It was another full night at our latest meeting. We are grateful to have Two Track Malting dial into the meeting to talk about their processes and products along with a few beers brewed by members with Two Track Okefenokee Pale — an American Bitter, SMaSH Pale Ale, Rye IPA, and New Zealand Pilsner. They make amazing malt products, so keep an eye out — and ask you local retailer — about stocking some!

Here are some notes from the business portion of the meeting:

• The fundraiser for East Side Neighborhood Services closed out with $1150 raised and a matching $1000 check coming from the club. Thanks to everyone who supports ESNS!!
• We are cleaning up the Google Group used for the email list and club knowledge base access. If you have not yet paid your 2022 dues, please check that email and reach out to club leadership. Unpaid accounts will be removed from the Google Group soon.
• We had a couple in-person events recently
  • Taproom Takeover at Fat Pants in Eden Prairie. A number of members got together for a pint, a bite, and social hour. We will be at Waldmann in St. Paul the first week of May. Check out the Club Calendar for a full schedule.
  • The first bike ride was a success with stops at Wooden Ship, Steel Toe, and LynLake. Plans are being formed for potentially two rides in May: a longer ride west of the city and a ride into St. Paul for the Bad Weather Arcade Bay event. Fill up your tires and join the rides!
• A few members of the club will be at HomebrewCon in Pittsburgh in June. Say hello if you run us — and, more importantly, check out the education session on sour beer blending!
• With more events happening this year again, we are also thinking of some ideas for a field trip, potentially to Duluth for All Pints North, Fargo breweries, Schell’s Oktoberfest, or somewhere else around the region. Previous trips have been to Mighty Axe Hops, Schell’s, and Rahr Malting.
• The Sour Times competition is open for account registration with entries open through May and judging in the first half of June. Check out the competition site for more details.
• Planning for the 2022 Yeast Experiment is underway. Ideally we will find a way to brew ourselves or work with a brewery partner to create a batch of middle-of-the-road wort where different yeast strains will provide different results. We are targeting the beers to be shared at the July meeting as the experiment topic.

In closing, we would like to give a shout out to the Primary Fermenters homebrew club. They recently announced they are shutting down operations. The NBA has been lucky enough to partner with them for events like Brew For Good and they will surely be missed. We are lucky to have so many other clubs in the area including St. Paul Homebrew Club and Minnesota Home Brewers Association.

Cheers!