Cedar Rapids Brewing Society

My name is Bret - I'm 42, married with a 3 year old and a 1 year old. I've been brewing with extract kits for about a year. Right now I have some cherry wheat in bottles and a Liberty Cream Ale kit waiting to be started. I'm still using my starter kit, but it is starting to show some wear and tear and will have to be replaced soon.

I was in the Navy for almost 10 years - which is probably why the title says FNG (if you don't know, I can't type it out here). I've lived in the area for 8 years now, currently in Swisher. I like the area and will probably stay at least till my kids are out of school.

Guess that is enough about me.

Tap, tap, tap - is this thing on?

Some of us, even non-navy guys like me, have been called the FNG before.

Welcome.

We hope to see you at an upcoming meeting.

tony b

Hi Bret.

Welcome to the website, and the club.

Looking forward to sharing a beer with ya.

Tom

Sorry that I missed your post. Feel free to come to the April meeting. If you are interested in joining the club, you can tap into my stash of speciality grains that we have. For example, we have roasted barley, crystal 20L, 60L and 120L and chocolate malt just to name a few. Hope to see next Thursday.

Dave

Hey - Thanks!

I'm not doing grain yet, but that is the direction I'm headed. I've been noticing that all my extract brews have a certain flavor in common - they just don't seem to be as crisp as I would like. I mean, different kits taste differently, but there is some kind of a sort of syrupy smell/flavor in common. Could be my technique...

One of the guys in the club, Mark Rippe, extract brews and has won many awards. You should talk to him about what he does.

Dave

Dave, if you happen to see this before the meeting, can I trade a couple pounds of Aromatic for a couple pounds of 120L. I guess I should put up that I have 50# of Aromatic. I only need maybe 20# if I go Belguim crazy.

Tom

Welcome Bret. I'm Brian Anderson the club VP.

Club info:
I'll try to give you a little info and background on the club. We are a relatively new club that has been trying to expand and create an identity the last couple of years. The club has gone through multiple iterations the last year or so and we now feel it is coming together. As you know our formal club name is Cedar Rapids Beer Nuts or CRBeerNuts for short. The club started out pretty small but has grown in size the last 6 months or so. We had a core group of about 8-10 member originally but now have about 20-25 members of which more then half make it to the regular club meeting each month.

The Meetings:
The club meetings are held the 3rd Thursday of each month from 7-9PM but usually go much later then 9PM. Members of the club take turns hosting the meeting. I guess it is just a sign-up to host as you go. I think we have named the hosts through Oct of this year. The host usually provides a few snacks but at the last club meeting, we decided to make it more of a snack pot luck where members will bring some snacks to share. Everyone who attends usually bring about a 4-6 bottles of either their home brew or a new commercial brew for sharing. We try to name a beer style for each month for consistency but that doesn't always happen. This month's style is Pale Ale and we are actually having a pale ale intra-club competition. So members of the club brew a pale ale and we have a small club competition. Not everyone brews or enters the competition but it's a fun way to learn how to rate and judge beer.

The Members:
We have members of all ages mostly males but we do have a few females. Not all members are active brewers but we all share at least one thing in common, we love beer and learning about how it's brewed. We have all types of brewers in the club with varying levels of experience. We have all-grain, partial mash, extract, soon to be extract and a professional brewer.

The Club goals:
The primary goal of the club is to have fun and meet new people. The secondary goal is to learn as much as we can about beer and experience the various styles that exist today and maybe even create a few new styles along the way. We also want to make this the best club possible and the only way to do that is to have a club that is active and enthusiastic about beer and the promotion beer education.

I hope you are able to attend this Thursday's meeting and will consider joining the club.

Hi Bret
Glad you found us, hope you make it to the meeting this week. Bring your beer with no worries, the last beer I brought to a meeting Dave grimaced with disgust and dumped it out....


Mark

Dumped it out??!! Oh the humanities!



I have a couple interesting beers I got at the New Glarus Brewery last week - I'll see if I can make it to the meeting and bring some of those to make up for the funky Cherry Wheat I'll bring.

Glad to hear you can make it. Also glad to hear you hit one of my favorite breweries, New Glarus!