February 2013 meeting minutes

Elections were held during the February meeting on February 4th at Crabtree Brewing. Our new President is Brian Schmalhorst. Our new Vice President is Erik Briscoe. Steve Skinner is still Secretary. Bill Gehrman is still Treasurer. Dave Butler is still our Media Specialist. Two new positions were added. Dennis Swingler is our new Event Coordinator and Shawn Crawford is our new Competition Coordinator. Ken Kramer will help Shawn as needed. (Ken, see what happens when you miss a meeting?)

The interview that was conducted at the old Crabtree Brewery for the Colorado Brews TV show will air on Saturday April 6th at 9:30 pm on Rocky Mountain PBS, and yes, during the end of the Final 4 semi-final game.

Beers Tasted:

Club Wee Heavy
Greg Bowdish - Gruit
Greg Bowdish - Blended beer from Montana Brewing Co.
Adam Wills - Mint Chocolate Chip Milk Stout
Steve Skinner - Cranberry Ale
Alan Hermance - Belgian Dark Ale
Alan Hermance - Blackberry Mead
Dennis Swingler - Vanilla Coffee Stout
Mike Ruah - Stout
Mike Lurbe/Swingler - 2nd Run Wee Heavy
Bob Biffle - Double Black IPA
Mike Mosher - American Red
Dennis Swingler - Vienna Lager
Mike Mosher - Pepper IPA
Brian Schmalhorst - Hard Apple Cider
Club Imperial Stout, 4 samples pulled from the 4 conditioning kegs
Dennis Swingler - Brown Ale

January 2013 meeting notes

The club met on Monday, January 7th at Crabtree Brewing Company in Greeley.  We will be brewing a S.M.A.S.H. beer (same recipe but different hops) asap and sharing the results at our March meeting. The following is a list of hops that was chosen by different members. If I didn't get your hops recorded please let me know. Eric will be posting the recipe soon so we can start brewing.  Also, at the February meeting we will be holding club elections.

Greg Bowdish - UK Palisade
John Coan - UK Target
Shawn Crawford - German Tettnanger
Paul Dolan - Antanum
Bill Gehrman - US Chinook
Michael Hinton - German Opal
Ken Kramer - Amarillo
Dave McGinley - US Perle
Mike Mosher - US Galena
Michael Rauh - UK Bramling Cross
Eric Reinsvold - UK Progress
Brian Schmalhorst - German Perle
Del Scholfield - Kent Goldings
Dennis Swingler - German Smaragd
Steve Skinner - German Saphir

Beers Tasted:

Greg Bowdish - Coffee Mead
Dennis Swingler - Brown
Eric Reinsvold - Cherry Cranberry Blonde, Gluten free
Erik Briscoe - Cherry Wit
Michael Hinton - Esoteric Heather
John Coan - Tart Cherry Cider
Steve Skinner - Pumpkin Spice Ale
Michael Ruah - Wheat IPA
Ken Kramer - Rye IPA
Bob Biffel - Stout
Jeremy Fusco - Bacon Bourbon Stout
Michael Hinton - Wee Heavy - club beer

December 2012 Meeting Minutes

Happy Holidays everyone! On December 3rd, the Treehouse Brewing Club held their annual Holiday Homebrew Competition at Crabtree Brewing Company. Here are the highlights.

There were 13 beers entered into the competition. These beers were split into two flights for judging: Regular holiday ales and Spiced Holiday Ales. Members of the clubs judged each category and the top 2 beers in each flight were then moved onto the finals where a small panel of judges did the final winning selections.

The overall winner this year was Dennis Swingler and his Winter Warmer Stout. Congrats Dennis! He takes home the traveling trophy. Display it proud!

Other entries included: (highest ranking listed first)

Ken Kramer - Holiday Porter
Steve Skinner - Saison
John Coan - Wheat Wine
Neil Fisher - Oak Aged Coffee Porter
Eric Reinsvold - Pumpkin Spice Saison
Neil Fisher - Bourbon Barrel Aged Brown
Jeff Graber - Seasonal Amber Ale
Shawn Crawford - Holiday Spiced Ale
Steve Skinner - Barleywine
Eric Riensvold - Cherry Cranberry Blonde (Honorable Mention)
Marco Sanchez - Pumpkin Spice Brown Ale
Neil Fisher - Run Barrel Aged Old Ale

See you all in the New Year on January 7th, 2013!

November 2012 Meeting Minutes

Nov 5th, 2012 meeting minutes

Eric Reinsvold: President
Bill Gehrman: Treasurer
Dennis Swingler: Vice President
Erik Briscoe: Brewery Liaison
Steve Skinner: Secretary
Dave Butler: Media Specialist

Our seasonal beer competition will be held at our Dec meeting. Please bring in your Stouts, Porters, Barleywines or spiced beers that would be appropriate for the Christmas season. We will be setting up for the contest at 6:30. Anyone who is interested in helping out is encouraged to come in then to get stuff set up.

We are looking at rescheduling our Booze Cruise to Feb 23rd. Check your calendars now and reserve that date if you are interested in attending. The more people that sign up, the less it will cost each person to go. More information will follow as the date draws near.

We are looking at having a beer club competition between Brewnion Colony and Treehouse sometime in March. Nothing has been set for sure, but we are looking at 3 styles: Imperial IPA, Imperial Stout, and Belgian Dark Strong. These beers can take a while to brew and condition so you might want to consider getting something started soon if you want to participate.

We also discussed having everyone brew a simple beer, identical grain bill and yeast and the only difference would be the hops. Everyone participating would use a different hops and when the beers are ready we will bring them in and compare the flavors, that way we can sample what an individual hops tastes like. Eric R. will be posting a recipe before too long and we are looking to share the beers at our January meeting.

Elections for officials will be coming up in March. It's a few months away, but give it some thought if you would like to run for office.

New members:

Kurt Dallow, Brad Denney, Paul Dolan, Jeff Graber, Mark Lindemann, and Marco Sanchez.
Welcome to the club!

Beers Sampled:

Dennis Swingler - 2nd run Stout.
Ken Kramer - Cider.
Shawn Crawford - Oktoberfest.
Eric & Tiffini - Engllish Pale Ale.
Ken Kramer - 2nd run Wee Heavy.
Marco Sanchez - Peach Pale Ale.
Kurt Dallow - Brown Ale.

Submitted by: Steve Skinner

Highlights from Learn to Homebrew Day

We had an excellent turnout for yesterday's Teach A Friend To Brew Day. There were 13 brewers in all, the biggest turnout we've had so far. Here is a list of the following members plus a few others that showed up and what they brewed.

Erik Briscoe: Gluten Free Ale
John Coan: Wheat Wine
Jeff Crabtree: Seasonal Porter
Shawn Crawford: American Amber
Jeremy Fusco: Wheat
Michael Hinton: Heather
Ken Kramer: Rye IPA
Mike Lurbe: Vienna Lager
Eric Reinsvold: Gluten Free Ale
Brian Schmalhorst: Pumpkin Spice Ale
Steve Skinner: Pumpkin Spice Ale
Dennis Swingler: Vienna Lager
Mike Terango: Queen of Diamonds (Zymurgy recipe)




We also had several of our club members win raffle prizes:

Alan Hermance - 50 lb. bag of 2 row
Erica Coan - Better Bottle
Michael Hinton - 2 vials of yeast
John Coan - 2 lbs. of hops. ??
Mike Terango - Hydrometer
Michale Hinton - 1 year Brewnion Colony Membership




We also have 2 new members: Kenton Keiner and Michael Rauh.

Report from Steve Skinner 11/4/2012. Photos by Dave Butler.

Call for Learn to Homebrew Day Participation

Save the date - Saturday, November 3rd, 2012 10:00am to 4:00pm - Learn to Homebrew Day. It's time again for the annual AHA Learn to Homebrew Day event. In addition to a fun day of homebrewing, we'll be doing several FREE raffle drawings in the afternoon (2:00pm-ish) for Homebrew Club Members and their guests (4 tickets max). We'll have raffle items for both new brewers and experience brewers alike. Be sure to come down and bring your new brewer friends for a chance to win some cool stuff.

Let Eric Reinsvold know if you're planning on coming down and brewing. He'd like to get a diverse number of brew setups; everything from the Crabtree Pilot brew system to extract rigs, so don't be shy about setting up and showing new people how you brew. Also, if anyone wants to demonstrate a mead or cider, feel free to spread your knowledge (but don't forget, Beer is President, so mead can be VP and cider can be Secretary of State). We may need a couple of RV water hoses and a splitter, but otherwise everything should be ready to go.

Juice of the Barley (Homebrew Shop) will be having sales / discounts all day and Crabtree is getting a food truck for us as well. If the weather holds up, it's going to be an awesome time. Family and friends are all welcome!

Feel free to contact Eric with any questions if you're willing to donate something cool for the raffle.

Cheers,
Eric Reinsvold - treehousebrewers@gmail.com

October 2012 Meeting minutes

Meeting minutes for October 1st, 2012 - held in the Brewer's Lounge at Crabtree Brewing.

The Russian Imperial Stout has been moved to kegs and the Wee Heavy is now in the oak barrel. The blended final gravity going in to the barrel is 1.026. A date will be set for the bottling of the R.I.S. in the near future.

Our brewery tour is scheduled for Sat. Oct 27th. Transportation is still being looked into by Dennis. We will be touring in the Longmont/Boulder area. Specific breweries have not been chosen at this time.

We are looking at having a friendly competition between us and Brewnion Colony around October fest next year focusing on German style beers.

BJCP classes are being held at the tasting room on the 2nd Tuesday of each month from 6:30 to 8:30pm. There are still openings for those who want to audit the class.

New members:

Eric Kent, Tiffini X and Brian Wille have joined our club. Please make them feel welcome.

Beers sampled:

Michael Hinton - Red Ale
Brian Schmalhorst - Passion Fruit Brown Ale (fruit beer contest winner)
Neil Fisher - Sweet Josie Brown Ale (commercial)
Neil Fisher - Brown Ale
Steve Skinner - Blueberry Lager
Neil Fisher - Imperial Brown
Eric Reinsvold - Pumpkin Belgian Beer
Steve Skinner - Ginger Beer

September 2012 Meeting Minutes

The September meeting was held on the 10th, one week later due to the Labor Day holiday. We have one new member, please welcome Alex Drayer to the club. Eric has already sent out information concerning bottling the Russian Stout and getting the Wee Heavy into the Keg. We are looking into having a brewery tour on Oct. 27th. We will firm up plans at our Oct. meeting. Teach a friend to brew day is coming up on Nov. 3rd. Keep your calendars open for a group brew at Crabtree brew house (the old location).

Notes on our fruit beer competition held on Aug. 12th.

Beers entered:

Eric Reinsvold - Blackberry Wit
John Coan - Apricot Peach Opal
Steve Skinner - Blueberry Lager
Brian Schmalhorst - Passion Fruit Brown

Congratulations go out to Brian on his Passion Fruit Brown.

Steve Skinner - Secretary