Major Win - My First Beverage Award...s

Congrats!

In reply to Beer Baron :

My schedule is pretty open.

Congratulations!!

Since your awards are in the area of distilled spirits, does that mean you will be changing your screen name from Beer Baron to something else, Ginned Up, Whiskey Rebellious, something related to commemorate the triumph?

Yeah, that would just confuse people I guess, but still, good job.

Toebra said:

Since your awards are in the area of distilled spirits, does that mean you will be changing your screen name from Beer Baron to something else, Ginned Up, Whiskey Rebellious, something related to commemorate the triumph?

How about "Crazy Diamond"

Seriously - still gotta make beer first in order to make whisky. I am a Master Brewer. I still consider myself a barely competent distiller.

Beer Baron said:

Robbie (Forum Supporter) said:

Beer Baron said:

And there's some weirdness. It looks like our Cask Rum may have been judged in the wrong category against the Spiced Rums, and STILL won a silver. It's a nice award either way. I just find it amusing and arguably more impressive if it beat a bunch of spiced rums without being spiced.

(It's finished with French Oak and Brazillian Amburana wood, which lend natural vanilla and spice cookie notes respectively. So not crazy, but amusing.)

I think this is likely because spiced rum is the devil. 

You're not wrong.

I do want to experiment with some spiced rums. But doing it by actually infusing whole spices, vanilla, and dried fruits, rather than by adding flavorings and sugar.

I just talked to the organizer to get it sorted out... and we're still not sure what happened. We know it earned silver. We're not sure which category it went through final judging in, or if it was judged in BOTH categories.

Some spiced rums are spiced for the sake of being spiced. Good ones are smooth with flavor. Cheap ones feel like diabetus in a bottle.

There are a handful of people in my office who are interested in going also, though I told my middle kid we would go to Grissom AFB to watch the One Lap event on the 30th. 

bobzilla said:

Some spiced rums are spiced for the sake of being spiced. Good ones are smooth with flavor. Cheap ones feel like diabetus in a bottle.

I'd like to do interesting things with rum and do them right. I dislike adding flavor for the sake of adding flavor in beers, and I don't like it any more with spirits. I also don't like adding flavors to a beer or spirit that you can add just as easily and get a better result at a bar - like fruit. You want a blueberry hefeweizen? Get blueberries, mash them up, and pour hefeweizen on top.

I think our rum is our best product, and I think the market is going to be shifting towards rum. I want us to get ahead of that. I think our base rum is a wonderful canvas to start from to do interesting things with. It's a good white spirit on its own. Neutral enough to play very well with a wide variety of flavors for mixing, while still having distinctive character to be interesting and lend a distinct character.

Good spiced rum has a lot of potential. I can infuse a lot of interesting spices that it wouldn't be practical for people to do at home. Gotta figure out which ones, and whether we add them to cask rum or white rum.

You make whiskey out of beer, or you have to have beer to go with the whiskey for boilermakers?  I am hoping for the former

Toebra said:

You make whiskey out of beer, or you have to have beer to go with the whiskey for boilermakers?  I am hoping for the former

Make whiskey out of beer.

Sort of... effectively... I'd be getting into nerdy details that aren't going to matter to you on the nuances of different variations on a process.

For the sake of simplicity, to make whiskey you start with unhopped beer. Then you concentrate everything in a still and isolate different chemical compounds that come out of the still at different times/temperatures. Then the tough part is knowing what from the still to keep and what to discard.

Since I know a lot about brewing and fermenting, I have a lot more knowledge and control about what sort of liquid I put into the still to get good liquid out of the still. But I'm not a master of operating the still to play with those flavors.

Musical analogy - it's like I'm incredibly well trained at playing acoustic guitar, and then handing me an electric guitar. I know how to play a guitar and make nice noises. But I don't know how to take advantage of the amplification, effects, and other technology to control and coax specific sounds out.

Since I can't get my hands on anything of yours, I picked up a local bottle of bourbon this evening. Seems like it must have been a different judging, but allegedly this one was awarded as well. Again - not a connoisseur - but going to enjoy a drink tonight (I haven't paid this much for a bottle of liquor, ever -$50)

Get Together at Endeavor

I've got a couple of tours this Saturday 4/30, one (tentatively) at 12:30 and another at 3pm.

I'd be happy to do a guided tasting and give folks a tour of the brewstillery space at around 1:30

In reply to Beer Baron :

Myself and Ms. RBS will be there to congratulate you and take the brewstillery tour.

I will be there, the wife and a few people from work maybe also.

So, I know this is an alcohol tour, but are kids allowed? We all came and ate once when it was under the prior brand and the Explorer's Club people were serving food there. That's been a few years!

In reply to dculberson :

Kids are welcome, provided they aren't crawling on the brewery floor.

No more Explorer's Club. I don't think we're going to have any food option this weekend. Food trucks have been especially rough to schedule since the pandemic.

In reply to Beer Baron :

Thanks to beer baron for his time  and insightful tour of the brewstillery. Learned the difference between European and American malts; as well as the difference between toasted and charred wood casks. Ms. RBS had a bourbon-tini and I had the cash rum and ginger beer. Oh, and get a bag of the dill pickle-flavored popcorn while you're at it. The bonus was getting to meet dculberson and his family. Perhaps a future "do over" tour could be arranged for more GRMers to attend.

In reply to RustBeltSherpa :

It was great to meet you and the mrs! 
 

And the Endeavor gin was shockingly good. I'm going to be honest - my expectations for small batch local liquor are pretty low. But I think this stuff is better than any mass produced gin I've tried. I'll have to try some more to be sure. Maybe just a little more again. 

Thanks Beer Baron for the tour yesterday, your were very generous with your time.  It also reminded me how long it has been since there had been an Ohio get together , we should try to do better with that.

You do realize we're all entitled to judge for ourselves.  I'll PM you my address.  :)