Category: Monthly Meeting Preview

Brewers, It’s getting colder, so what a great time to focus on cold fermented beers, and get brewing for the June Club comp! It’s Lager month at the Canberra Brewers meeting, 5 June 2025 at the  Polish White Eagle Club.

The raffle will have some great German-Style lagers (some dark for the Winter) as well as some lager yeast, thanks to Mashematics. Don’t forget to bring your latest and greatest brews to share. Extra NOOKIE points for those who bring a keg the share. We will also have some of our club barrel project beer on tap.

Education

This month’s education session will be on tips for brewing lagers. Although simple to drink and readily available, this style can be deceptively difficult to brew well. The seasoned lager brewers of the club will highlight common issues and provide tips to brewing better lagers.

Six-pack swap

The six-pack swap is on again! Add your beer details to the FB or the forum, bring your 6 beers to the meeting and walk away with a mixed six-pack to enjoy at your leisure!

Raffle

The raffle will be on again with great prizes up for grabs! Thanks to our sponsors who donate prizes or provide significant discounts on great products. Don’t forget to bring your latest brew along to earn NOOKIE points with raffle tickets purchased.

Club Competition

Canberra Brewers Winter Comp is on Saturday, 28 June at BentSpoke Budding Cells. We need your beers, ciders and meads so please jump onto the comp website and enter. We also need volunteers for judging and stewarding. A great opportunity to get experience and be a part of the comp. More details including beer styles for this competition are at the website Canberra Brewers Winter Comp – Brew Competition Online Entry & Management

Beer school’s out!

Congratulations to the seven club members who sat the Beer Judge Certification Program Judging Exam earlier this month. After months (and in some cases years) of preparation, Amber, Ken, Frank, James, David, Richard and Ed judged six beers in 90 minutes, without style guides, and without any prior knowledge of the beers they had to judge. They will be assessed on their scoring, perception, descriptive ability, feedback and completeness and communication, with their scoresheets compared to those of three proctors: Weenie, Stretch and David. Thanks to the proctors and our stewards Nicole, Stephen and Chuck, and the brewers who donated beer for the exam.

A HUGE thanks to BentSpoke for letting us take over their upstairs bar for a Saturday morning – it was an outstanding venue and a great place to enjoy that first beer you don’t have to judge!

People seated at tables, filling out score sheets while judging beer
Brewers sit the club’s 2025 BJCP Judging Exam at BentSpoke brew pup in Braddon.
People seated at tables judging beer during the BJCP exam
Judging one of the six beers served during the 90-minute exam.
Three people seated around a table, reading, writing and judging beer
Proctors assess one of the beers during the judging exam.
Beer glasses spread around a table at BentSpoke
Cheers! Celebratory beers at BentSpoke.
A man wearing a beanie holds up his phone for a selfie photo while people gather at bar tables in the background
Pencils down! Brewers enjoy that first at BentSpoke pint after the exam.

See you at the June Meeting!

It’s Belgian month at the Canberra Brewers meeting on 1 May 2025 at the Polish White Eagle Club in O’Connor. The six pack swap is on again (sign up on FB or the forum) and the raffle will have some special Belgian treats up for grabs. Don’t forget to bring your latest and greatest brews to share!

Education

This month’s education session will be on beer, breweries and bars of Belgium!! A few lucky Club brewers have recently returned from a European Beer pilgrimage and have brought back some awesome experience and some great prizes for the raffle.

Six pack swap

The six-pack swap is on again! Add your beer details to the FB or the forum, bring your 6 beers to the meeting and walk away with a mixed six-pack to enjoy at your leisure!

Raffle

The raffle will be on again with some special prizes up for grabs! Along with some fantastic Belgian beers from our sponsors, the grand prize will be a Westvleteren 12 gift pack. This beer is almost impossible to get outside of Belgium (I’ve seen them sold for $100 per 330mL bottle in Melbourne)!! Don’t forget to bring your latest brew along to earn NOOKIE points with raffle tickets purchased.

See you at the May Meeting!

Brewers,The next Canberra Brewers meeting on 3 Apr 2025 at the Polish White Eagle Club in O’Connor. This is the first full meeting for the 2025 committee. The six pack swap is on again (sign up on FB or the forum) and the raffle will have a range of amazing prizes up for grabs. Don’t forget to bring your latest and greatest brews to share!

Education

This month’s education session will be presented by Pat and David, demystifying the art of sensory analysis and beer judging. The ability to judge beers is a critical skill for any brewer. It helps you accurately assess your beers to determine if there are any off-flavours or imbalances that you can factor into brewing the best beer possible. Pat and David will take you through some simple tips and tricks to evaluate a beer and use these skills to improve your product!

Six pack swap

The six-pack swap is on again! Add your beer details to the FB or the forum, bring your 6 beers to the meeting and walk away with a mixed six-pack to enjoy at your leisure!

Raffle

The raffle will be on again with great prizes up for grabs! Thanks to our sponsors who often donate prizes or provide significant discounts on great products. Will the committee win again?? Buy some tickets and stick around for the draw at the April meeting. Don’t forget to bring your latest brew along to earn NOOKIE points with raffle tickets purchased.

Club Competition

The Canberra Brewers Autumn Comp. is on this coming Saturday, 29 March 2025 at a location known to those who are judging and stewarding. Thank you to all judges and entrants, and to the club sponsors as well! Results will be announced in due course after the comp, perhaps at the April meeting.

BJCP Judging Exam

The Canberra Brewers have booked a Beer Judge Certification Program judging exam for 10 May 2025 and need 6-12 participants. We will host a series of exam preparation sessions in the weeks leading up to the exam. For more information, and to express interest, send an email to bjcp@canberrabrewers.com.au or check out the recent posts on the Facebook group or club forum.

We need your beers!!!

As we prep to host the BJCP exam, we need home brew good, bad and in between to practice judging and for the exam itself. For the exam, we need about 2L, but for the practice sessions 500mL will be enough. We can keep the submissions anonymous if you prefer, and can provide feedback if you would like. Pat can collect donated beer at the April meeting or arrange to come and collect it.

Welcome to 2025 and another year of brewing!

The club meetings are starting up with our next meeting on 6 February 2025 at the Polish White Eagle Club at the O’Connor shops.

Kurtz is preparing some great learnings for the education session, the six pack swap is back (sign up on FB or the forum) and the raffle will have a range of amazing prizes up for grabs and we will be drawing the NOOKIE raffle.

Plus don’t forget to bring your latest and greatest brews to share!

All for the N.O.O.K.I.E.

The Newcastle Or Otherwise Kind of Interstate Experience is our end-of-year raffle where the lucky winner is welcomed by a brewery (typically somewhere on the east coast) for a brew day and good time.

While the experience is to be finalised, if you bought raffle tickets or have been bringing your beer to the meetings in 2024, then you’re in the raffle and you should come along to the February Meeting!

AGM and Committee positions

With each new year comes a new committee. If you’ve previously thought about volunteering, why not make 2025 the year to give black to the club?

All committee positions are up for re-election, including office bearers (the president, treasurer, social secretary, competition secretary, education officer and editor) and ordinary committee members (the webmaster, assets manager and assistant committee member/s).

If you’re interested in finding out more about these roles, please don’t hesitate to contact one of the current (of previous) committee members.The AGM is scheduled for the March meeting, with more details to come.

A hand holding a plastic cup under a beer tap, pouring a beer.