CAMRA BC, Vancouver Branch’s Education Program has been one of the most successful parts of the last 2 years. Danny Seeton our Education Liaison and Amanda Barry – Buchart have worked hard putting together the classes which have run at Steamworks Brewpub. Almost every month we put on a sold-out class featuring some of the best local beer experts sharing their love of craft beer and cider.
All of our classes are available on YouTube, and the presentations are available on our website; just click on the Education tab. Classes are available to everyone, not just CAMRA members, although our members do get a discount on tickets. Typically we get to taste between 4-6 samples in each class and although CAMRA makes very little money on the classes, the value of that education is well worth the work each month. The presenters frequently ask to come back as they usually have much more fun than they expected.
This month we decided to start running 2 classes back to back for a full evening of tasting and learning, specifically Cider 101 and 102 (Spanish Cider). The class sold out in days and we had a long waiting list. In the end close to 30 people packed the room! Leading the class again was Alex “Cidermonger” Fortin, a local cider maker and writer who did a great job entertaining and educating on the relative merits of East Coast v West Coast cider and introduced a number of people to the delights of Rev Nat’s Hallelujah Hopricot Hard Cider.
Cider 102 is a brand new class and it drew on both Alex’s recent visit to the Basque region of Spain and the dedication of our lovely friends Kelly & Shawn from Txotx Basque Imports (pronounced chotch) who import the Basque cider to BC. We tasted 3 wonderful sidras and we even made sure to see the proper Txotx pouring technique when Kelly showed us her impressive escanciar un culín. Check out the video soon (or you can view an amateur version on our Facebook page).
Seeing such a great turn out shows that CAMRA BC’s Year of Craft Cider has really helped bring craft cider into the forefront with more and more people interested in making and drinking this delicious gluten-free nectar. I really hope that next year’s CAMRA executive consider revisiting the successful CiderWISE festival that CAMRA Vancouver presented in early 2014, as the growth of great cider in and from BC should be showcased.
As always a huge thank you to Steamworks Brewpub for hosting, Cidermonger and the Txotx crew for presenting, Darren Hull for volunteering to record and produce all of our education events, Danny and Amanda for arranging the classes, Ryan and Monica for pouring and everyone else who came out to learn while they sipped.
Please try and come to a CAMRA education class in the new year, they really are some of the most fun events we do. If you can’t make it then why not just try watching one of the videos?
Adam Chatburn
CAMRA BC, Vancouver Branch President
Leave a Reply