April Meeting

We want to give a big thanks to Bryan Simpson for his excellent presentation on malt varieties.  We have posted his hand-out on our website so you can review it later and employ all it's useful information the next time you are putting together a recipe.

Please take a moment to fill out our survey so we can keep putting together quality presentations and meetings.  Your feedback helps make the club better and more exciting!

Big Brew 2014

Once again we are happy to announce our partnership with Bell's General Store in order to host another AHA Big Brew event!  For those not already familiar, Big Brew coresponds with National Homebrew Day (Saturday, May 3rd) and is sponsored by the American Homebrewers Association. The idea is to celebrate all things homebrew by trying to gather as many brewers together to simultaneously brew as many gallons of beer as possible. We hope to have all-grain, extract and everything in between going that day.

Festivities will begin at approximately 10am as our all-grain get started and will go through the afternoon. At noon there will be a toast that will be held all the way across the country. We will be arranging all the brew rigs in the courtyard west of the General Store. Even if you don't brew yourself, this is perfect opportunity to see how the process and learn more about how the beer you enjoy is made. Likewise, you can invite friends, family and co-workers to introduce them to the fine art of homebrewing. If you are interested in volunteering to brew that day, please contact us and we'll get you all set up. There are three AHA-provided recipes but you can choose to brew anything your heart desires.

Growlers Outing

Kalamazoo is once again home to our very own minor league baseball team: The Kalamazoo Growlers.  We are currently organizing a club outing for their home game on Saturday, May 31st at 7pm.  We will be reserving an area in the grandstand specifically for our club.  Tickets are for sale in advance for $12 which includes admission as well as your choice of a hot dog, chips and drink OR Growlers hat.  You can sign up at the next meeting or at Tempo Vino Winery in downtown Kalamazoo.  This is a family-friendly event so we're welcoming spouses and children to join all the fun!

Great Taste of the Midwest

As some of you may be aware, fellow homebrew club The Madison Homebrewers and Tasters Guild put on one of the best beer festivals in the country every year in August in Madison, WI.  This year the date is Saturday, August 9th.  Tickets for this event are extremely hard to come by and there is a lottery system to keep it fair.  However, we are lucky enough to once again have a set of 25 tickets set aside for our members.  We will be doing our own internal lottery at the May meeting.  You must be a member in good standing prior to the lottery.  The cost of each ticket is $60 and you must have cash, check or credit card ready at the meeting or you ticket will go to someone else.  If fewer than 25 members are interested in tickets, we will have a secondary lottery for any remaining tickets.  We still strongly recommend attempting to acquire tickets through the general lottery as there is no guarantee you will get one through KLOB.  If there are extra tickets, we will work with you to help find them a good home to a fellow member or their family.

NHC First Round Winners

Congrats to KLOB National Homebrew Competition Winners Elijah Eversole (2nd place with an American Brown) and David Curtis (2nd place with a Mead) in Chicago Regional.  You can see the full list of winners at the AHA's website. Cheers to all KLOB 2014 entrants!

Pale Ale Bittering Experiment

Speaking of David Curtis, he wants to extend his gratitude to everyone who helped with his hop experiment.  For those that participated, the A beer was the Mash Hopped beer, B was the First wort hop, and C was the 60 minute boil. Also, the presentation will be Saturday, June 14 at 9:00am for those that are interested and will be at the conference. He hopes to have a new set of batches to serve to those in attendance there.

National Homebrew Conference

We have set up a special newsletter strictly for NHC business.  If are attending the event but you have not already signed up, please to do so ASAP.  If you would like to volunteer beer for us to share at the event, you can sign up for that as well.

20th Annual KLOB Roast

Mark your calendars for Saturday, September 20th.  That date for this year's KLOB Roast: a celebration of BBQ and homebrew!  This is the 20th anniversary of the event so we are hoping to put together something special to commemorate the milestone.  If you are interested in volunteering to help organize, please let us know.  We are also looking creative individuals to help with this year's artwork.  If you or someone you know has ideas, please send them our way.