Touring Raleigh breweries with the club was a blast.  It is amazing how quickly the craft beer scene has grown in NC over the past couple of years.  We've got more NC brew tours with our April monthly meeting at a special location... Foothills Brewery in Winston Salem (April 18)... and May 11-13 is the big Asheville trip where we hit as many breweries as we can in a weekend (bring your significant other and make a vacation out of it!).

We had a van load of judges and stewards go to Raleigh to help out with the Shamrock Open.  Great competition.  We walked away with a few ribbons, but there is definitely room for us to get more beers entered into competitions this year.  Competitions are a great way to get unbiased feedback on your beers.  Keep an eye on the forum for deadlines.  There are several competitions this Spring and it's as easy as 1)Bottling 2)Signing Up and 3)Dropping your beers off at the right location.

Great to have so many new brewers coming out to meetings.  Make sure you hook up with some experienced brewers and get out and see them brew.  There's no better way to pick up tricks than to see them in action.

Cheers,

DERICK