WEB’s meet-up for May was at gracious repeat host, Cedar Links Golf Club in Medford Oregon. Kelley, his cool mom Theresa and fun server Alexis, all treated us well.

Every month Women Enjoying Beer meets at a location in the Southern Oregon area to learn about beer. The 1.5 hour meet-up revolves around a select 4 small pour beer and food pairing. We’re glad so many businesses are eager to welcome us in, we have anywhere from 10 to 30 women each time, and it’s loaded with fun, engagement and flavor exploration.

The menu we enjoyed, in order:

• Boneyard RPM IPA with lemon pie on crushed graham cracker crust
• Good Life India Brown with puff pastry and sun-dried tomatoes
• Oakshire Line Dry Rye with Thai inspired chicken pasta
• Good Life Mountain Rescue Dry Hop Pale Ale with fresh baby tomato, basil, and mozzarella

With the pattern that is the meet-ups, we had Veterans (those who had been before) and Newbies. New attendees always receive a Welcome packet of goodies. I love giving away goodies and everyone likes getting them. It’s a simple, economical, and easy “thank you for being here” gift.

We also talked about American Craft Beer Week, the 2012 Rogue Flavor guide and took a short walk around a bit of the course before the event started.

So thanks to all – who attended, hosts, and supporters.

Beer businesses: if you choose to host women + beer groups, call on us first to help you develop a proper and successful plan. It’ll get you jump started in the right direction.

“I got so much from your talk yesterday. I was just talking with my brewery partner about why beer is not more popular with women and how we want to do something about that.”

Fun & smart women enjoying beer (Eugene, OR)

This quote was from a supporter who came to see our educational session at the 2012 Craft Brewers Conference. The bonus is this person took the time following the talk to approach me, introduce themselves and chat briefly. This is always appreciated and very much liked by me.

When you get specifics ‘back’ after a presentation – comments, questions, etc. – it should tell you that something has tripped the idea trigger. That’s a good thing and a measurable outcome.

The best things in life to me at un-measurable like enthusiasm, sharing, and thinking in support. Positive dialogue, like this, is another.

Be sure to support the speakers you hear and let them know specifically what you found useful and valuable, as well as constructive feedback to help them improve their connection to the audience. Any speaker worth their microphone will appreciate it.

Last night we again enjoyed great company, interesting information from Sandi and learned about 3 new beer and food pairings. Swig & Stitch is a fabulous format for us to engage and encourage exploration of talents and tastes.

Pouring great things at Swig & Stitch

Here’s the menu served by our fantastic hosts:

• Lost Coast Great White with Bubbles & Squeak (cheesy potato and veggie cake with dill aioli)
• Oakshire Line Dry Rye with Taylor’s English Style pork sausage with whole grain mustard
• Deschutes Black Butte Porter with fresh house made Tomato Bisque soup with bleu cheese crumbles

We talked about examining our beer as well as intensity and pairing beer with food.

Education is fun and should be, no matter the crowd or teacher. Keep pushing (non snobbish) education forward – it’s good for all of us.

Beer focused Swig & Stitch is now on summer break, to return with great enthusiasm in September. If you want to join us, contact Fabric of Vision. It’s never too early to reserve your seat for the monthly episodes. These events fill up very fact and well in advance.

World Beer Cup 2012

The 2012 World Beer Cup winners are announced here. They are recently complete following the annual Craft Brewers Conference, this year held in San Diego, California. Yours truly was there with the usual anticipation and enthusiasm.

The World Beer Cup, aka WBC, happens every two years in conjunction with the CBC. It’s a reflection of the global beer community and is truly a great opportunity to meet people from all over the world and try their beers. After judging is complete, remaining beers in unopened bottles are then opened and available before and available during the WBC Gala dinner. A BIG Pints up to Chris Swersey, judges and everyone involved in pulling off this incredible happening and making it look smooth and seamless.

Cheers to Global Beer Colleagues!

The Cup is biennially and I’m guessing one reason is that it’s an enormous undertaking. Very worthwhile and an orchestration the rest of us can only guess the enormity of effort involved.

At the dinner, Emily and I sat with some colleagues from Canada, a lively group of Australians were at the next table, and everywhere you looked, there were people from across the globe.

I love that beer is sincerely global. Just ask the Icelanders who won a medal if the trip was worth it.

Cheers to community, camaraderie and quality the world round.

2012 Canny Awards

The first ever Canny Awards were held yesterday preceding the Craft Brewers Conference. Yours truly judged which was harder than it would seem. Let’s see, here are a few reasons why…

1. 7 Categories to examine
2. Dozens of entry cans
3. Learning to dismiss certain attributes while focusing on others
4. Some categories had dozens of entries
5. Varying sizes of cans lent the challenge of more compact space for (for 12 oz) graphics vs. 16 oz+ cans.
6. Picking 3 overall choices was tough

Nonetheless, it was an engaging and interesting exercise. Paul and the Mumm crew had it organized, were very friendly and we weren’t rushed at all – which was good!

It was also enjoyable to meet the other judges – some whom I knew, some were new connections.

I’ll be eager to hear of the resulting Awards selected by a well-rounded panel of judges. They’re announced at 3 pm PST today.

The 2012 Craft Brewers Conference, known as the CBC in industryese, is happening today through Saturday in San Diego, California, USA.

WEB is well represented by Ginger, Founder, and Emily, Events & Speaking Development. Come find us if you’re there. If you’re elsewhere, enjoy digging through the conference site here.

Ginger speaks Friday 4 – 5 pm at the host hotel, the Town and Country. She’ll cover the 1st ever report The State of Women And Beer, based on this survey and responses from dozens of women all across the USA on their relationship with beer.

In the meantime, no matter your involvement in the beer community, keep enjoying fresh beer in moderation with friends and food. Cheers!

All of these were edutainment sessions I lead at last weekend’s inaugural Rogue Valley Wine (Beer) and Food Fest. As promised, we post the menus instead of handing out papers that invariably get recycled and not used.

Thanks to Lillie Belle Chocolates and Full Sail Brewing for the donation of their goods for the sessions. We’re also glad to feature the high quality Rogue Creamery cheese. Plus a thank you to Harry & David for letting us use their cool stage set up for best guest experience – Tim, Jeff, Kari, Brenda and crew. As well as Chateau of Hidden Jungle for his help with the beer.

Enjoy these ideas ~

Beer and Chocolate:

• Full Sail Phil’s Existential Alt with Lillie Belle Perfect Illusion chocolate
• Full Sail Session Black with Lillie Belle Purple Haze chocolate
• Walk About IPA with Lillie Belle Lavender sea salt caramel

Beer and Cheese:

• Rumiano whole Monterey Jack cheese with Walkabout IPA
• Rumiano New York Sharp Cheddar with LTD 5
• Rogue Creamery Flora Nelle blue with Full Sail Alt

Cooking with Beer:

The ideas here are innumerable and I riffed on using beer in all sorts of cooking applications. In addition to these I shared, here are a few more:

• Dressings made with porters like a deep rich balsamic vinaigrette
• Roasting red meats with deeply fruity beers
• Quick breads with Belgians and hefeweizens
• Sauces and reductions with flavors that fit

gorgeous hand blown Gathering Glass globes

Gathering Glass hosted the Women Enjoying Beer Monthly meet-up last night with a full house in attendance. Keith and Scott, the studio owners and operators, were very welcoming helpful and glad to enjoy tasting the beers and foods on the menu.

A little background: We met at a glass blowing studio because Keith and Scott generously donated 30 hand blown ornaments for a fundraising festival we were part of last year. Bringing almost 30 women to the studio to learn about them, beer glassware and do our usual tasting of 4 beers + foods was a natural fit.

LOTS of questions were asked, most we were able to cram in, some will wait until next time. There’s so much to share about beer and to have a unique host location spurs even more curiosity, which is a big part of learning.

There’s never a lack of engagement, questions, and fun at these events. If you’re a business that could benefit from a lively group of women visiting to learn about beer on a regular basis, call us. We can help you set it up for success from the start.

If you’re a female consumer who enjoys learning about beer, seek these opportunities out. We realize there are still too few to satisfy and recognize (with full respect) that women want to know more about beer. That said, ask your local establishments to put them on. Smart businesses will react.

There's Moylan's in that glass!

Here’s the menu we enjoyed:

Moylan’s generously provided beer (Thanks so much!) for the evening and we mapped out the 4 choices. As far as food went, we suggested some things from the strolling “pick the goodies you want” selection and encouraged them to mix, match and discover as well.

Beers tasted:

• Tipperary Pale Ale
• Dragoon’s Dry Irish Stout
• Ryan Sullivan’s Imperial Stout
• Old Blarney Barleywine

Having both a ‘regular’ stout and an imperial was a particular bonus. We had one after the other and attendees could experience them very close together, which is an effective learning technique.

Foods available:

Mixed nuts, yogurt covered raisins, mission figs, black licorice bites, (dried) veggie chips, animal cookies, dried cranberries, dark chocolate malted milk balls, Wasabi peas, fresh french bread, and cheeses (medium cheddar, Monterey jack, Cojack, provolone).

Swig & Stitch is the brainchild of business person, Sandi Globus, Fabric of Vision. Last night was another great session of Sandi teaching useful sewing techniques around specific projects. Interspersed in the lessons by Sandi I lead attendees through 3 different beer and food tastings and pairings.

The goal is fun and useful education for all. And the monthly events succeed smashingly! Our host is very happy to have us, it’s a perfect spot and every month we’re getting ‘veterans’ and newbies.

Here’s the menu we explored (all beers on draught):

• Guinness with roasted garlic humus and fresh carrots, celery, and slivered french bread
• Lindeman’s Framboise with fresh sliced Bartlett pears, Granny Smith apples and red grapes
• Boneyard’s Hop Venom with lightly deep-fried fresh jalapeno slices (YUM!)

Exploration and consideration are the names of this game. Go exploring yourself and discover tasty things. Doing it with friends is even better.

Saturday’s 2012 Spring Beer & Wine Fest found us on the Educational Chef’s Stage sharing all sorts of great ideas on Cooking With Beer. (Friday’s session info here)

Beer has become a favorite ingredient of mine in cooking. It’s so versatile that once you start cooking with it, you can see why. Replace thinner liquids with beers, being careful to find complementary beer styles to replace. Here are a few of the many ideas we shared with a great audience.

• Sauces with Porters
• Gravies with Stouts
• Muffins with Hefeweizens
• Breads with Pale Ales
• Soups: Gazpacho with Chili Beers
• Crockpot: Red meats (like ribs) with fruit beers
• sauteing & simmering
• Baking: Chocolate cakes with stouts
• Beerinades: Pilnser with lime/garlic/cilantro for Carne Asada
• Ice creams with Imperial Stouts
• Desserts: fruit cobbler with Belgians
• Crusts & doughs: pizza crust with IPA’s

The list goes on and on. The Crux is to have fun using beer as ingredient. There are no failures – just lessons to repeat and recipes to try only once.

Thanks to Bridget and our hosts at the Fest for letting us Bring Beer To Life!

EXTRA TIP: Freeze any left over beer in ice cube trays to portions out in future cooking.