Just wondering - as mead is more a wine than a beer, what is the history of it being part of AHA/BJCP?
I did the old google thing and did not come across any of the history?
Same question for cider?
When the homebrewing movement/AHA/BJCP were getting started, other organizations existed to promote and judge wine from grapes. But they weren’t concerned with mead and cider, so mead and cider were sorry of adopted by the brewing community. I think at the time craft beer, mead and cider makers all felt like they were keeping alive a lost art, so that gave them something in common.
Yep. Mead and cider were not worthy of the oenophiles attention, and the AHA/BJCP welcomed them.
Today there is a little shunning from the BA, as these are not legaly beer amd do not fit into the BA charter.
And yet, a brewery has to get a vintner’s license to brew either cider or mead…
There’s a cider maker (brewer? Vitner?) that opened up here in Denver in the last year, I really want to check them out. I have a soft spot for cider…whenever I’m stuck in beer wasteland’s, I can almost always get strongbow.
Mead…the Red-Headed Stepchild. ( Michael Fairbrother, you are welcome to use this in your next promo 
)
Mead and cider - yes.
Vodka, rum, whiskey… no :o
That varies by state. In MO you can get a license to make any kind of alcohol you want, as long as it’s under 22% ABW. There’s another license you can get to make any kind of alcohol of any strength. Where the wicket gets sticky is labeling and such with the Feds.
Yes, I’ve noticed in my own HBC that there is a bit of a condescending attitude about mead makers - “you’re not a brewer, you’re just mixing”, “I’d be upset if a mead won Best of Show”. Likely complicated more in recent years as wine organizations are talking about, and judging meads; and you get the chance to taste meads at wine festivals.
I usually respond by saying, “If so easy, then go ahead and show me how well you can make a really good mead”, or, “like brewing, it comes down to selecting the right ingredients, and properly managing fermentation.” You would never say extract brewers are not really home brewers because the upfront is not as hard as doing all grain.
(edited spelling)
Some people do say that. Some people like to feel like they’re different and superior. If they can’t actually be better than anyone, they make up stupid ways to dump on other people.
i’m glad it did, otherwise, i’d have probably not made the cider i did, nor the mead i plan to make. lately i’ve been wanting to get one of those wine kits and try that.
Go for it! I’ve thrown yeast at just about anything with sugar and water in it.
Some are better than others, but pretty much, it’s all good.
I find it odder that mead and cider are included, but sake is excluded. Sake is almost beer, after all.
They used to include sake years ago, but there was almost no interest at the time or at least very few entries into the major competitions.
Tell them that boiling is not very complicated either and technically mashing is also just mixing ingredients.
Years ago I judged the BOS round at a competition. When we tasted everything at the table, it came down to a RIS and a mead. The mead ended winning by universal vote.
A little while later, much to my surprise, the competition results were announced, big party, etc. The guy that had won with his mead was sporting his medal, proud as could be… for “Best of Show - Mead, Cider”. The RIS had been moved to winning the BOS.
That made me pretty cheesed off because the rules said absolutely nothing about a BOS M/C and it sure as hell wasn’t something we were doing as a BOS panel. I didn’t say anything to the meadster because I didn’t want to ruin his high.
The only thing skeevier - the RIS that “won”? That’s right, brewed by the competition organizer who I heard after the BOS panel complaining that a mead shouldn’t win a beer comp.
Definate bull#$^&. Especially since as organizer, he could have set it up that way from the beginning if he didn’t want a mead to win BOS - but he didn’t.
I agree. In that regard it’s all about making great homebrewed fermented products. And we should encourage that whether it is malt extract, apple or honey based if we are going to have it included in the AHA.
That sounds real familar, except I was the meadmaker and the competition organizer. When it was discovered that one of my entries was being considered for BOS I removed myself from the BOS judging room.
I ended up taking runner-up BOS for my mead. I was told (months) later that the judges thought my mead was hands-down BOS but the judges did not want to award BOS to anything but a beer.
This reinfornced my then-forming opinion that beer competitions are little more than ego-fests and crap shoots. I stopped entering and judging beer competitions a year or so later.
Rule for judges: If it’s on the BOS table, it should be eligible for BOS.
Rule for organizers: If you don’t intend to pass it to the BOS table, it better say so in the competition rules.
If more judges and organizers followed these rules, then there would be fewer problems. Anything else is unethical. If you don’t have a problem with accepting money for a mead and cider entry, then you shouldn’t have a problem with giving them an equal shot at an award. If BOS judges aren’t giving every style an equal opportunity, then you picked the wrong BOS judges. That’s true whether it’s mead, American Lite Lager, a specialty beer, or anything else someone at the table might not personally approve of.