Miasmatic Review

Beer Tasting successfull.

This last weekend I hosted my first ever Beer Tasting. I’ve attended Beer Tastings, but I’ve never hosted one. The ones I attended were always a formal event. An attendant or host would serve 4-6 fluid ounces of beer in a sampler glass and we’d all sit at a table and discuss what we liked and didn’t like about the beer. Each person would have a scorecard and we would discuss the beer to death. I liked these tastings because I was able to sample beers I had never had before, but to be honest I really didn’t like the atmosphere. So for my tasting I decided to go with something a whole lot less formal.

We were all in my back yard. Most of the time we sat around a portable fire pit Ktreva and I had as we reviewed the beer. I had grilled up burgers, brats, hot dogs and Chicken Asiago Cheese Bratwursts. We had potato salad, barbeque baked beans, chips and other food. Of course there were saltines and pretzels to clean the pallet before the tasting. So as people arrived, everyone could eat and make sure they weren’t drinking on an empty stomach.

I did print out some interesting beer facts I had found online and gave each participant a copy, which I was made fun of for doing. Honestly, I really didn’t care. I think two or three people actually liked the information in there and took the packet home. Others burned them or threw them away. Either way I was okay with it.

During one of the breaks in the tasting we did some brief tomahawk throwing. Apparently my hawk block had seen too many days outside and one too many tomahawks. It started cracking and coming apart until finally it shattered when Wes of Bodhran Roll, Please sunk a hawk into it at 7 paces. Thus ending the ‘hawk games.

Overall the “skilled” group of tasters was Shadoglare, Labgirl (Shadoglare’s new GF), Wes, Harvey, Ktreva, Noah, Bruce, Wil, Tina and myself. Graumagus showed up right at the end with two more beers and only really was able to review 2 beers… the two he brought.

Now you have to keep in mind, this was not a beer review. It was a beer tasting. Basically it’s to decide whether or not you like a beer. We did rate the beer, but that was more for fun than anything else. Plus by the time we hit the 10th beer, our taste buds were pretty much broken, even after cleansing the pallet. Below is a list of beers I order tasted along with the average rating, including highest and lowest scores.

Dragon’s Milk: Average: 8.5. Highest: 9.5(twice) Lowest: 7.5
Dirty Helen: Average: 3.5 Highest: 5 Lowest: 0 (Yes, someone gave it a zero)
Dragon’s Gold: Average: 4 Highest: 7.5 Lowest: 2
Badger Porter: Average: 5 Highest: 8 Lowest: 2
1554 Brussels style Black Ale: Average: 6 Highest: 8 Lowest: 4
Headless Man Amber Ale: Average: 1.5 Highest: 3 Lowest 0 (Twice)
Mocha Porter (Rogue): Average: 4 Highest: 7 Lowest .5
Bully Porter: Average: 4.5 Highest: 6.5 (Twice) Lowest:0
Black River Red (Pioneer) Average: 5 Highest: 7 Lowest: 4
SummerShandy: Average: 3.5 Highest: 7.5 Lowest 0
Oscars Stout: Average: 7 Highest: 8 Lowest: 6
Celis Grand Cru Average: 1.5 Highest: 2 Lowest: 1

The best beer of the weekend was Dragon’s Milk provided by myself with an average rating of 8.5. The lowest is actually a toss up between Headless Man provided by Harvey and Celis Grand Cru provided by Graumagus. Honestly if you want to be fair, Celis Grand Cru was the worst of the two. If you subtract the highest and the lowest rating Celis scores a 1.5; Headless Man scores a 2.

Now we did rinse and dry the glassware between beers, but by the end of the night the rinse water and the standard American Lager we drank the rest of the night looked the same. Can you guess which one is the beer?

sorry about the crappy quality of the pic, but you get the idea.

Sunday was more of the same for those that wanted to come back. We really didn't drink different kinds of beers, but we did drink a lot of beer. approximately 4 cases to be exact.

Overall it was a good time. The feedback I received was very positive, including multiple recommendations that I do this every year. Which, Ktreva and I discussed it and decided that we are going to host a Beer Tasting every year. It is going to be an annual event every Memorial Day weekend. Including possibly a second one in the fall, possibly coinciding the Blogcrawl.

So if you are interested in getting on the invite list, let me know.