Return-Path: owner-judge at synchro.com Received: from srvr20.engin.umich.edu (root at srvr20.engin.umich.edu [141.212.2.26]) by srvr5.engin.umich.edu (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id LAA12136 for ; Sat, 28 Mar 1998 11:59:18 -0500 (EST) Received: from twins.rs.itd.umich.edu (twins.rs.itd.umich.edu [141.211.83.39]) by srvr20.engin.umich.edu (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id LAA20606 for ; Sat, 28 Mar 1998 11:59:16 -0500 (EST) Received: (from root at localhost) by twins.rs.itd.umich.edu (8.8.6/2.5) with X.500 id LAA28253; Sat, 28 Mar 1998 11:59:16 -0500 (EST) Received: from uu6.psi.com (uu6.psi.com [38.145.155.3]) by twins.rs.itd.umich.edu (8.8.6/2.5) with SMTP id LAA28243; Sat, 28 Mar 1998 11:59:14 -0500 (EST) Received: by uu6.psi.com (5.65b/4.0.071791-PSI/PSINet) via UUCP; id AA07788 for spencer at umich.edu; Sat, 28 Mar 98 11:56:13 -0500 Received: (from majordom at localhost) by synchro.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id LAA00196 for judge-digest-outgoing; Sat, 28 Mar 1998 11:15:45 -0500 Date: Sat, 28 Mar 1998 11:15:45 -0500 Message-Id: <199803281615.LAA00196 at synchro.com> From: owner-judge-digest at synchro.com To: judge-digest at synchro.com Subject: judge-digest V1 #1557 Reply-To: judge at synchro.com Errors-To: owner-judge-digest at synchro.com Precedence: bulk judge-digest Saturday, 28 March 1998 Volume 01 : Number 1557 ============================================================================ J u d g e N e t - t h e b e e r j u d g e d i g e s t ============================================================================ Moderator: Chuck Cox Archivist: Spencer Thomas Publisher: SynchroSystems Submissions: judge at synchro.com Subscriptions: judge-request at synchro.com Archive: http://realbeer.com/spencer/judge BJCP info: geninfo at bjcp.synchro.com ============================================================================ contents: Gushers Re: infected beers re: judging gushers apology for offensive behaviour Re: Fast Return of Scoresheets Judging Gushers Last note on the Fecal Pile; Gushers; Slander Re: Al K's score sheet Re: infected beers Re: Fecal aromas Date: Fri, 27 Mar 1998 11:28:55 -0800 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Charles Hudak Date: Wed, 25 Mar 1998 22:54:26 -0800 Subject: Gushers Brian writes: >Is there a "proper" procedure for judging gushers? AFAIK it is the same as judging any other beer. >I recently entered a porter to a local competition and got three score >sheets back. All three were blank except for the 19 at the bottom. >Two sheets said "gusher" at the very top. I have to assume that the >beers was immediately dumped and no attempt to judge it was made. > This is obviously poor form on the judges part unless they were left with too little beer to adequetely judge. Only they would know why they didn't actually judge it. >Is such an overcarbonated beer "out of style by kind"? If the >beer is infected, I can see where it is probably severe enough to >warrant a 19. If the beer is not infected, the judges owe it to >the entrant to judge the beer. No, a beer is not necessarilly condemned to a 19 by being overconditioned. Honestly, I have to really find little or no merit in a beer to give it a 19. I mean, hey, if the guy/gal is manning the brewpot that counts for something, eh? I hate to give people feedback that will serve only to discourage them from brewing. I have given 19's though, but it was only in cases where it was really deserved. I really hate to see this attitude by judges. I've come across some truly hideous beers but I give every one of them my all, taking multiple tastes to try and separate the flavors and flaws and provide detailed feedback. I know that the last thing that you want to do when you smell a beer that reeks of vomit or rotting fruit is taste it but...IT'S YOUR JOB (I've been known to make some funny faces and groan about having to taste something after having smelled it but I do it). There is absolutely no excuse IMHO for not tasting a beer and giving it 100% of your time in a competition. There's nothing in that beer that will kill you or really make you sick and we owe it to the entrants to give them what they pay for. The only exeception would be, as I mentioned above, if the beer was so violently gushing, that most or all of the product gushed from the bottle and there was inadequete volume left to judge. In this case, this is exactly what should be written on the scoresheet alongside the score > >On a related note, I notice while juding Bav. Weizen that many >are overcarbonated. I'm not sure where to draw the line for this >style, but a lot of brewers flirt with that threshold between >high carbonation and too high carbonation. Bav Weizens can have carbonation levels almost twice as high as many other beers (3.5 volumes is perfectly acceptable). Only *you* can make the call, having a good idea of what a highly carbonated BW should look and taste like. Charles Hudak in San Diego, California (Living large in Ocean Beach!!) cwhudak at adnc.com ICQ# 4253902 "If God had intended for us to drink beer, he would have given us stomachs." - --David Daye ------------------------------ From: Dion Hollenbeck Date: 26 Mar 1998 07:36:17 -0800 Subject: Re: infected beers >> Bryan L Gros writes: BLG> Is there a "proper" procedure for judging gushers? I recently BLG> entered a porter to a local competition and got three score BLG> sheets back. All three were blank except for the 19 at the BLG> bottom. Two sheets said "gusher" at the very top. I have to BLG> assume that the beers was immediately dumped and no attempt to BLG> judge it was made. I think that gushers should be given the benefit of the doubt. I have been on a panel that has gotten one and after the gushing subsided, we tasted it after *carefully* smelling it first. There was nothing in this beer that indicated any infections. We marked it down some for being overcarbonated, but other than that, there was no reason not to judge it. However, if a panel gets a gusher, then smells that the beer is badly infected, it may be prudent *not* to taste it due to fouling the palate for the rest of the flight. I would have to carefully think this over based on how bad the beer actually smelled. dion - -- Dion Hollenbeck (619)597-7080x164 Email: hollen at vigra.com http://www.vigra.com/~hollen Sr. Software Engineer - Vigra Div. of Visicom Labs San Diego, California ------------------------------ From: "Curt Speaker" Date: Thu, 26 Mar 1998 11:04:14 EST Subject: re: judging gushers Hey there: I agree with Bryon Gros regarding the judging of gushers. I think every effort should be made to try and judge what beer is left after the bottle is done spitting. As a brewer who has made his share of overcarbonated beers, or bottled a little to early, or whatever, I have found that once you get past the excess carbonation, some of these beers are not too bad. There are also degrees of gushing too, from the slow crawl of thick foam out of the bottle to a beer fountain. Another problem is that often the yeast cake is carried up through the beer along with the CO2, making the beer murky and yeasty-tasting. But each beer must be judged on it's merits! To cold-bloodedly just assign a "19" to a gusher with no comments other than "gusher" is not fair to the brewer. The beer may deserve much more than a "19" based on flavor, aroma and other characteristics that WE ARE SUPPOSED TO BE JUDGING THE BEER ON! I'll get off the soapbox now... Curt Curt Speaker Biosafety Officer Penn State University Environmental Health and Safety speaker at ehs.psu.edu http://www.ehs.psu.edu ^...^ (O_O) =(Y)= """ ------------------------------ From: jucks at cfaft4.harvard.edu (Ken Jucks, ph # 617-496-7580) Date: Thu, 26 Mar 1998 14:48:08 -0500 Subject: apology for offensive behaviour Mr. Bill Giffen felt the need to take the Boston Wort Processors and the Boston Homebrew Competition to task on both HBD and judgenet for offending Dr. Tom O'Connor by including an inappropriate co-brewer to his entries in our list of winners for this year's contest. He is very correct that this was an offensive act. On behalf of The Boston Wort Processors, the organizers of the Boston Homebrew Competition, and myself, we are truly sorry to Dr. Tom O'Connor that he was wronged in this way. I cannot offer any suitable justification for the act and am TRULY embarrassed that this happened. One member of the club included the co-brewer upon data entry in what he thought was a practical joke. I did not know this and honestly thought that Dr. O'Connor included this himself as a joke and I mistakenly played along. Not knowing Dr. O'Connor myself, I did not realize that such a joke is not his style. I was informed of my misunderstanding by Dr. O'Connor a few weeks back and was stunned. I apologized to him at that time for my error. I am embarrassed that I did not catch the fact that this was a practical joke on the day of the competition. The offender has personally apologized to Dr. O'Connor. I am also sorry that this forum was bothered with this incident. Y'all have many more interesting topics to discuss than this. In my personal opinion (and not necessarily that of the club) this sensitive matter is best handled behind the scenes such that only the NECESSARY apology is posted here. This saves alot of bandwidth, misunderstanding, and hurt feelings. It is my hope that such an incident never happen again. On a more personal note: this whole incident leaves a very sour taste in my mouth. I am fairly new to the judging scene. I volunteered to organize this competition because I had found them to be fun, worthwhile, and educational. I worked VERY hard make the competition a success, one that our club is proud to sponsor. After having to endure this public embarassment, I will think long and hard about every helping to organize another contest, especially here in New England. With the exception of this weekend where I will judge at competition sponsored by a club that supported the BHC with lots of entries and quality judges (South Shore Brew Club), I will back off judging in our area for a while as peoples' egos are way to big for me to enjoy these competitions at the moment. Sorry again for the added bandwidth. Ken Jucks Disgraced Coordinator for the Boston Homebrew Competition ------------------------------ From: Stephen Murphrey Date: Thu, 26 Mar 1998 19:36:34 -0500 Subject: Re: Fast Return of Scoresheets I agree that it's easy to return score sheets quickly after a competition. The Shamrock Open (Raleigh, NC) makes a commitment to contestants that we will mail score sheets out 72 hours after the competition. On the day after the competition, about 6 of us meet and stuff the envelopes. It takes about an hour to get this done. We spend another hour discussing how we can improve the next year's competition. Then we drink beer and barbecue something good to eat. In the end, the administrivia is really just an excuse to have a party. Steve Murphorey Director of Judges 1997 & 1998 Shamrock Open ------------------------------ From: Reegleyj Date: Thu, 26 Mar 1998 21:30:27 EST Subject: Judging Gushers I've certainly had the experience of judging a beer which looked cloudy when inspecting the bottle, gushed on opening, but nevertheless tasted surprisingly good. We marked it down on appearance and conditioning, but the overall score was in the 25-29 range. Just marking a beer down to 19, and not tasting (or at least smelling) it and giving some specific feedback is unconscionable. Brad Reeg ------------------------------ From: "Mark S. Johnston" Date: Thu, 26 Mar 1998 21:42:43 -0500 Subject: Last note on the Fecal Pile; Gushers; Slander For those who have not experienced a commercially "fecal" beer, I'd suggest trying (if you can find it) the Boon Mariage Parfait Kriek that showed up stateside about a year or two ago. Some people raved about it, but I found it undrinkable. - --- Bryan Gros questioned the judges who returned a blank sheet with a score of 19 solely because the beer was a gusher. This is WRONG! Overcarbonation does not automatically mean infection. I have had this same type of thing happen to me in years past. It has caused me to avoid entering certain competitions as a result. It has also allowed me to resist forming quick decisions when judging. - ---- Bruce Stevens (I think) and later Bill Giffin wrote of a comp that essentially slanders its winners if they're not from the local club -- especially if they are perrenial winners. I have seen "friendly competition" stretched to its limits before. But this seems to be beyond the pale. There is an individual in my area who brews fantastic beers and meads. He is a consistant winner, sometimes taking home 2 out of 3 ribbons in a category. His personality, however, tends to alienate most people. So when his name is announced as a winner, it is not unusual to hear some groans from the gallery. No competition in this area, however, would ever think of, nor would there be cause to, insulting this individual in a public forum. It appears to me, assuming the facts are as reported, that the comp owes a very public apology to those offended. But let's make sure that it was a club action, and not just one tasteless individual. (I can't believe that I almost agreed with Bill Giffin!) - -- "If a man is not a liberal at eighteen, he has no heart. If he is not a conservative by the time he is thirty, he has no mind." - Winston Churchill ------------------------------ From: John DeCarlo Date: Fri, 27 Mar 1998 14:08:16 -0500 Subject: Re: Al K's score sheet karnowski at juno.com (Thomas p karnowsk) wrote: >I know some guys who actually got a score sheet back that said "fecal" >on it. They interpreted this to say "this judge is trying to find a >funny and pompous way to say our beer tastes like crap!" >I would NEVER put such a >DEGRADING adjective on a score sheet because I think it defeats one of >the purposes of homebrew competitions - to provide feedback to >homebrewers and encourage them to brew more and brew better. [...] >"fecal" they basically ignored everything else because the judge came >across as an arrogant, pompous asshole. [...] > I don't think anyone can ever justify such a term. Yow! I don't necessarily disagree with the sentiment of "don't use nasty language just to offend someone", but aren't you going a little overboard? It reminds me of the time someone got offended by the term "anal" (short for anal-retentive). He thought he was being called something worse than "a**hole". But my question is "How are we to know?". I don't see anything degrading or humiliating about fecal. It is an *adjective*. The more adjectives we use to describe the beer, the more accurate the judging feedback. I have to say that "taste like crap" is unacceptable, but "fecal aroma" is clearly appropriate. - -- John DeCarlo, Arlington, VA--My views are my own Internet: jdecarlo at burp.org Web: http://www.geocities.com/NapaValley/1113 ------------------------------ From: John DeCarlo Date: Fri, 27 Mar 1998 14:18:14 -0500 Subject: Re: infected beers "Bryan L. Gros" writes: >Is there a "proper" procedure for judging gushers? I *always* pour some and smell it. If the smell is too scary or overpowering, I will avoid tasting it. So far that has only happened to me once. Every other gusher I have at least tasted. Some are perfectly good and presumably just overcarbonated. It is always a distraction to have a gusher. Some find it harder to recover from this than others. I think that we as judges have to try as hard as we can to get sensory impressions we can use to comment on the beer. I will also tell the brewer on the scoresheet if I couldn't adequately taste the beer. In fact, the latter happened to me once with a gusher that smelled foul and once with a chile pepper beer that burned my tongue so that I could taste nothing. I wrote something like "this is too hot for me to taste, hopefully the other judges have a stronger tolerance and can give you better feedback". - -- John DeCarlo, Arlington, VA--My views are my own Internet: jdecarlo at burp.org Web: http://www.geocities.com/NapaValley/1113 ------------------------------ From: John DeCarlo Date: Fri, 27 Mar 1998 14:24:04 -0500 Subject: Re: Fecal aromas karnowski at juno.com (Thomas p karnowsk) writes: >Thus, perhaps I will lighten up and point out that some words >are a bit loaded, and utilizing such words should be >done with caution. In fact, I was guilty of this once (that I know about--I got the feedback primarily because the brewer was in my club). I wrote "dirty dishwater" on the scoresheet. I had thought I captured the slightly oily flavor and color in my mind at the time, but came to realize I was only being insulting. I should have clearly mentioned a gray-brown color and whatever specific flavors I sensed. I apologized and have worked hard ever since to try and read my comments with the brewer's eyes. However, this is a communications process, and we never know when those we speak to understand what we mean to say. I think Thomas correctly points out that context can make a big difference. I try to add more words to comments that point out flaws and will be taken negatively. - -- John DeCarlo, Arlington, VA--My views are my own Internet: jdecarlo at burp.org Web: http://www.geocities.com/NapaValley/1113 ------------------------------ From: Dave Sapsis Date: Fri, 27 Mar 1998 11:28:55 -0800 Subject: Date: Fri, 27 Mar 1998 11:28:55 -0800 Randy evokes two issues regarding the manner in which the BJCP program evaluates testtakers: turn-around time, and quality of feedback. I think it is important for all to recognize that in general, the two are inversely related, ie, the better review and commentary the exam group does the longer it is likely to take to get both formal and informal knowledge of how you did. It is my belief that taking a bit longer while providing significant feedback to the examinee is well worth it. The kinds of things that can be suggested to the examinee can really help them become better skilled judges. I know when I got my RTP, there were two sentences on it. Knowing firsthand what it takes to grade and effectively comminicate feedback, it is not at all surprising that we are running around 3 months to get official resposes back to folks. Think about it: 1.exam taken. 2. mailed to Exam Director. 3. Copies sent to Graders. 4. Review, Grade and Initiate RTP. 5 Send to Associate Director for review. 6. Send to Director. 7. finalize score and RTP. 8. Send to Program Administrator. 9. Send to examinee. Thats a lot of steps. We all have other jobs too. I know that if weren't for the leadership exhibited by the Exam Co-Direcors and their selfless and tireless efforts, the BJCP program probably would have floundered. Instead were are making the program work, as evidenced by the quantity (record numbers!) and quality of the new members coming out of the program. I, as a judge coordinator for competitions, welcome this bigtime. Hats off and Mugs tipped to Jay and Scott, and the whole gang associated with the exam review. And lets not forget Russ, who somehow keeps track of everything. Now if I could just get my chapters for the studyguide done....... cheers, - --dave ------------------------------ End of judge-digest V1 #1557 **************************** Send subscription cancellations & changes to judge-request at synchro.com. Messages sent to the wrong address will be ignored.