When: Thursday, Decembeer 1, 2022, 6:00 – 9:00 p.m. Six o’clock for socializing, business at 7 o’clock. 
Where: Lee's Chicken, 1940 W Van Dorn St, Lincoln, NE, 68522, 402.477.4339

We're back at Lee's for our annual chicken-and-beer meeting. Dennis and his crew will have an area reserved just for us. Plan to discuss the Nebraska Shootout, the upcoming elections for club officers, BJCP study group, and the last quarterly battle with the 402s. We'll also engage in a little contest: Guess the Sower's Cup Score! We'll sample a few comp leftovers and see who can guess our judges' scores. In addition to the 50/50, we will be giving away two more free memberships to American Homebrewer's Association. You know you want some fried chicken! See you at Lee's on the first of December! 

Our January meeting/party date is confirmed: Saturday, Jan. 7, at Cosmic Eye. This will be a combination of the monthly meeting, renewing your membership, scoring your hockey tickets, and our annual holiday pot-luck get-together. Happy New Year!
 

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2023 Officer Elections

All club members should have received an email from Jason McLaughlin with a link for nominations for the 2023 club officers. Please check your email and make your nominations. Note that the deadline is Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2022.
 

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• Kölsch (5B)
• NE IPA (21B) 
• Specialty Wood (33B)
• Fruit & Spice Mead (M3A)
• Kicker / Specialty Category: No-Hop Beers
• Best Damn Beer 

We are in the second year of the quarterly homebrew contest with the Local 402 Brewer’s Union from Omaha. This year we mixed it up with each club choosing a style for each quarter. We are planning the judging of imperial stout and English barleywine on Sunday, Dec. 18, at Code Brewing Company at 1 o'clock. If you have one of these two styles, please let us know ASAP. Check out the BJCP Style Guidelines for details on these and all of the recognized styles. Watch the club website and Facebook for more fourth-quarter judging details. 

During a recent judging session, we tossed around some ideas for 2023. Maybe going to twice a year and the winner picks the next comp's styles. Also thinking about sweetening the pot with some gift cards. 

March: English IPA & British Golden Ale (Omaha)
June: American Pale Ale & Saison (Lincoln)
September: Cider & Vienna Lager (Omaha)
> December: Imperial Stout & English Barleywine (Judging in Lincoln, Dec. 18)
 

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• Are you thinking about taking the BJCP judging certification exam? Well, the club is gearing up for another study group (a.k.a. “beer school”). Craig Samek has volunteered to organize it and is looking for a head count. The plan is about six weeks of two-hour classes on a Monday or Tuesday evening, starting in January. The class locations will be determined by the numbers; for now, we’re looking at Code, Cosmic Eye and/or members’ homes. Contact Craig if interested. Even if you're unsure about taking the exam, this is a fun way to train your palate and expose it to lots of different beer styles.
• Save Friday, January 20, on your calendar for the Lincoln Lagers "Night with the Stars." Yeah, it's been a while since the last one. It's always fun at the Icebox. Let's Go Stars!   
• On Sunday, Dec. 4, from 2 to 6 p.m., Cosmic Eye Brewing is hosting the 4th annual Art & Maker Fair. There will be 30 vendors. No entrance fee and lots of food, cocktails and beer!
• Did you know that Patriot Homebrew Supply has some great customer benefits that include the following: loyalty program, gift registry (Hey! Christmas is coming!), "Hoppy Birthday," AHA member discount of 5%, call-ahead services, PBW refill program, a place to recycle your beer magazines (or pick up one you may have missed) and a consignment corner for selling your no-longer-needed equipment. Check them out at 2929 N. 204th Street, #107, Elkhorn, NE 68022. Call them at 402.991.6655. Closed on Mondays.
• On Nov. 17, Steve Olsen and Kim Theesen volunteered to teach a UNL session on beer and how it's made. Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI) put together a class listed as The Science of What We Drink. It covered coffee, wine, beer, tea and milk. The class, hosted at Cosmic Eye Brewing, was attended by 29 students and their OLLI coordinator. Sam & Michelle Riggins talked about what it's like to be professional brewers and gave tours of the facility. 
   
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Question: Is there anything better than a chilled, fresh, relaxing, tasty, proper pint of beer in the pub? Answer (as if we actually need an answer): absolutely not. Check this link for the best ways to get that perfect pint. From our friends at Mashable.com.

The six best beer openers, according to the pros
Are you tired of bending bottle caps? No, well you should be. Use the openers that are designed to keep bottle caps intact. Here's a list to the best bottle openers from winemag.com.
 

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The Trub Zone - Kim Theesen, Brewsletter Editor

More End-of-the-Year Trub

Club Officers…

The email for club officer nominations is out. Please take a moment and fill this out. If you get nominated for a position, please take a moment and seriously consider taking it. If nominated again for this Brewsletter business, I look forward to continuing in this role for another year. 

A good club is made of good people. To keep a club like ours going, we need to add new people. I’m optimistic about the recent additions to the club. We have some energetic folks who have already demonstrated that they are willing to take some time, contribute, and help the Lincoln Lagers continue to be a good club. The recent success of the Sower’s Cup demonstrates what we can achieve when we all chip in to help. 

If we’re short of nominations, we may have to consider some sort of executive committee to keep things going. I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing. Perhaps we need to rethink the makeup of our officers and the individual roles’ responsibilities. It will be interesting to see who gets nominated and who will accept to help run the club in 2023.

The "Annual" Bus Trip…

I believe we still have a bus deposit to consider. Is it too late for a February trip? Should we think about going to Omaha in March? I think it would be a good thing to schedule a short trip. There are certainly lots of newer breweries to check out and if somebody else is driving, so much the better.

Club T-shirts…

Yes, it’s been a while since we’ve done shirts. Some of the longer-running members may still have enough shirts to last a while. Maybe you’d like a new design to brighten up the T-shirt collection. Shirts were mentioned in the previous Brewsletter and there’s a post on Facebook about it. I’m working with Screen Ink to set up some sort of online store. This way members who want one can order in advance and get the shirt design and size you want. 

Nebraska Brew Club Websites…

Regardless of club officer nominations, I want to continue to help with the club’s website. Some of you may not visit often, however, I believe it’s a good thing to have an online resource out there with current information. For better or worse, not everybody is enamored with Facebook. Lincolnlagers.com is a good site. Can it be better? Yes. Does it need a little facelift? Wouldn’t hurt.

Anyway, I was looking for inspiration and I thought I’d look at Nebraska’s homebrew clubs. To get started, we do have a few links on our site, plus there are more Nebraska links on Patriot’s and American Homebrewer’s websites. 

For what it’s worth, there are 27 “clubs” listed on Patriot’s page. Only five have URLs linking to a website. Most of the others have a Facebook page. (We’ll review those later.) Some have email and phone numbers. 

I’m happy to say that we have the freshest web content for a Nebraska club. The German American Society has a one-page description with officers listed, but no date. The OmaHops last edited theirs in June of 2021. The SOBs’ site said: “This site can’t be reached.” Local 402s' gets you the following message: “This account has been suspended.” The Railroaders has a “2016… under construction” notice. The Kearney Area Brewers shows some weird oriental characters.

I’ll investigate this some more. Maybe these Nebraska groups communicate by email and Facebook. They could be using Google docs in the same way we do. Who knows? I’ll do some more surfing and see what others do. 

I’m also curious as to what kind of club newsletters are out there, in Nebraska and other states. Do most just use a simple email? Do they depend on their members checking the Facebook page on a regular basis? In the meantime, please click on our website. Let me know that you’re out there. We have talked about eliminating one of these: website, newsletter or Facebook. Do we really need them all?

Cheers and happy holidaze! 

K!M T.
molarartist@hotmail.com

DECEMBEER
1... Thurs... 6 p.m. Monthly Meeting - Lee's Chicken Restaurant
4... Sun... 2-6 p.m. Art & Maker Fair - Cosmic Eye Brewing Co.
15... Thurs... 6 p.m. Monthly Social - Code Brewing Co.
18... Sun... 1 p.m. Quarterly Contest Judging (402s) - Code Brewing Co.
22... Thurs... 6 p.m. Festivus Eve Celebration - Cosmic Eye Brewing Co.

JANUARY 
7... Sat... 6 p.m. Monthly Meeting / Annual Holiday Gathering - Cosmic Eye (More details to come)
20... Fri... 7 p.m. Night at the Stars! Lincoln Stars Hockey!

FEBRUARY
2... Thurs... 6 p.m. Monthly Meeting - Cosmic Eye Brewing
16... Thurs... 6 p.m. Monthly Social - TBD

(Disclaimer: Dates and details are subject to change at the last minute. Confirm with the organizers that these are accurate and still happening. Sometimes things are out of our control, you know? Check the website and Facebook when in doubt, OK? Cool. Thanks!)