In this category, you take a classic style— say an IPA—and add a complimentary ingredient, maybe lemongrass. You choose some great flavor hops like Citra and Amarillo to pair well with the added citrus of the lemongrass. The beer still tastes like an IPA, but it also showcases the unique flavor that lemongrass imparts. There are two things to keep in mind when brewing a beer for this category in competition: 1) the base beer style needs to be obvious, and 2) any special ingredients you list need to be obvious. If you brew a beer with five herbs, but only two are really noticeable, it’s better to just list those two rather than lose points because the other three aren’t discernible. (click for more tips)
This SOQ is a PEOPLES CHOICE competition. To enter you must bring a keg to our annual Holiday party in December. This mean each attendee will vote on what they liked 1st, 2nd, and 3rd best. You can technically participate without a keg, but you might have limits on getting enough votes if you run out!
Style Guideline Excerpts:
The entrant must specify a base style, but the declared style does not have to be a Classic Style. The entrant must specify the type of spices, herbs, or vegetables used, but individual ingredients do not need to be specified if a well-known spice blend is used (e.g., apple pie spice, curry powder, chili powder)
Should be a harmonious marriage of SHV and beer, but still recognizable as a beer. The SHV character should be evident but in balance with the beer, not so forward as to suggest an artificial product.
We use the common or culinary definitions of spices, herbs, and vegetables, not botanical or scientific ones. In general, spices are the dried seeds, seed pods, fruit, roots, bark, etc. of plants used for flavoring food.
Herbs are leafy plants or parts of plants (leaves, flowers, petals, stalks) used for flavoring foods. Vegetables are savory or less sweet edible plant products, used primarily for cooking or sometimes eating raw.
Vegetables can include some botanical fruit. This category explicitly includes all culinary spices, herbs, and vegetables, as well as nuts (anything with ‘nut’ in the name, including coconut), chile peppers, coffee, chocolate, spruce tips, rose hips, hibiscus, fruit peels/zest (but not juice), rhubarb, and the like. It does not include culinary fruit or grains.
Flavorful fermentable sugars and syrups (agave nectar, maple syrup, molasses, sorghum, treacle, honey, etc.) can be included only in combination with other allowable ingredients, and should not have a dominant character. Any combination of allowable ingredients may also be entered.