipients at synchro.com (JudgeNet Recipients) Subject: JudgeNet Digest #743 (Apr 21, 1994) Date: 21 Apr 94 05:15:37 EST (Thu) JudgeNet Digest #743 Thu 21 Apr 1994 THE BEER JUDGE DIGEST Chuck Cox , publisher Michael Hall , archive administrator digest submissions to judge at synchro.com administrative requests to judge-request at synchro.com send rank updates to the administrative address messages sent to the wrong address will be ignored FTP archive information in /pub/judge/README on cygnus.ta52.lanl.gov Published by SynchroSystems and the Riverside Garage & Brewery Contents: First round awards? (bickham) Too many judges (Allen Ford) Re: 2nd round (Jeff Frane) Orignal Porter Guidelines (Algis R Korzonas +1 708 979 8583) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 20 Apr 1994 09:03:44 -0400 (EDT) From: bickham at msc.cornell.edu Subject: First round awards? One suggestion I have for next year's competition is to give awards for the category winners in the first round. The prizes at some of the regional competitions are really getting good - sacks of grain, pounds of hops, etc., so combined with a cheaper entry fee, I feel that many of the better brewers are skipping the AHA Nationals. One local example occurred last year when a brewer had a beer rated first out of 50+ entries in his category at a first round regionals, but finished 4th at Portland. His award for brewing such a fine beer is a mass produced cardboard "gold" certificate which recognizes him for having a beer "rated excellent by a panel of qualified judges." At $8 per entry and access to many sponsors, I think the AHA can do better than that! Scott "brew globally, enter locally" Bickham - -- ======================================================================== Scott Bickham bickham at msc.cornell.edu ========================================================================= ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 20 Apr 1994 09:26:04 -0500 (CDT) From: Allen Ford Subject: Too many judges Steve Stroud writes: > I was at last year's Second Round in Portland, and I was appalled at the number > of judges that were allowed to sit at each table. We had six people judging > Belgian Ales! This appeared to be the norm for most of the categories. > > I wonder if the AHA has decided to limit the number of judges sitting at each > table this year. It seems to me that it is much more important to insure that > the beers are properly and fairly judged than to please everybody at the > conference who feels like judging. Surely the number of judges at each table > could be limited to three! Too many qualified judges. Now there's a switch! I know that this is the first time I've ever seen such a complaint about a competition. In last year's second round, I judged barleywines with 4 other judges. Five was definitely not too many since it took 4 of us to shout down one especially confident and vocal judge. But really, how would you decide who gets to judge and who doesn't? Judge ranking would be one possible way, but could exclude judges who are very knowledgeable in certain styles. Choosing a judge based on his/her knowledge of the style could exclude other ranked judges. Organizing this would be a nightmare. I have no confidence in the AHA's ability to do this. As evidence, I cite the fact that last year I wrote to AHA about two months in advance and let them know I would not be attending the conference but would be in Portland to judge the second round. When I arrived in the judging room, there was no knowledge on their part that I had volunteered/requested to judge. Given the inability to even put together a judge list, how could we expect an equitable division of judges in a selective process? I say, "the more the better", but I do think that six is nearing the upper limit. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Allen Ford =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= =-=-= Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research San Antonio, Texas =-=-= ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 20 Apr 1994 08:58:37 -0700 (PDT) From: gummitch at teleport.com (Jeff Frane) Subject: Re: 2nd round As a point of reference, I'm pretty sure we only had four judges at my table in Portland last year (British Bitter) -- which is certainly plenty. Frankly, as a contestant, I would prefer too many judges to too few, although that doesn't seem to be a problem at the 2nd round. -Jeff ------------------------------ Date: 20 Apr 94 18:05:00 GMT From: korz at iepubj.att.com (Algis R Korzonas +1 708 979 8583) Subject: Orignal Porter Guidelines Well, as promised, I've put together my best 1st cut at the proposed guidelines for an Original Porter Subcategory. Note, that for clarity, perhaps it may be beneficial to include the name "Entire" parenthetically along with the title "Original Porter." Here I go: Original Porter (Entire) Ruby-red to dark brown. Translucent. Low carbonation. Medium to high hop bitterness. Hop flavor and aroma low. Some fruitiness and esters. Brown (not black) malt flavor and aroma -- no burnt flavor or aroma. Low to medium diacetyl. Brettanomyces yeast character low to medium. Low lactobacillus character OK. Style Original Gravity (Plato) Alc/vol IBU SRM c) Original Porter (Entire) 1.050 - 1.090 (12.5-22.5) 5-7 50-150 35-70 So, what do you think? Could "1720's-style Porter (Entire)" be even more descriptive? I've taken virtually all my data from Terry Foster's book, Porter (trying to make compromises in the few areas in which he was a bit inconsistent) and from the Durden Park Beer Circle's book, Old British Beers and How to Brew Them. The Alcohol was calculated using the estimated FG from Foster plus formulas from Eckhardt and an HBD post from Darryl Richman. Note that if I had used just Foster's numbers and ignored the work of the Durden Park Beer Circle (which I think would be a mistake) the OG would be only 1.050 - 1.070 and the IBUs only 50-70. However, there was only one recipe in the DPBC book that bumped the OG up so high (the 1750 Original recipe), the others were in the range that Foster suggests. Perhaps the DPBC's reserch was based upon older documentation than Foster's? Geoff? What I find most interesting is that the gravity and alcohol are so high considering that this was a "quick pint" quaffed by London labourers while taking a break from their heavy work. The original gravities, however, appear to have been researched quite deeply by Foster and there was even a measured original gravity of 1.071 of a Porter in 1785 which was a report on an early use of the new "hydrometer." Fireproof underwear on... Al. ------------------------------ End of JudgeNet Digest ************************