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Happy New Year brewers.

We’re off and running again this week with a meeting on Wednesday night. It might seem early, or you may have thought it was scheduled for next week, but the calendar situation is unusual this time. Since January 1 fell on a Wednesday, this is already the third Wednesday of the month. Phew. Time for a beer.

The plan was to taste the four versions of the beer brewed in December at the SABS brew day but there’s been a hiccup in the fermentation and they’re not ready yet. We’ll do that next month (TBC).

However, all is not lost. We’re cobbling together something else fun and interesting — and yes, involved beer tasting.

If you have a beer you want to present to the meeting, bring along about 3-4 litres to share. Please drop us a line if you have something. info@sabrew.com

What brew day? What else has been going on if you were under a rock for the tail end of 2024. Read Lachlan’s end of year dispatch here.

What’s coming up this year? See below and subscribe to the calendar in your Google, Outlook etc.

Summer Competition – all things wheat

Competition day is February 9 at the East Torrens Kensington Gardens Tennis Club again. Bottle drop before judging starts at 11am.

• Date: Sunday, 9th February 2024
• Time: 11:00 AM (bottle drop from 10am)
• Venue: East Torrent Kensington Gardens Tennis Club
• Cost: $5 per entry

Categories: This competition will feature the following BJCP styles:

• American Wheat (1D)
• Weisse Beer (10A)
• Dunkelweisse (10B)
• Witbier (24A)
• Saison (25B)
• Berliner Weisse (23A)
• Gose (23G)
• Wheat Wine (22D)

Important Dates:

• Portal Opens: NOW
• Portal Closes: Friday, February 8th  
• Drop-off Locations: SA Brewing Supplies, Thebarton to COB Thursday or at the venue on the day from 10am.

We encourage everyone to nominate to judge or steward. Nominate via the portal when it opens.

Calendar Dates Summary*

• Jan 15: At the Wheaty
• Feb 9: Summer Comp – It’s time to start brewing if you’re keen on a Dunkelweisse, Witbier, or Wheat Wine.
• Feb 19: How RO works.
• Mar 19: Brewery visit – TBC
• Also… Southern Vales brewery bus tour,

(*Events subject to change).

New year, new membership if yours has lapsed. Renew now.

As the year draws to a close we’ve had a flurry of club activity. The combined Xmas case swap and brew day at SA Brewing supplies was a fantastic event despite the sweltering conditions. The SA Brewing supplies team looked after us with a giant AC and ice cold hop water. Club members contributed with various beers including everyone’s favourite on a hot day, Wolf’s Pils!

The case swap had great participation with all contributors going home with a crate load of fantastic beers, and positives reviews and feedback and flowing in via the Facebook group. If you haven’t participated in case swap before, I highly recommend you mark a slot in your brewing schedules for xmas 2025.

Following the weekend event we had our December meeting at the Wheaty where we distributed prizes from Nationals. Everyone who placed at AABC received one of these fantastic teku glasses.

Then there was the big one – Club Brewer of the Year. In a very tight race Charles on 21 points was just beaten out by Brenton George on 22. Well done to Brenton who had a very strong showing in the Winter comp to set him up for BOTY success.

The day after our monthly meeting we received some more great news when Beer and Brewer magazine posted an article featuring club member Tali and her summer comp winning recipe for a Scottish Light. Well done Tali! Read the article here

As we sign off for 2024 I would like to thank everyone who has helped contribute to the SA Brewing Club in the last 12 months. The sponsors, the members, the committee and anyone who has volunteered their time in some capacity. We appreciate all contributions to club no matter how big or small.

Happy holidays and we’ll see you in 2025!

Hi Brewers,

Our monthly meeting is this Wednesday at The Wheaty, from 7:00 pm. Apart from catching up and trying delicious Wheaty Brewing Corps beers, we’ll focus on pressure fermentors. We’ll explore how to do pressure transfers or bottle from them or kegs to get the best results—perfect timing with Christmas around the corner if you’re thinking of gifting your brews or putting them in the case swap.

Don’t forget to bring along a bottle of homebrew to swap for another in bottle bingo. To encourage more members to participate, we’ll give all the swappers a bottle of the SABC x TAFE collab ESB. Bring one bottle of beer and go home with two!

Looking ahead, our end-of-year event on Sunday, December 15, is shaping up to be a big one. SA Brewing Supplies will host us at their Maria Street store for a Christmas Brew Day and Case Swap. This is your chance to see different brewing systems in action as we put them to the test with “System Wars” – brewing one batch, split across three systems with different chilling methods (immersion, plate, and no-chill). The results will be blind-tasted at our January meeting.

The Case Swap is also on that day: now is the time to brew a batch, bring twelve 750 ml or 24 stubbies, and go home with the same amount of different beers. Think of it as a beer advent calendar! If you want to join, sign up via the Facebook event or check in at Wednesday’s meeting.

To make the day successful, we’ll need a hand with food—BBQ chefs, salad makers, or those who can bring something to share. If the weather’s hot like last year, we might need marquees too. Any help you can offer will be greatly appreciated. Let us know at info@sabrew.com or at the meeting.

These events are for club members with up-to-date subscriptions. Renew now if you’ve let yours lapse.

Calendar Dates Summary

• Nov 20: Club meeting, The Wheaty. Bottle and filling from kegs and pressure transfers
• Dec 15: Christmas bottle swap and brew day! Facebook event here.
• Dec 18: End of year drinks and pizzas
• Jan 15: At the Wheaty where we’ll be A/B tasting the brew day beercertain beer.
• Feb 9: Summer Comp – It’s time to start brewing if you’re keen on a Dunkelweisse, Witbier, or Wheat Wine.
• Feb 19: How RO works.
• Mar 19: Brewery visit – TBC

The Australian Amateur Brewing Championships (AABC) results from this year’s competition in Brisbane have just dropped, and SABC has had another great showing!

At a state level, South Australia has placed third with three Gold, five Silver, and three Bronze awards, achieving a total score of 22.00.

Here’s the rundown of placegetters from SABC

Table 3: Amber & Dark Lager

2ND John Van Der Zalm – Style/Name: Traditional Rauchbier

Table 4: Pale Ale

1ST Sabelo Charles Nzama – Style/Name: Belgian Blond Ale

Table 5: American Pale Ale

2ND Lucas Veitch – Style/Name: NZ Pale Ale

3RD Mark Lehmann – Style/Name: Make Pale Great Again!

Table 6: IPA

1ST Mark Lehmann – Style/Name: Double Cheers IPA

Table 8: Amber Ale

3RD Sabelo Charles Nzama – Style/Name: Son Of The Soil

Table 10: Porter

1ST Darren Williams – Style/Name: Nordic Noir

Table 12: Strong Stout

2ND Maz Ali – Style/Name: Southern Starlight Stout

Table 13: Wheat and Rye Beer

3RD Matthew Kennedy – Style/Name: Plain Beret (Saison)

Table 16: Sour and Wild Ale

2ND Matthew Kennedy – Style/Name: The Goose (Gose)

Table 18: Specialty Beer

2ND Russell Saint – Style/Name: Manuka Smoko

HUGE congratulations to all members who placed by brewing some truly outstanding beers. As club president, I am extremely proud to see both the state and club continue to do very well in the national competition.

The dedication of club members, the quality of ingredients from our LHBS, and the willingness to share advice on how to brew better beer all combine to produce these results.

Next year the competition will be back in Queensland and co-hosted with the Australian National Brewing Conference. It’s not too soon to start planning for 2025 now.

October meeting wrapup

Last week we had another cracking good monthly meetup themed around a show-and-tell of the best and worst brewing tech members have purchased. Facilitated by Sam, we covered all manner of items including pH (pH strips bad, pH meters good!), filters, standard gravity readers, scales and the infamous Kegland Hop Bong! See below for links to some of the recommended items.

We also had a surprise guest appearance with Jon from Yakima Chief Hops dropping in. Jon donated a bunch of hops to the club last year, so we returned the favour with a bottle of the SABC x Pirate Life Barrel Aged Strong!

Xmas brew day and case swap

We can now confirm our good friends at SA Brewing Supplies will host club members* for a Xmas Brewday and case swap on Sunday 15th December at their Maria Street Thebarton store just around the corner from The Wheaty. Jon is keen to start hosting regular brewdays at the store which is a great way to see and learn how others brew their beers.

For this inaugural brew day, we’re doing it System Wars style with a batch brewed 3 ways, specifically trying a different chilling method on each system (immersion vs plate chiller vs no chill). At the January meeting everyone we’ll have a three-way blind tasting to see which method reigns supreme.

The Brew Day will also be the location for the annual Christmas case swap. Refer to the previous newsletter and the Facebook event for swapping details. There are less than eight weeks to go so get those brews down NOW. The event is here to join.

It’s an all-day event and we’re working out the fine details including food. if you’re keen to get involved in the recipe and brewing, sing out info@sabrew.com

Summer competition

A reminder that the Summer Comp has been announced and the theme is Wheat. Refer to the competitions page for categories/dates and drop-off locations.

November meeting

Next month’s meeting, on November 20 at the Wheaty, we’re looking into the best practice of bottling from kegs and pressure fermentors. This is timely with the Christmas case swap coming and you can bottle up some of your best as gifts to your drunk uncles.

Brewing tech recommendations

From the October meeting, here is a list of products members use and recommend.

• Carbonation cap: Easily connect gas or beer disconnects to PET bottles. Useful for filling bottles or flushing beer lines. Very useful for getting that last bit of beer out of a disconnect.
• Hanna PH meter: Good quality PH meter at a reasonable price
• Milwaukee PH meter: A more expensive meter that stores the prob in a solution
• PH Storage solution: Highly recommended for looking after your probe
• Kegland Hop Bong: Initially created so you can purge dry hops before dropping them into a sealed fermenter, Mark Lehman showed us a version he uses for adding fining agents to carbonated beer. Very versatile based on what parts you add to it.

*cough cough.. renew your membership

Calendar Dates Summary

• Nov 20: Club meeting, The Wheaty. Bottle and filling from kegs and pressure transfers
• Dec 15: Christmas bottle swap and brew day!
• Dec 18: End of year drinks and pizzas
• Jan 15: At the Wheaty where we’ll be A/B tasting a certain beer.
• Feb 9: Summer Comp
• Feb 19: A side-by-side comparison of R1 filters and how RO works.
• Mar 19: Frankenchillers! 

This is a reminder that our monthly meeting is happening this Wednesday at the Wheaty from 7pm.

This month we’ll be interrogating our medal-winning brewers and generally opening up the floor to questions, feedback and ideas about brewing winning beers from ABCSA.

We’ll glean tips and taste some and learn how they crafted their winning entries.

Congratulations to all the SABC brewers who placed: Percy Balls* (7 places and best brewer of show), Mark Lehmann (4), Charles Nzama (5), Lucas Veitch (3), Lachlan Johnson (2), James Edwards (2), Matthew Kennedy (4), Gary Waters (3), Gavin Pennell, John Van Der Zalm, Brendan Macey, Gus Kingston, Darren Williams, Maz Ali, Aaron Young, Russell Saint.

The full winners’ list is here enter.abcsa.org.au

Judges’ score sheets are now available in the portal for downloading as PDFs.

Thank you to everyone who helped judge, steward and administer ABCSA. It went very smoothly and we couldn’t do it without you.

Looking forward to seeing you on Wednesday! Bottles for bottle bingo swapping are encouraged.

New members are welcome to join us.

AABC entry

The Australian Amateur Brewing Championship will be judged in Brisbane on October 26th. To register, visit enter.aabc.org.au and submit your beer(s). If you are interested, SABC will organise a shipment to Qld. Drop your entries with labels affixed to bottles at the September SABC meeting or at SA Brewing Supplies by October 5th. Entries will be shipped on October 8th. Alternatively, you can send your entries directly to the competition. Good luck!

Calendar Dates Summary

• Sept 18: Club meeting, The Wheaty. ‘Best brewers reveal their secrets’
• Oct 16: Club meeting, The Wheaty. ‘Best brewing kit and stuff you don’t need’
• Nov 16: Club meeting, The Wheaty. ‘3V vs Brewzilla system wars, can you tell the difference?’ Beers to taste.
• Dec (date TBC): Christmas bottle swap
• Dec 18: End of year drinks and pizzas

*membership ‘pending’.

This Wednesday’s monthly club meeting, August 21, is at The Suburban Brew at 26-30 Provident Avenue, Glynde (not Goodwood!). The owner and brewer, Tony will give us a tour of this brewhouse and give us the secrets to producing the Royal Adelaide Beer and Cider Awards Gold Medal-winning Sunday Session Ale.

Formally from 7pm but the taps are open before that of course. Parking is available on site or bus 174, 176, or H33 from the city.

Reminder, ABCSA entry is open

The ABCSA Home Brewing Championship for 2024 is open for entry! ENTER NOW and don’t leave it to the last minute.

• Entry Fee: $8 per entry
• Entries close online: Thursday, August 29

If you can judge or steward – get involved! Register your interest in the entry portal or talk to Competitions Director, Gerard at the meeting.

Bring a bottle to swap in the random bottle bingo.

Renew your membership, view the updated calendar on the website and subscribe to your Google Calendar or Outlook 365 and don’t miss an event.

A reminder the July meeting is this Wednesday and we will be holding the annual general meeting to elect a new committee. After the offical proceedings we will be announcing the winners of the Winter competition and tasting a barrel aged barleywine. The barleywine is the result of a member led barrel project that has been in works since late 2023, and base on the sample I had on packaging day its well worth coming along for!

The Annual General Meeting for the SA Brewing Club will be held on Wednesday, July 17th at The Wheatsheaf Hotel, George St Thebarton at 7pm.

All financial members of the club are invited to attend. The agenda can be downloaded here. Nominations for committee positions can be submitted by email in advance or will be accepted on the night.

The SABC BeerBQ is this coming Saturday! 6PM at ETKG tennis club. The chefs are already busy preparing the feast that awaits, which includes:

Slow cooked pulled pork
American style hot wings
Low and slow Beef brisket
Italian sausages
Kransky’s
and for the first time, Beer Barbacoa – mexican style pulled beef!

all that along with sides, salads, condiments.. and thas just the food menu.

There will be a vast assortment of member brewed beers, and a special treat from the recent TAFE x SABC collab. BeerBQ will be the only time you can try the collab ESB served through an English Handpump!

If you havn’t already, PLEASE register via the SABC shop – https://shop.sabrew.com/. We’re catering based on registrations so no rego means no food!