Presidents Message for December

Happy Thanksgiving to all! Do not over eat today so you will have plenty of room for all that good homebrewed beer you made.

Winter Solstice party is coming to a city near you. At our November meeting we finalized the arrangements and Eric and Caroline have graciously agreed to host the party. We will be holding it on December 14 starting at 1:00 pm. As customary please bring a cover dish and as many of your homebrews that you see fit. If you our bring kegs please bring some type of container to put it in so you can keep it on ice. There maybe Co2 available but if you can bring a tank set up it would be for the best. Please RSVP to the groups e-mail list with what you will bring so we do not end up with twenty five pounds turkey and two potatoes.

Officer elections will be held at the Solstice party so if you where moved by the recent government elections and want to run for one just put your name in the hat. All officer positions are open and need to be filled. We will be presenting the 2008 Brew Of The Year award to one of our members.

The 2009 BOTY year kicks off at the Solstice party with a style that is sure to be interesting. The style is Fortified beer, mead's or other, the possibilities are endless.

At the meeting we talked about the Coconut Cup venues in regards to size of the judging flights. Last year we split the final rounds over two days and some of the out of town judges would like to have more flights to judge per day. We are working on this and are hoping for a venue that will let us have all the final flights on one day. We covered the need for beer boxes to hold the entries in a organized manor. Steve and Bob have agreed to collect boxes from various sources to fill that need. Thanks to both of you.

We held our last round of the 2008 BOTY the style bring Spiced /Herb / Vegetable Beer category 21. We had four entries all of which where very good but there has to be a winner. Honorable mention went to Alex with his Belgian ale with coriander. Third place went to Scott & Denise for their American Amber Oatmeal Cookie Ale. Second place went to Steve for his American Amber Pumpkin Ale. First place went to Russell for his British Bitter Pumpkin Ale. Remember to look at the web sit for next years BOTY style list and keep brewing.

Have a great holiday season,
Darryl Hickey
Miami Area Society of Hombrewers President.
Hickey Family Brewing & Meadery.
Brewing at ten feet above sea level with bar stool correction.