2025 SCHF - May 2,3

[lexuschris]

Greetings all!

Spring and the Southern California Homebrew Festival is right around the corner! This is an amazing weekend, and something you should at least look into!

For 2025, they are returning to Vail Lake Resort near Temecula. Some folks camp, some drive in, some stay local. Friday night is commercial brewers pour and campfire crawl, then the main even on Saturday has dozens of homebrew clubs pouring homebrew! It is a great way to experience everything from seltzers, meads, ciders, ales, lagers, gruits, etc.

For more information, and signups, go to the California Homebrewers page, and become a member. Then purchase a ticket to the event, or volunteer for a free entry pass! https://www.calhomebrewers.org/2025-sou ... formation/

Brewcommune will be have a booth and we are pouring homebrew this year! The Brewcommune campsite is at the top of the 'Oaks' area, near the Bunkhouse Bar. Be sure to stop by and say hi and visit us at our booth on Saturday!

If you are interested in bringing a keg of homebrew to pour at the booth, please PM me as I am putting together our tap list and schedule. Its going to be another great event!


--LexusChris

[lexuschris]

Brewing for Homebrew Festival!

After a few false starts (weather related), I finally got my SCHF brews done on Sunday! My systems is built for 10-gallon batches (brutus stand, 3 burners, 2 pumps) with 15 gallon kettles.

To get 2 beers out of brewday, I do a shared big mash, then split to 2 vessels, and use different boil elements (hops, additives) and put in 2 different fermentation vessels with different yeasts. That is why last year, I had an old ale and my gruit (based on an old ale mash).

This year, I wanted to try an American Pale Ale and American IPA. So my mash was 10-gallons of 2-row Pale Malt (88%), Caramel 40L (10%) and Caramel 80L (2%), plus some mash hops.

The pale ale got some Azacca & Galaxy hops for 8-min, and Eukanot for 2 mins, plus WLP-051 (California Ale V).

The IPA got 2# DME & extra Cascade in the boil, plus Azacca & Motueka at 8 mins, Motueka at 2 mins, and a whirlpool addition of Azacca & Motueka at 180-F. I tried a new thiol-ized yeast, Omega Star Party, with some Phantasm Thiol Precursors added during whirlpool!

So, if it all goes well, I should have a solid 5% ABV APA, and a nicely thiolized IPA at 7%.

Stay tuned!
--LexusChris

[romen]

Very cool. I've been wanting to try the thiol-ized yeast. Can't wait to try that.

[lexuschris]

California Homebrewers Association
4/21/25

SCHF 2025

Only 11 days until we are gathering for SCHF 32 we have some exciting things to share with you. But first if you haven't gotten your tickets yet now is the time to do that. Remember, only members can attend Fest. If you have friends that are considering attending, but have not registered yet, please tell them to proceed with all due haste to our Shop. We will be closing registrations at midnight on May 1st , there are NO ticket sales at the event.

Do not forget, we have a fantastic raffle every year at Fest and this year's raffle will be the biggest ever! We first want to thank all our great sponsors who have donated prizes this year.
We also have two amazing grand prizes, first from our friend Trip over at Trip's Beer Trips an amazing chance to win a beer tour in Germany!





And once again the fine folks at the Brewer's Supply Group have continued to be ever generous with lots of great prizes including a Grainfather G30.
You of course must be at the event and purchase raffle tickets to win.







Cheers,

Board of Directors, California Homebrewers Association






calhomebrewers.org