BrewUnited Archives - Five Blades Brewing

As I hope you are well aware, the 2015 BrewUnited Challenge is officially underway and I have been spending a lot of time thinking about the recipes I am going to brew. I have entered each of the three categories (Malty, Balanced, and Hoppy) in an effort to win the coveted BrewUnited Homebrew Hero award, which goes to the brewer(s) with the highest sum of entry scores. Word is that the Homebrew Hero will receive a cape as a reward, so the stakes are high! I thought this might also be a good time to discuss the different elements of the competition and examine how I go about building and brewing a recipe for a maybe continuing series I am calling “Brewcrafting.”

I know, I know, I can already hear you asking, “if you give away all your secrets will you not lose your advantage for the competition!?” Now, in both my personal an professional life I am of two core beliefs:

Good ideas should be shared–a rising tide lifts all boats and all that.
Good ideas are a dime a dozen–it is the execution of the idea that is important.

After all, if we remember Brulosopher’s Brewer’s Thumbprint xBmt we learned “that even when using the exact same ingredients, mash temp, and fermentation schedules, every brewer is going to produce a unique beer.” So really, if you glean enough from this to beat me in the competition you were probably going to beat me anyway. 🙂

Read on and let’s take a look!

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I am excited to announce the 2015 BrewUnited Challenge is now officially open for registration! My buddy Olan over at BrewUnited has been working feverishly to put together what is sure to be one of the most interesting homebrew competitions this year. On top of that, he has managed to secure some amazing prizes for the winners (and the list keeps growing). Heck, there are so many prizes on the line it would almost be more expensive not to enter!

The gist of the competition is as follows:

Build a recipe for the handful of styles divided up into “malty,” “balanced,” and “hoppy” using all of the required malts.
Choose exactly two of the types of hops from the list of available choices.
Choose whatever yeast (including Brett) you want.

You might be asking yourself, “how am I supposed to make a Mild or Brown Porter using just Pilsner, Munich, and Crystal 60?” That’s the challenge! Just because you’re limited to Pils malt does not mean you cannot take that Pils malt and toast it in your oven to recreate something like Victory or Amber malt. I have already begun researching how to toast my own malts, perhaps I will even throw up a guide once I experiment a bit.

Just remember: there are only 100 entries available for each category, so be sure to act quick to secure your spot. Good luck and happy brewing!