August Lehigh Valley Homebrewers Newsletter
Greetings Brewers!
Our next meeting will be held Tuesday, August 25th at 7:30 PM. Please RSVP here and we'll send you the Zoom link.
Agenda:
Announcements
Style Deep Dive: 29A: Fruit Beer
Style Deep Dive: 26D: Belgian Dark Strong
Education session: Panel Discussion: Brewing with Fruit
Style Deep Dive: 21A: American IPA
Style Deep Dive: 27: Historical Styles: Gose
For the Style Deep Dives, it will be helpful to have a sample of the style to taste alongside the description. We are suggesting three beers that use the same fruit, blood oranges:
Belgian Dark Strong: Fegley's Orange Black
American IPA: 21st Amendment Blood Orange Brew Free Or Die
Gose: Anderson Valley Blood Orange Gose
The beers can be found at Tanczo's (Bethlehem) and other stores. Fegley's beer will have to be purchased directly from them. Larger supermarkets should also have these or options in these styles. If you can't get these specific beers look for other fruit forward beers.
Future Meeting Locations:
September 29th @ TBD
Meetings are open to anyone (21 and older) who home brews (beer, wine, mead) or is interested in learning about home brewing. Our club has over 30 certified judges and several members who have "gone pro" by opening their own brewery, meadery, or distillery! - So bring your latest craft creation and get some constructive feedback and/or accolades!
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Special Thanks
Thanks to Joe Kalinosky, Bryan Hoke, and Dave Barber for leading the educational session on brewing with oxygen and the style deep dives at the July Meeting! Joe's presentation is located here:
LVHB-2020-07_German Dark Lagers Deep Div
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Download • 1.01MB
The Blow Off - Below are links shared by members during the last meeting. Relevant or not.
Beer History:
Prost! - Recommended Reading on German Beer History
Oxygen in Beer:
YouTube video showing closed transfer from a Fermzilla to a keg. That part starts at about 3:40
YouTube video from Genus Brewing about using asorbic acid as an antioxidant in your beer
Spunding Valve used to control pressurized transfers
Miscellaneous and Weird:
"Grain to Glass" Barleywine in 10 days
Put it on a shirt!
We're working on some ideas for a new club shirt (and other club merchandise), lead by the efforts of our VP, Ken Solt. We're asking for your suggestions and will be putting some ideas up in the Forum on the website. Here are some of the clever suggestions that have been proposed:
Homebrew: The perfect beer, no road trip required.
Never trust someone that doesn't brew their own beer
Good people drink good beer. -Hunter S Thompson
I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts, and beer. —Abraham Lincoln
Sometimes when I reflect back on all the beer I drink I feel ashamed. Then I look into the glass and think about the workers in the brewery and all of their hopes and dreams. If I didn't drink this beer, they might be out of work and their dreams would be shattered. Then I say to myself, it is better that I drink this beer and let their dreams come true than be selfish and worry about my liver. ~Jack Handey
During a quarantine, I’m fully prepared to brew gallons and gallons of delicious craft beer. What are you going to do, watch Tiger King?
How many beer taps are in your house? or... How many beer taps per square foot?
Keep the suggestions coming! We'll put a vote up next month!
We're also looking into the work shirts.
Homebrew Equipment for Sale
Checkout the website forum for some recent posts of homebrewers selling unneeded equipment. You won't find a better deal!
Member Benefits
We recently refreshed our club roster with our sponsoring Homebrew stores. If you have registered with our website, you will see a "member-2020" badge associated with your account. This badge grants access to the Member's Benefit section of the website. Also, tasting glasses have been ordered! Thank you to everyone that paid their dues on time!
The discount code for Malt Madness entries ($3 off each entry) has been added to the Member Information page.
A discount code for NextLevelOak.com has been added.
We're starting a new Pallet Buy List of Interest. Once we have enough interest we will coordinate the next order. See the Members page for details.
The Pallet Buy List of Interest is currently at 19 sacks. Not quite there yet...
Keystone Homebrew Supply offers 10% off online and in-store purchases for LVHB members as well as a points based loyalty reward program. They offer weekly local delivery on Saturdays at Bonn Place in Bethlehem (it's one of the shipping options available at checkout - it's super easy, just place your order by Thursday) Keystone offers full sacks of grain as well as a large selection of brewing and wine making equipment. Also, for most local competitions they provide a drop off point so you don't have to mail in your entries! https://www.keystonehomebrew.com/ Hop and Grain offers members 20% off purchases on their online store, free shipping and flexible local pick-up options. You'll find them very accommodating, even if you require a special order. https://hopandgrain.us/
There's no excuse not to brew because you can't get ingredients or equipment! Thank you to the local shops that support our club!
See all the benefits of membership as well as how to join here.
UPCOMING CLUB EVENTS
We'll let you know as soon as we can confirm info. Hopefully soon! Check out the Events page for the festivals tentatively scheduled for later this summer.
OUR BREWERS (are awesome)
We look forward to posting our award winning brewers here again soon once competitions resume. In the meantime, our brewers are being awesome in other ways!ne
If you are a listener of the Brulosphy Podcast, you may have recognized the name of Lehigh Valley Homebrewer, Ryne Gade, who's question was featured in episode #150. What did Ryne ask? Check it out here (Ryne's question is at the 43 minute mark).
CLUB COMPETITIONS
Bracket Competition
Round 2 entries are due for September. If we can't meet in person, we'll judge the weekend before the September 29th meeting.
Black is Beautiful Challenge
We'll be presenting our selected charity and the label design at the August meeting. Please join the meeting to give any feedback so we can adjust before sending off to the printer! See the latest information on the competition web page!
Iron Brewer Challenge
Cancelled for 2020.
Clone Competition
TBD for now
UPCOMING COMPETITIONS
Full list is available here.
It's happening!
Last Call to get your Entries Registered!
CLUB COMMUNICATION
The details for most of our happenings (news, events, etc.) will either be included in the monthly newsletter or will be found on the LVHB Website Club Info page. More random thoughts, photos, and links will be shared via the club Facebook page. Find photos of our brewing activities on Instagram! @lehighvalleyhomebrewers
LVHB T-Shirts
LVHB t-shirts are available for sale. Please see a club officer for more information and to purchase. Styles and pricing are as follows:
T-shirts - blue only, Short sleeve L-XL
$10