Hello all! long-time lurker, first time posting! I have fermenting now a farmhouse ale that was co-pitched with a sachh. strain and a brett strain, and I added some sourwood honey in primary- would i enter that as a specialty wild ale, or just as a brett beer? any guidance would be much appreciated!
Cheers!
Welcome!
It doesn’t fit into 28C Wild Specialty if it doesn’t have spice, herb, fruit, wood, or vegetable. Honey would not count here.
But it might fit as 31B Alternative Sugar Beer, IF the honey character comes through obviously in the flavor.
Otherwise, it is a 28A Brett Beer.
Remember, the judges don’t get a copy of your full recipe. They don’t necessarily know you’ve used honey in any style. If you enter a style like 31B where you have to supply them with a description of the style and special ingredients, they will look for the honey or other ingredients that you’ve added, and if every specified ingredient doesn’t show up, your score will reflect that.
So enter the style category above based on how obvious the honey flavor is. If it is very subtle, do not enter as 31B alternative sugar. They don’t have to know that you used honey if it doesn’t show up.
I’m assuming, however, that the Brett shows up. If it doesn’t, then the base style would likely be 25B Saison rather than 28A Brett Beer.
This stuff does get confusing. This is one of the reasons I dislike the 2015 BJCP Guidelines and wish they would simplify back towards 2008. They said it was broke, and aimed to “fix” it. But if you ask me, 2008 wasn’t as broke as they thought it was.
awesome, thanks for the fast reply!
All that matters is what it tastes like not what you used or intended it to be. Pour a glass and drink it while you read through the guidelines. Whatever it tastes like is how you should enter ir.
excellent advice- thanks, fellas!
The best you can do is emulate the intended style by closely following the BJCP guidelines when formulating your recipe.
Like I did recently with a couple different brews…thinking they would be either a Festbier (4B), or maybe a Marzen (6A).
So you then taste the result, and determine if it meets the color, aroma, flavor, and the other profiles listed on the BJCP website.
Like what Denny said!
here’s another question I’ve had in my mind for a while, this seems like the time and place to ask- Is it acceptable to enter one beer in to more than one category at a competition? If the brett in the farmhouse ale I have ends up subtle, enter it in both the brett beer and saison category? Or if a beer really rides the line between or kinda fits the description for both an american pale ale and an american IPA, enter it in to both? Not sure if this is frowned upon.
Absolutely! Go for it!
awesome, thanks again! really appreciate the help! 8)
28B mixed fermentation allows for many underlying styles and descriptions where one uses different yeasts and bacterium, such as sacc and Brett, lacto, pedio, etc…the key is to adequately describe it. The judges will base their evaluation highly on your description to determine how well you met that. In this type of category the judges tend to also give it a score based on subjective hedonistic evaluation (or how well your entry was enjoyed). Good luck on your entries. Enter it as many ways as you would like, but try to describe it based on meeting the underlying styles that it meets.