Greetings Homebrewers,
Fall is finally upon us! As the leaves and temperature both begin to drop, we outside brewers enter prime brewing season where, just like in the Goldilocks story, it’s not too hot, not too cold, but just right. Like many other craft beer enthusiasts that also means some of my favorite style beers are in fashion, mainly malt forward and spiced fall beers like pumpkin beers, oktoberfests, marzens, and soon stouts, Christmas beers, and winter warmers.
In honor of that glorious gourd that is the pumpkin, our October meeting will be dedicated to the pumpkin beer and the topic of brewing with vegetables. We have a special treat in store, another rare beer tasting! We have managed to obtain a case of the very rare and much sought after St Arnold’s Pumpkinator! The 2015 Pumpkinator currently has a 98% rating on ratebeer.com and is an incredibly difficult beer to get your hands on, even if you live where it is brewed in Houston, TX. It is a 10% imperial stout brewed with a combination of pale two row, caramel and black malts, Cascade and Liberty hops, pumpkin, molasses, brown sugar, spices and dry-spiced. A single batch of Pumpkinator is released every year around October 15 and typically elicits black Friday quality lines of craft beer fans at the liquor stores causing it to sell out roughly 15 minutes after opening. We are incredibly fortunate to have such a rare treat make its way all the way up to Indiana! We will also have a discussion on brewing with vegetables and you are encouraged to bring and share any vegetable beer recipes (and vegetable beers!) that you may have.
In other club news, Learn to Homebrew Day is coming up fast. Learn to Homebrew Day (LTHD) was established by the American Homebrewers Association (AHA) in 1999 to encourage homebrewers to introduce their non-brewer friends and family to the most rewarding hobby, obsession and lifestyle since the beginning of time! This year John Mullins has offered to head the event. We will be brewing at Tieman Chiropractic, 202 S. Fourth St. in Boonville (corner of 4th and Locust). This location is right on the main drag through town, and would be hard to miss by anyone driving by. John will be there by 8:30am, and ready to fire up by 9:00. Restrooms will available to brewers for the day, and John will be bringing his Crank n Stein 3 roll mill with drill, along with RV hoses, charcoal filter, and extension cord (and anything else we may need). John will also be grilling burgers until they run out, since this will be getting into lunch time. A big thanks to John for heading this, and if you have any questions feel free to message or call John Mullins at (812) 217-2552.
Holy Redeemer’s 6th annual Tap and Cork Festival is Saturday November 14th from 6-9 pm. John Mills, the event organizer, will need volunteers and beer donations, so keep an eye on the OVHA chat room, set a keg or two aside, and mark your calendars.
After the Tap and Cork, the next club beer festival will be the Christ the King Winterfest on January 9th from 6-11 pm. Nate Ferrell is the event coordinator on this one and it will also be the OVHA’s first time participating in this festival. We always have a long period of downtime in the winter and spring where no beer festivals are going on so I am pleased that our club has decided to add another festival to our list.
Thanks to everyone who volunteered at the Evansville Museum’s Brew Ha-Ha and the Wesselman’s Wandering Owl. Both organizations are treasures in our community and by donating our time and beer to these events we are ensuring their continued prosperity. Both groups have expressed their sincere gratitude to the OVHA for our donation and we will continue to support them in the future. We are working to repair some minor equipment issues and create a post event procedures list for cleaning the equipment for better efficiency in the future. And also, we may or may not have misplaced the OVHA pop up signage, so if you happened to take that home after the event please let someone know.
Reminder, next month’s meeting will be held early on November 18th as we have in the past due to Thanksgiving. At the November meeting we will be collecting your Big Turkey submissions and nominating next year’s Board. If you want to be a board member or think you know a good candidate please let us know, and don’t be afraid to nominate yourself as well. We are always desperately in need of members willing to put forth their time and effort into the monster that is coordinating the OVHA club meetings and events.
In a final note, I am still on track to meet my new year’s resolution goal of brewing more by brewing at least once a month every month for the year. I hope everyone in the club is having as much luck with their “brew year” resolutions. To me there is nothing more wonderful then brew day. I love that sweet smell of the wort boiling and the spice of hops. I love sharing my finished beer with my friends, family, and strangers at the beer festivals. So for those that haven’t brewed in a while, there is no better time than now to dust off the old kettle and start making something special!
Don’t forget your canned good and I’ll see you at the Wednesday meeting!
Cheers!
Sky Buttrum
