Indiana Beer News – Feb 5

Great Crescent Brewery will start canning in about a week.

Sun King, er Clayton Robinson, gets ink in the Indianapolis Business Journal. article Bonus video talking about business plans and stuff.

Ron Smith sends lots of AHA news. Contact him for more info about any of these items.

BJCP Study Group and Exam in Indy - For those of you interested in the BJCP (Beer Judge Certification Program),  there will once again be a study group and an exam in the Indy area. The study group will meet on Saturdays at the Payless Liquors in Carmel.  he dates are Apr 9, Apr 23, Apr 30, May 7, and May 12 (a Thursday).  Study group sessions run from around 12:30 - 6:00 (final times TBD).  The exam will be held at the same location on Saturday, May 14 at 1:00.  The cost for the study group is approx $150, plus $50 for the exam (assuming a first time taker). The exam is limited to only 12 test takers, and the study group members will be placed first.

National Homebrew Competition First Round in Indy - The American Homebrewers Association (AHA) hosts the largest homebrew competition in the world, with thousands of entries. To handle this number of entries, there are various First Round Competition sites that a beer must place first, second or third in, in order to advance to the finals. The finals this year will be at the AHA National Conference in San Diego in mid June.  One of the first round competition sites is here in Indy and myself and Brian Steuerwald are the coordinators, along with the help of many other volunteers. This competition will be held at Sun King Brewery on April 15, 16, 17. It is not an open event, but we do need BJCP judges, stewards and other volunteers.

Beer MBA Classes Start This Week - Be sure to sign up right away as I expect this series to sell out. The Friday night series is a great way to end the work week and start the weekend!  See the website, www.BeerMBA.com/classes.php for all the details and to sign up.  Note the new location at the Payless Liquors in Carmel, near the Meijer.  Dates are Feb 11, 18, and 25, each from 6-9pm. Cost is $135 for all 3 classes (or $50 per class).

The classes are designed to be taken in sequence and to take all 3 of them and get your Beer MBA Certificate.  Class 1 is a prerequisite for the other 2 classes, so once you have taken it, you can take the other classes in a future series if you have date conflicts.

Belgium Beer Trip - Summer 2011 - July 24 - Aug 2 - With the way the economy has been, I had somewhat decided to hold off on these trips until things improved, but there seems to be a lot of interest now, so this Belgium trip could be on for this summer. If you have an interest, let me know as soon as possible.  If I can get at least a small group together, we can make it happen.  See  http://www.beermba.com/belgium-beer-vacations.php for details. The dates will soon be changed to Sunday, July 24 to Tuesday August 2, and all the other details are the same. This is an incredible trip that is certainly beer focused, but there is much more to it than beer. Great food, culture, historical sites and of course great beer await.

IUPUI Beer Class - 3 Credit Hour Course - If any of you attend IUPUI or know someone who does, be sure to check out TCEM 328, Introduction to Microbrewing, which is a class I teach.  It is a much more in-depth version of my Beer MBA classes, and includes field trips to breweries and distributors, more information about food and beer pairing, etc.

Falls City Beer gets ink in the Louisville Courier Journal. article “Falls City is sold at some 100 places. Easterling, who lives in Anchorage, said production could triple — to 240 barrels per month — by Kentucky Derby time.”

Odors were rated as more pleasant when sniffed through the right nostril and were more accurately named when sniffed through the left nostril. - Herz, R. S., McCall, C., & Cahill, L. (1999). Hemispheric lateralization in the processing of odor pleasantness versus odor names. Chemical Senses, 24, 691–695.