AIBA - Australian International Beer Awards

Work as a steward at the 2014 AIBA Awards

Set-up

Receipting and storing the over 1500 different beers entered into the AIBA Awards 2014, took over two weeks.

Lots of lifting, unpacking and sorting of so many wonderful and interesting beers.

Beers were catalogued and put into chilled reefers/fridges - in class order

Kegs are also received and sorted into daily tasting order

Beers arrive on pallets to be sorted & unpacked.

Kegs are sorted into serving day order

After unpacking, beers are refrigerated in class order

Fridges inside the steward area are set-up

Final days of set-up for the awards

The room and tables are setup

Mike's birthday celebration

The Award Judging - 1 week

 

 

 

Post judging BBQ. Awards for "Golden Tray"

 The pack down/ bump out

 Another week was spent cleaning up after the event.
Finally - Beers packed for exhibitor tasting event, AIBA Awards Dinner and a consumer tasting
Reward boxes packed.
That's it for another year.
Let the muscles relax and have a beer!

Royal Melbourne Fine Food Awards 2014

Royal Melbourne Fine Food Awards 2014

Royal Melbourne Fine Foods Awards 2014

For the first time this year (2014), I decided to help as a steward at the Royal Melbourne Fine Food Awards. I worked for 7 days over three weeks and helped with the awards shown below.

Day 1 & 2 - Distilled spirits (whiskey, gin, vodka & fruit liqueur)

Getting ready for Distilled Spirits tasting

What we see back of house. Judges have blind tastings

Plenty of Whiskey, Gin, Vodka for the judges

Whiskey is served!

Fruit Liqueurs ready for judging

Getting the fruit liqueurs ready for pouring

Fruit Liqueurs, ready for pouring 

Fruit Liqueurs in many wonderful colours

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Day 3 (event 2) for me was the Cider and Perry judging.

Day 3 saw the judging of both cider (apple) and Perry (pear). Some excellent quality brews were judged

Preparation for Cider tasting

Cider & Perry judging. These are Perry (pear)

 

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Day 4 - my third event included Salts, Spices, Crisp Bread plus Honey

Spices and Salt judging

Some interesting Salts for judging 8 baked garlic and olive salt

Silver medal winner "Friggin'Hot Chilli Paste

Honey Judging

Honey is on the table for the judges - labels removed of course!

Honey judging

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Day five was the judging of Cereal, Muesli, confectionery and infusions (tea)

Cereal & Muesli Awards

Cereal & Muesli awards

Muesli judging

Muesli Judging

Confectionery

A plate of confectionery for the judges

Nougat ready for the confectionery judges

Infusion (tea) judging

Infusion judging under way

Lemon Verbena ready to be infused and judged

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Day 6 & 7  was setting up and running the pasta judging day.

The Age newspaper came and took photos of the pasta judging
Click to see The Age Photo Gallery

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 The final day was judging garlic. 

I didn't steward on that last day - but the garlic was looking and smelling wonderful