Maifest

I didn't plan it this way, but this weekend ended up being sort of a Maifest Celebration. I'm doing a lot of yard work: cutting down around 30 trees, planting some new ones, getting the hop plants started, and mowing of course. One task I've been waiting for the right weather for was putting in a dog door so the dogs can be outside more. Since I need to have the flaps open for a while to teach them to go through it, I needed it to be warm enough, but not real buggy yet. It's only borderline on the temperature, but I needed to get a jump on the later.

I brewed an American Stout yesterday. It's loosely based on Rogue's Shakespeare Stout. That beer is one of my favorite of the style and it's actually the commercial example listed by the BJCP. We'll see how it turns out.

I entered a few beers into the Midwest Region of the National Homebrew Conference competition. It's the largest and most prestigious homebrew competition in the US and possibly the world. Round one is spread out among 10 regions. This year they maxed out at 700 entries per region. Each reagion advances the top 3 beers for each of the 23 main beer styles to the national comp in June. I scored a 35 out of 50 for my experimental Jalapeno-Berry Blonde Ale, which is a decent score. I entered it in category 23, specialty beer, which is sort of a grab bag of beers that don't fit in any of the other styles. That makes it a very difficult one to judge and it tends to be one of the most competitive categories. So I was very happy with the score considering it was a total experiment for me. Unfortunately, it was not good enough to make the top 3.

Last night Michelle and I attended a beer and food tasting hosted by Tyler and Downings, a restaurant in Anamosa. They featured beers by Summit, which is based in Minnesota and is one of the oldest craft breweries in the US. They have a solid lineup of beers and have resisted the trend to make over-the-top beers. As a result, their beers can seem a little bland to the hard core craft beer drinker. But I admire them for sticking to their guns and making beers that are solid style examples. The food pairings were excellent. The chef at T&D did a really great job of combining unique and very tasty foods with each beer. 

Today I'm taking a few beers down to the Amana Colonies to enter them in the Thirsty Classic. That's a local homebrew comp organized by the club in Iowa City. We'll probably stick around for a bit and see what's going on with the Maifest Celebration going on in Amana this weekend.

On the way home we're going to take a slight detour and stop in at Red's Alehouse in North Liberty. Red's has become the best beer bar in the area with a rotating lineup of beers on tap that is really quite good. I wish Cedar Rapids had a place that would try to server something beyond the Bud, Miller, Coors beers. There are a couple that are starting to experiment, but none can compare to Red's. Their food is quite good as well. Among the beers I'm hoping to try today include:

• Toppling Goliath Naughty 90
• Ommegang/Brasserie d’Achouffe Gnomegang
• Haandbryggeriet Dark Force
• Dieu du Ciel Aphrodisiaque

Yesterday I kegged the English Bitter that I brewed a couple of weeks ago. I'll keg the Hefewiezen in the next few days. I need to get both of these beers ready for a major beer festival in Cedar Rapids on May 14th.

Randy