Upcoming Events!
2016 Winter Party – January 21st 2017 @ noon – Location Announcement Soon
2016 High Gravity Beer Competition – Must be brewed in 2016 – Must be higher than 7% ABV.
Continue reading November 2016 Re-Cap and Important Information
All posts by Perrin Bishop-Wright
September 2016 Recap and Upcoming Events
September 1st, we had a great gathering at Steel Toe Brewing Company. We had a fantastic turn out and closed down the tap room. As well, September this year we hosted the Big River Beer Homebrew Competition.
Big River Beer Homebrew Competition
On September 24th and 25th, we held our annual homebrew competition. Here are some of the highlights.
August 2016 Recap & Upcoming Events
August in the Twin Cities is one of the most fantastic times of the year! One of the many reasons is at the end of the month is the Minnesota State Fair. There, you can see giant swine, butter sculpted heads, anything you can dream of on a stick, live music and great Minnesota craft beer. As well, the results of the MN State Fair Homebrew Competition results are posted. A big shout out and congratulations to NBA members Bryce Larson, Tim Stuemke, Matthew Tjosaas, Steve Towey and Erin Towey for placing in the Minnesota State FairHome Brew Competition!
On August 4th a small but motley crew of NBA’res met at Indeed Brewing Company to attempt our monthly taproom take over. Alas, we were dwarfed by large group of what appeared to be conference goers. While out numbered it did not deter us having good beer, great conversation and an all around good time.
August 20th the NBA was at the Nordeast Farmers Market, to brew, recruit and socialize. While a good time was had, you can never predict the weather.
August Meeting Re-cap
August 18th the NBA convened at East Side Neighborhood Services for our monthly meeting. We welcomed new attendees and touched on what had happen since the last meeting, including barrel fills of the Hobo and Koval barrels and the summer party.
Nick McLawhorn also shard with us a small experiment he had done, which was how long the same beer had been dry hopped.
Upcoming Educational Topics
Saisons – Sept
Diastatic power of differing malt – Oct
Base Malt Experiment – Nov Please sign up if you are interested in participating in this.
August Education Topic – Brew the same beer.
We had eight members brew the same exact recipe, using the same exact malt, hops, water and yeast. All from the same source. A huge thank you to Matt T, Aaron H, Nick, Steve, Bryce, Aaron D, Matt P and Eric for brewing for this!
10lbs Golden Promise
1lb Golden Naked Oats
1.25oz of EKG @ 60min
.5oz of EKG @ 20min
.5oz of EKG @ flameout
Danstar BRY-97 Dry Yeast (No rehydrate)
8.25 Gallons Kandiyohi Spring Water
Needless to say it was surprising to see the difference. The major one that stuck out was the difference in ferment characteristic, which after some discussion was thought to be due to the age of the dry yeast. (Always check the dates on your yeast!) Another fantastic experiment and conversation.
Upcoming Events and Important Dates
Sept. 15th 7PM – Monthly Meeting @ East Side Neighborhood Services
Sept. 24th and 25th 9AM till 5PM (both days) – NBA Big River Homebrew Competition! We need volunteers. Please sign up if you can help.
Sept. 28th 7PM – NBA NHC 2017 Planning @ Fulton Brewing.
Oct 6th 7PM – October Taproom Takeover @ Surly Brewing Company
Oct. 22nd 1-4PM – Eastside Neighborhood Services – Nordeast Big River Beer Festival.
July 2016 Recap
Ah… July! What a fantastic month!
July 7th, the NBA had our monthly tap room takeover at Bauhaus Brew Labs, and we had an awesome turnout! Three picnic tables plus!
July is also our Summer Party/BBQ + Small (6% or less) beer competition. President Aaron DeBoer hosted us. A number of members brewed on the club system. As well we had homebrew beer brats, burgers, grilled corn, as well as many other of the delicious delicacies of a summer BBQ. Congrats to Mike Colling, who’s Simco Smash won first place in the small beer comp.
May 2016 Recap
In May we had a fun month. We kicked it off with a tap-room take over of Dangerous Man. We had a good turn out of a very social and casual group. We then proceeded that weekend to have an awesome presence at the annual AHA Big Brew Day. We showed up at Northern Brewer Minneapolis and brewed on the club system an American Pale Ale. 
As well, at our monthly meeting we discussed for an education topic, the effects of first wort hopping. Matt Price gave a good talk and samples on the difference.
April 2016 Re-cap
April was a fun month at the NBA. Here is a run down of things that we did.
Social Science – Fermentation Informational Beer Fest @ Science Museum of Minnesota
A handful of members came out to represent the NBA at the Science Museum of Minnesota’s annual Social Science – Fermentation Informational. We hosted a booth on the science of Malt. We had an information poster and supplied malt and a mill to explain what malt is in the process of brewing, what it tastes like if one was incline to try it, and a mill to crush malt, because that is what brewers do!
Monthly Meeting Recap – April 21st @ East Side Neighborhood Services
March 2016 Re-cap
Spring is here! Which means brewing season is upon us, especially for those of us who brew outside! To get everyone fired up, here is what it coming up, and what we did in March.
Upcoming Events
- April 6th-comedy showcase@ Lake Monster 8pm
- NBA Taproom Takeover – April 7th 7PM @ Able Seedhouse and Brewery. Wear your NBA Gear!
- April 14th Science Museum of Minnesota – Social Science Fermentation Informational 4pm-10. We will be doing a presentation on Malt. If you are interested in volunteering please contact Tyler (tylerabye@gmail.com).
- AHA’s Big Brew Day! May 7th 10am @ Northern Brewer Minneapolis! Get all of the deals here.
March Meeting Notes – March 17th 7PM @ Midwest Supplies
February 2016 Re-cap
First and foremost, a huge thank you and shout-out to Northern Brewer Minneapolis! They hosted us for our February meeting and did a fantastic education discussion on packaging beer. It was awesome to get tips on kegging, bottle/keg carbonating and conditioning, and bottle filling to touch on a few.
2016 – Year of the Experiments. The Executive committee met to discuss the year, and we are moving forward in doing member driven, documented experiments. If you have an experiment that you would like to do, please reach out to the community for any support or brewing you might need. You can find the latest information on the 2016 Experiments page.
As well, in 2016 we are bringing the Taproom Take Over back! Every first Thursday of the month, we encourage all members to show up at a taproom to socialize and proudly display our NBA apparel. All events are going to be posted on the Club Calendar.
2015 Single Hop Tasting Gallery
A big thank you to Northgate Brewing for making wort and hosting us for the tasting it was a pretty epic evening! Listed bellow is the list of what was tasted and my personal tasting notes.
- Nelson Sav. : Slight white wine. Fruit.
- Motueka: Slight cirtus flavor.
- Rakau: Plesant, not super bitter. Cirtus and fruit.
- Waimea: Strange and intense fruit and citrus flavors, pine finish.
- Wakatu: Clean citrus/lime flavors.
- Galaxy: Nice tropical fruit flavors
- Amarillo: Smells like Something off. Jules says it smells/tastes like Buttercups paws. Nice citrus flavors.
- Equinox: Cirtus tropical flavors.
- Jarrylo: Great hoppy fruit favor.
- Zythos: Love the fruit pine balance.
- El Dorado: More fruit that orange citurs than expected
- Azacca:Tropical fruit… yes please.
- Saaz: Classic Saaz… I mean fugle.
- Pilgram: Something wrong, berry but off flavors… cheese? old hops? Yup.
- Ahtanum: Way more berry and fruit than citrus.
- Warrior: Fruit but not great.
- Brewers Gold: Smokey and blackberry. Something wrong with the smoke…
- Horizon: Cheesy aroma, clean bittering flavor.
- CTZ: Tastes like CTZ.
- Chinook: Acetaldehyde
- Simcoe: No cat pee, surprisingly good.
May Recap
May was another fantastic month of events for the Nordeast Brewers Alliance. There were a number of important things that we participated in.
Friends of the Mississippi
President De Boer went to the Friends of the Mississippi to not only represent the NBA but also to bring back some information to share with the club on how we can be more friendly to the ol’ Miss.
Koval Barrel Empty, fill, and the lack of…
In the middle of May the empty and fill of the Koval Barrel (Barrel Project 3.0) was slated and prepared for. What we were not prepared for was the extreme pediococcus infection that was in the Imperial Red ale. It seems that some members’ previous barley wine that was in the Koval barrel was also seemed to be infected. So, it was not emptied and filled with delicious double IPA. It now will get emptied and filled with an acid wash. Once the acid wash has some time to soak in the barrel, the barrel will be filled with a brett & lacto sour beer.
Community Hops
PAD-B (President Aaron De Boer) and Tim Stuemke and fellow NBA member and Community Hops President , Bryce Larson represented the NBA at the Community Hops Member and Fund Drive. NBA beer was poured and very well received.
Farmers Market
For the opening of the Nordeast Farmers market on May 30th, we had our first representation coordinated by Matt Price. A great time was had and we picked up a few new members to boot!
Meeting recap
Our May meeting at Eastside Neighborhood Services was planned to have Rahr Malting do the education topic, but unfortunately there was a snafu and we had to change up. Fortunately it gave us the time to sample a number of members beers and give some very constructive feedback. As well we got to taste Richard Brower’s Northern Brown ale aged on Blackswan Barrel Alternative Cherry Wood.
As well we discussed past and upcoming events, including our upcoming June meeting which will be our 2015 Single Hop Experiment. First, and very important, dry hop your one ounce of hops 7 days before packaging. The first of possibly two tastings will be at Northgate Brewing Company on June 16th, 6:30PM, 783 Harding St NE, Minneapolis, MN 55413.
Aaron De Boer posed the idea of purchasing a CO2 racking cane for transferring the beer out of our barrels. The purchase of $270 was brought to a vote and was vote to purchase. The idea is to provide a cleaner, oxygen reduced transfer process. As well, we are hoping that it reduces the possibility of contamination between the barrels.
