How Beer Festivals Should be Done! Cudos to the CCSD for their Novemberfest!

[KPatton]

This past Saturday at the Catty Corner Ice house, the CCSD (Connoisseurs Club of Smoking and Drinking) held NovemberFest 2012, hosting 4 Brew Clubs. For $15 you got all the great home brew you could handle and all the wurst and brotchen you could eat. There were 51 different beers, wine, meade and non alcoholic sodas. Of course beers predominated. I can say, that while I did not like some of the beers, it was based more on a stylistic preference (I like heavy barley wines when the outside temp is in the 50's not the current 80's) I did not taste a bad beer. I think you could stack the offerings up against any commercial craft brews available in Houston or at your local Spec's. There were a few too many stouts and barleywines, and too few pale ales and IPAs for my taste. There was only one IPA if I can remember correctly. Their offered meads were on the dry side for my taste, I'm a sack mead maker and I prefer mine a bit more sweet. But those criticisms are just me nit-picking. Servings were generous, with no lines. Complimentary cups were 8 oz and you got nearly that on every pour. I had to ask for <shudder> smaller pours, and even then my wife and I chose different selections and shared, as I wanted to make it through as many of the beers as possible and I thought 19 pints in one sitting might be too much. There were no nanny state reps pouring cough syrup sized servings to be sure. Everyone in attendance were adults and knew how much they could consume. We need to have more of these events, to drive the money grubbing distributor and promoter "festivals" out of business. They should be hanging their heads in shame looking at the comparison of what a few enterprising home brewers can do who are more interested in promoting brewig and fine beer, than making mony off of the gullible public. If you missed it, you really missed something. Once again the guys behind it deserve a big pat on the back. Job well done!