On Saturday March 25th DOZE once again took part in the Brewing Network’s Spring Brews Festival in Concord’s Todos Santos Plaza. This was the 19th Brewing Network festival. It was a great success, with great weather, fun crowds, and over 30 commercial breweries sharing their beers, including many friends of DOZE, and for the first time, Five Suns Brewing. As has been the norm in the past, DOZE pulled out the stops to continue Mike “Tasty” McDole’s legacy by running ever-popular Tasty’s Tasting Room homebrew booth.

Remember, teams, your Club Team Competition entries are due by March 18th. Unlike previous years, each team will be allowed one (1) entry, so get together with your team mates and decide which of your fermentations will be the one to represent the team. Winners will be announced at the March meeting.

Following several preliminary judging sessions, things got busy on Saturday in the California State Homebrew Competition. This year DOZE had the honor of being the organizers of the competition, and for the first time meads and ciders were included. On this big Day 1 of judging, 155 entries were judged with help from 35 Judges and 22 stewards/staff. Thank you again to Oakland United Beerworks for hosting the event at their warehouse in Oakland’s Jack London Square district, a hub of the city’s beer scene.

Last weekend, DOZE once again enjoyed the opportunity to share our hobby with the public at the Downtown Martinez Zombie Brew Crawl. After several years on hiatus, the event was on once again, and DOZE was invited to take part. Our booth was hosted by Del Cielo Brewing Co., on Escobar St. The sold-out event was a success and we got to have many wonderful conversations with attendees, including a number of past, current, and nascent homebrewers, and distributed dozens of club business cards.

Del Cielo Brewing Co. 🚨 REGISTRATION OPEN 🚨 *Limited ONLY to 50 entries *Drop off window 6/10 – 6/16 *Judging Date 6/18 – 6/26. Awards ceremony June 26th Registration Form https://www.delcielobrewing.com/2022-homebrew-competition/ #delcielobrewing #homebrew #2022 #competition #beer #craftbeer #yum #winner

DOZE members now have access to a Competition Tracker spreadsheet thanks to Tim Murray. Tim says that “Here I will periodically add DOZE, CA, and major national comps. You’re on your own for out of state (for a little help, the AHA competition calendar is also linked on the spreadsheet).” Check the pinned post on the “Competitions” channel on Slack for the link.

Saturday. Feb. 12th, was the perfect culmination of our DOZE 2022 BJCP Mead Classes and Exam. We had 20+ attend the class and had full count for the exam (maximum is 12) + 2 on standby. Thanks to proctors and Gordon and Ashley for helping out with the exam! Looking forward to soon having some new and awesome mead judges on West Coast!

By Matt Bolling, American Homebrewers Association Everyone starts homebrewing for the same reason: beer is awesome! What many people don’t realize at first, though, is that a whole community is devoted to the hobby we all love so much. The easiest way to experience the community-driven side of homebrewing is to check out your local homebrew club’s next meeting. If you’re like me, then you might have mixed feelings about doing this.

The Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP) Beer Style Guidelines are getting an update. According to the BJCP website the 2021 revision is complete and will be published shortly. However, Gordon Strong, Chair of the BJCP Style Guidelines Committee, gives some highlights of what to expect HERE.