News – Page 8 – Pacific Gravity

Hoppy Holidays – 2016 Edition!

December 3, 2016/in Charity, Club Parties, Events, News /by Mimi Bardet

It is time for the Pacific Gravity and Culver City Homebrew Supply Shop annual holiday event. Mark your calendars! This year the party is happening on Saturday, December 10, 2016 at Dean Sussman’s house – same location as our Summer party. Dean’s address is: 1310 Amalfi Drive, Pacific Palisades, CA.

The party will kick off about 5:00 P.M. If you have not attended one of the past holiday events, let us tell you this is one party not to be missed!

We really, really need your help with the following:

FOOD:

Although the club will be providing much of the main dishes, this is still a potluck party and YOUR favorite party dish will sure be appreciated! The menu should mostly reflect past holiday parties featuring Carbonnades ala Flamandes, prime rib ala BBQ, deep fried turkeys, spiced ham and much more! Suggestions would include any kind of main dish but especially all side dishes, veggie dishes, salads, desserts and appetizers. So, if you have a favorite family holiday recipe and want to share it with the rest of us, this is your chance. Please let us know what you will bring. If you have any questions about what to bring, please contact Club Chef Ian at: [email protected] or Mimi at [email protected]

The dinner portion of the event will be ongoing beginning at approximately 6 p.m.
Just like our Summer Party, all food prep, cooking, consumption and cleanup will be OUTSIDE. There is NO access to the house.
BBQs will be our heat source for food. Therefore, there will be very little space available for reheating food, so please bring your food ready to serve, not ready to cook. Crockpots and chafing dishes with sterno fuel would be a great idea of how to bring something and keep it hot. Also, don’t forget to label your containers or anything you want back.

VOLUNTEERS needed for setup & cleanup:

On Friday, December 9^th, starting around 6 p.m., we need help with setup at Dean’s. (probably ending around 8-9 p.m.)
We will be setting up tables, E-Z ups, lighting, the beer wave and anything that can be done and left out overnight.

On Saturday, Dec 10th, starting at NOON, we need help with final setup at Dean’s.

On Sunday, Dec 11^th, starting at 10 a.m., we need lots of people to help with clean up. The more we get the faster it goes. (probably ending around 12noon-1 p.m.).

If you’d like to volunteer for set up or clean up contact us: PG Board at [email protected]

EQUIPMENT:

We need a few more heat lamps and fire pits so please donate them if you can.

We NEED lot & lots FIREWOOD! If you can bring wood please do so. It is forecasted to be cold on Saturday evening so please help bring some wood so we can all stay warm.

We could also use a few more tables, E-Z ups (canopies), and power strips.

We also need jockey boxes and CO2 cylinders and Sanke taps to help make sure all the beverages flow cold with perfect carbonation. We have more kegs than taps on the Wave, and the jockey boxes help out big time.

If at all possible, please bring your kegs and heavy stuff to setup on Friday evening or between 12noon – 3 p.m. on Saturday (and at least before 5 p.m., if possible.) This makes the last minute activities at party time go much more smoothly. The early kegs get the best slots on the Wave. Make sure all your kegs, coolers, tanks taps, and other equipment are well labeled so they all return to their rightful owners Sunday morning.

Note, if you can’t deliver beer kegs to the Dean’s house at setup on Friday evening or Saturday afternoon, then please email Carl Townsend at [email protected] to make arrangements to drop off your kegs at his house.

2^nd Annual Holiday CLOTHING CHARITY DRIVE:
It’s time to clean out your closets…Pacific Gravity is having our 2^nd annual Holiday CLOTHING DRIVE!

We will have boxes for any donations you can bring to the party.
For clothes & other items, please see the detailed list below which will be donated to The People Concern (formerly, OPCC). They are mostly in need of men’s clothing in large sizes. Clothing can be “gently used” and should be clean.
(Please see this link for all donations ideas: https://www.opcc.net/?nd=in_kind

Monetary donations will also be accepted – checks or cash. Special donation envelopes will be available at the party. Tax receipts for monetary donations will be sent to you by mail.

Below is a list of items that we can always use:
Clothing
Sweat socks – for men, women and children
Sweat shirts and pants for adults – all sizes especially larger sizes
Sneakers – men’s & women’s most needed
Shower shoes/thongs
Rain ponchos for adults & children
New underwear – men’s, women and children
Flannel and long sleeve shirts for adults

Personal & Household items
Hygiene Items
toothpaste
toothbrush
deodorant
shampoo
disposable razors
bar soap
hand & body lotion
sanitary napkins & tampons
Blankets (preferably wool)
Backpacks or duffel bags
Sleeping bags for adults
Diapers – all sizes
Bedding: Twin size sheets, comforters and pillows. Please note pillow must be new.

Gift Certificates
Supermarkets (Ralphs, Vons, Albertson’s)
Fast food restaurants
Book & music stores
Movie passes
Clothing stores, department stores (Marshalls, Target or Ross)

Art Supplies
Markers, finger paints, facepaints, crayons, watercolors, glue, glitter, collage materials, coloring books, activity books, stickers
BEER:
Last but certainly not least is beer, got beer? We need all types of beer, meads, cider and sodas for this event. Pull out your favorite holiday beverage, dust off the bottle or keg and bring it down! We’ll have the Wave of Beer set up to help dispense your holiday homebrews. If you plan to bring beer, soda or other seasonally festive beverage, please contact Carl at: [email protected] & let him know what you will bring. Everyone who signs up in advance will have a colorful tap tag.

Final Party Details:

Dress warm for our winter party and bring your own chair and/or blankets.

Highlighting the evening will be the crowning of the Pacific Gravity Club Member of the Year, and awarding of the trophy for Brewer of the Year. Plus, a special toast to this year’s California Home Brew Club of the Year: Pacific Gravity!

Santa is sure to make an appearance to give away lots of great door prizes (prize donations welcome).

All club members and their guests are welcome, so plan on joining us…Celebrate the season, good beer, good food and good friends the Pacific Gravity way!

First Friday @ Smog City and Honest Abe Cider Competition!

December 1, 2016/in Events, First Friday, News /by lloyd

Tomorrow Dec. 2nd Pacific Gravity will be headed to Smog City for our last First Friday 2016! Come and enjoy some of the best LA beers in town with our friends at Smog.

Smog City Brewery
1901 Del Amo Blvd B, Torrance, CA 90501

Check out the PG even page link below for more info:
http://pacificgravity.com/events/first-friday-smog-city-december/ (note: this event was changed from Holy Cow to Smog City)

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Then Sunday Dec. 4th, Bring back your cider you made from the Honest Abe Cider Collection a few months back. We will be sharing them with Strand Brew Club and Honest Abe for a chance to win Best Cider Maker! Everyones invited, bring bottles, growlers, or kegs and get some great feed back on how you did on you cider. Should be a fun day at Honest Abe!

Honest Abe Cider
17800 S Main St #105, Gardena, CA 90248

Check out the link below of the Facebook invite put together by Strand Brewers:
~~https://www.facebook.com/events/1690467347933410/~~ UPDATE: It looks like that page was moved or taken down, but we’ll have more info on this event to follow!

Time to get ready for PG’s Holiday Party!

November 29, 2016/in News /by Mimi Bardet

Mark your calendars for the big event on Saturday, December 10th at Dean’s house in the Pacific Palisades.

Please start thinking about how YOU can help make this party a big success.
We will need your help with the following:

volunteers (setup, cleanup)
beer
food (it’s a potluck party so bring your favorite holiday dish – both savory & sweet!)
equipment (firewood, tables, e-z ups, jockey boxes, CO2 cylinders
clothing and goods for our charity drive (see the website for donation ideas: https://www.opcc.net/?nd=in_kind)

Please stay tuned…more details will be posted soon.
Cheers!

Mimi

Black Friday Discount On FW / PG Collaboration Bottles!

November 23, 2016/in News /by Michael Musgrave

Hey PG!

I have some REALLY exciting news to share! Once again, Firestone Walker is pulling out all the stops to support our membership. Those of you who are stopping into Firestone Walker’s Propagator on Black Friday to purchase bottles of our collaboration beer: BRING YOUR PG MEMBERSHIP CARD FOR A 25% DISCOUNT! 😀

The Propagator doors open at 10am for this event and I am planning on being there to represent and talk shop with visitors about the beer and our experience brewing with FW. Hope to see you too!

Shoutout to Brian, Carl, and the other club members who put together this collaboration and happy turkey day to all!

One last bit, if you have a social media account it would be great if you can post about the beer when you purchase or drink a bottle. Firestone did us a solid by brewing with us for our 20th anniversary, so we should thank them again with some cool PR.

Enjoy!

Michael

25nov10:00 amFW / PG Collaboration Bottle Release10:00 am Firestone Walker Propagator

Club of the Year, Club member or the Year, and Chili Cook-off Recap!

November 14, 2016/in Activities, Club Meetings, Events, News, President's Message, Recap /by lloyd

Hello PG Members,

We all have been pretty busy the last week, so its taken me some time to officially get this post out here. So please Read on:

First, if you haven’t heard Pacific Gravity won the 2016 “Anchor California Homebrew Club of the Year” competition!!!! We turned in our submission and judging was on Nov. 5th during the Cal. State homebrew comp. Check out the link here: http://castatebrewcomp.org. I want to thank everyone for a great year and to all the board members for helping make it so. We strived to make a difference, to evolve this club to higher standards, and this is just one of the pay offs. I hope everyone, for years to come, will continue to make Pacific Gravity one of California’s best homebrew clubs around. By striving for more education, involvement, club charity, and as always brewing the best damn beer!

Second, if you “missed” the Chili Cook-off and did not get a chance to vote for Pacific Gravity’s “Club Member of the Year” nows your chance! Please email your vote here: [email protected] you will have tell Next Sunday to vote. That is voting will now close after Nov. 20th. Nominated Members are: Lloyd Johnson, Michael Musgrave, Tim Bardet, Carl Townsen, Terry Malloy, Michael Patterson, Mimi Bardet, Tania Musgrave, Dean Sussman, and as always feel free to vote for any other PG member not on that list. You will get two votes for two different people. So please send those emails with two names!

Third, we had a blast at the Chili Cooks off. It was a good day, hot at first and then the marine layer rolled in to cool us off a bit. Chili’s and cornbread where showing up and snack where laid out. Terry had the lights up for night and a fire pit ready to go. We had a slow start, but soon got some good number later. Just in time for Rives amazing rare and expensive cider and mead tasting that lasted for quite some time into the night. Thank you Rives for going so above and beyond! We did announcement and last calls for voting about mid evening. As there was no contested board members for 2017 we did a vocal call for agreement in next years board members. They are as followed: President Michael Musgrave, VP Terry Molloy, Treasure Tim Bardet, then Carl Townsend for Competitions Coordinator, Dean Sussman as Styles, Mimi Bardet as Charities and Special Events, Tania Musgrave as Secretary, Michael Patterson as Education Director, and Brett Wilson as Activities Director that I know for sure as of now.

All the chili’s where great. We absolutely stuffed ourselves, but only two chili’s could come out on top. Ian Fraser took the win for Best Chili and Parker took the most unique! Both where amazing, Ian’s was a delicious super spicy meat chili and then Parker’s was like an amazing Mole like vegetarian chili (sorry Parker blanking on the actual ingredients). Also we did not get a lot of the style of the month beers that night, but we did get a bunch of kegs so we opened the best beer of the night to everyone that brought beer. It looked like by the end of the night Ian, Tim, Luis, and Larry took the win with there Big Red IPA, and then Carl was in close second with a hoppy pale “Extra Galactic”.

I want to give The Molloy’s a big Thank You for hosting at their house again this year, great times! Check out some of the pics below.

http://pacificgravity.com/2016/11/club-year-club-member-year-chili-cook-off-recap/

Chris Remensperger from Strand Brewers Invites us on his AHA Rally Bus to Stone!!

October 31, 2016/in Events, News, Road Trips /by lloyd

Chris Remensperger from Strand Brewers Club in the South Bay area is organizing a bus trip down to the AHA Stone Rally. He has a beer in the homebrew comp and its his B-day! As well Rives Borland has a beer in the homebrew comp which is put on for the Stone Brewery’s ProAm and Chris and Rives needs our support. If you’ve never been to the Stone Rally they have around thirty homebrewers pouring their beers in a festival like setting and then everyone votes for the best homebrewed beer later that day. Plus there are AHA Raffles, and all the offerings at Stone and food. The bus will also be going to other breweries after the Stone AHA Rally.

The Details to get on the bus

Date: Saturday, November 12th, 8am tell late.

Cost: only $25 (cash to Chris)

Seats available: about 15
(Note: Chris is paying for the bus out of his pocket, so please do not confirm a seat and then back out last minute without paying somehow if he can’t fill your seat.)

Bus Pick Up: Marine Ave. Park and Ride (8am on November 12th)
2406 Marine Ave. Redondo Beach, Ca. 90278

Rough Itinerary:
8am: Bus pick up and leaves Marine Ave. P&R
11am-2pm: Stone Liberty Station AHA Ralley (Rally, and Lunch)
2pm-4pm: Modern Times Brewery
4pm-7pm: North Park Brewing (dinner stop as well)
7pm-9pm: Council Brewing
9pm-? back to bus drop off.

RSVP’s: (There are 2 rsvp’s you need to do)
-RSVP to Chris at [email protected] and let him know if you want to confirm a seat on the bus.

-You must also RSVP to the Stone AHA Rally: It is free to RSVP, click on link below.
Let Chris know you RSVP’ed for the Rally as well when you confirm a seat on the bus with him.

Stone – Liberty Station AHA Rally

Here is Chris’s Facebook invite post with the trip info as well:
https://www.facebook.com/events/209803759440159/

This sounds link an amazing day. I am hoping I can make it and other PG members. If you where hoping PG was going to do a bus trip this year, well this is a great secondary chance to get on one!! Like always Please be safe that days too.
Please Uber, Lyft, Metro Transit (Green Line), or bus to the pick up location that morning or at least get a ride home that night. Do not Drive, it will be a long day of drinking and you might not be able get home safely behind the wheel?

http://pacificgravity.com/2016/10/chris-remensperger-strand-brewers-invites-us-aha-ralley-bus/

PG Golf Day Outing and Bottle Share afterparty @ Tomm Carrol’s Trux Stop, RECAP!!

October 27, 2016/in Activities, Club Parties, Events, News, Recap /by lloyd

Well we had a lot of fun this last weekend. First off I would like to thank our new Activities Director, Brett Wilson for organizing and taking on the new roll this last few weeks! I and a bunch of other people can’t wait for the next event. Also a huge thank you to Tomm and Denise for hosting the After Party Bottle Share at their back yard bar called the Trux Stop. So many beers where enjoyed by all. Lastly I would like to thank Ian Fraser, our resident club Chef for cooking up some amazing grub as well. Mesquite charcoal cooked sausages and brats that then got a beer bath in secondary! Plus thank you to everyone that brought other amazing side dish foods and to everyone that brought all the beer to share!

A good bunch of us started off by meeting up in the mid morning around 10:15-10:30am at the Westchester golf course, to hit some balls and pay for our golf rounds. It was a busy day and the course was behind about 20-30 minutes tell we tee’d off. Brian Holter and two of his friends and other club member Bill was the first 4’some and then Brett Wilson, Michael Patterson, Ian Fraser, and I (Lloyd) was the second 4’some. The sun was out, but with a cool breeze as we all hacked away at the balls. No matter how bad we did we where having fun and we celebrated big on the good shots! We had a running game between both 4’some of “closest to the Pin (flag)” on the par three holes, aka the ones we should hit it on the green in one shot. Good thing there where a lot of par threes! In the end one of Brian’s friend killed us on getting it closer, she took home the Beer Prize! Then we all finally made it to the 18th hole and finished off strong. There where a few craft beers enjoyed on the course, Brian was trading with everyone. We lost a couple balls in the water and over the fence, but we could of not had a better day out on the course!

Then we all headed to the Trux Stop, a bit late due to the late start on the course and a bit of waiting at the holes. Ian got right away to prepping the Charcoal Grills, Brian got to Popping Bottles, Tomm showed the first timers around the bar and walk-in, and we all got to drinking some rare beers! A bunch of PG members where already there when us Golfers showed up, but then a lot more came as the night fell. Brett awarded Brian and I (Lloyd) with best and worst scores, I got worst with a 102 vs Brians 82 for 18 holes! As a lot of beer talking and passing around bottles continued, soon came time for food. We where all ready and I loaded a few plates that night. The beer bathed sausages where amazing and we can always count on Ian’s great food ideas. Plus we had all the toppings, some awesome salads, Mac & Cheese and also Spiced beans from Scott, 2) potato dishes, and tons of chips. Some time later Denise brought out a cake with all the club member’s October Birthdays on it and we all got a huge slices and ice-cream on the side after singing the B-Day song to the members that where present. Although after all the beer, food, and cake, the best part of the night was about to come. Tom and Tomm combined forces and brought out a beer vertical of “Samichlans Bier” aka the Santa Clause Beer, an imported Swiss winter warmer I believe. The oldest bottle spanning back 26 year!!! Bottle order: 1990, 1996, 2001, 2004, 2005, 2010. It was quite a treat, granted the first two tasted like soy sauce, but still awesome to try something 26 and 20 years old. The early 2000’s where more oxidized tasting, and then the 2010 was probably the best tasting. Where you could still pick out the original qualities, but with 6 years of age. An inspiring vertical tasting for sure, thank you Tom and Tomm!

Finally the night wound down, but a ton more great bottles where opened. Rives showed up later with some beer from going to the grand opening of Ventura Coast Brewing, where Dan White is now Head Brewer. Tomm held down the Trux Stop bar like a captain at his ship, as I asked hit what was next form the fridge behind him. One by one people drop off and had to go and so did I. Only to come back the next day to pick up some stuff and find the lines of dead soldier bottles following around the patio, great times!

Having trouble viewing the photos in this post? Click here to see them.

Show off your Homebrew!! Craft (Beer) Night @ Craft & Folk Art Museum and a new LB HB Fest Comp.

October 26, 2016/in Competitions, Events, News /by lloyd

Hi PG members,

Here’s a chance to show off your homebrew to the public!! Thursday Nov. 3rd, the Craft and Folk Art Museum is doing a Craft Beer Night. Sorry its kind of last minute, my fault for not getting this out there sooner.

Pacific Gravity member, Lindsey Vaniman now works for the museum and thought this would be a fun thing to do with some of the members. So the Museum is calling out to all craft homebrewers to join them for the night and share your creations.

If you have any beers ready and would like to sign up, just email the Museum organizer at: [email protected]
Here’s the link to the events page for the month with the Craft Night listed on it: http://cafam.org/programs

Also let me know, Lindsey and I would be interested to hear if any PG members sign up! [email protected]

If you have never done something like this in the past, I assure you it will be a blast. I did one for an art event in the past and it was an awesome way to show off some beer, talk beer, and introduce people to new beer styles and watch what they end up liking the most. Plus everyone loves the person pouring their drinks!

Also, there is another event going on in Long Beach in early December on the 10th (2-5pm) as a Homebrew Comp and pouring festival. I imagine kind of like the Stone Homebrew comp coming up in November.

Here is the link to the sign up sheet and more info on dates of submission and festival. Along with a bunch of other questions. http://tinyurl.com/h2sguuw
You can email any additional questions to: [email protected] or [email protected]

Charity event Recaps, the past few months!

October 24, 2016/in Charity, News, Recap /by lloyd

So in the last few months Pacific Gravity did some great stuff for charity and the OPCC.net organization. Not just giving and donating clothes and other goods, but actual physical human time by volunteering for events to put smiles on community members/clients of OPCC faces and then to help OPCC celebrate while raising money for their organization and new merger with the Lamp Community of LA.

First off back in August, you might of saw the Facebook post about our first physical event we worked up as an introduction to volunteering and organizing charity events where we would go as a club to help out in our community with our friends from OPCC. Members of the board organized a Yogurt Parfait dessert surveying for a dinner service at one of the Santa Monica community centers ran by OPCC. PG club members and board members signed up and had a super fun time putting some grateful smiles on the OPCC client faces. The clients being the members of the community in need of help, where OPCC helps them not only survive, but thrive and get their lives back on a functional track with food services, counseling, over night shelter, and much much more. Here’s a photo of all of us form Pacific Gravity and OPCC having a wonderful time helping out. It was super easy and a truly great experience, I encourage all member to help out next time we organize another volunteer event.

Then just recently OPCC.net called on us Pacific Gravity for our help in getting PG member to volunteer for their “OPCC and Lamp Community 6th Annual Fall Affair” event. Here they would be raising all sorts of money for the organizations and announcing their big merger combining the two largest charitable community organizations together into one to be named “The Peoples Concern”.

Thank you to all the Pacific Gravity members that came out to help, it was a great event, full of celebrities and very charitable members of our communities. The newly named “The Peoples Concern” raised over $80,000 that night while we watched and help take donations over a very cool donation app texted to peoples phones and on the iPads we where carring around. We helped out with the silent auction as well where people where donating for some great gifts, we helped on the registration table, the painting sales, and even the initial set up! It was amazing to be a part of something like that and watch all the action go down. Here are some more pictures of Pacific Gravity members helping out at the Fall Fair event.

Again I encourage all PG members to help volunteer and donate to our events as much as you can. Our next donations opportunity will be at out Winter Party coming up sometime in early December. We hope to make it the biggest donation collection yet!!

Last Night’s Club Meeting Reminders and Recap.

October 21, 2016/in Activities, Club Meetings, Events, First Friday, News, Recap /by lloyd

Thanks everyone that came out last night, we had a great October Club Meeting that had some long announcements and Nominations for 2017.

Just a Reminder, Voting for the Club President, Vice President, Treasurer, and Club Member of the Year will be held November 5th at the chili cook off Saturday club meeting at Terry Maloy’s house. More info on that to come, but in the mean time Nominations for Pres., VP, Treasure, and Club Member of the Year will be open tell about Nov. 4th. Please email us at [email protected] for your Nominations. There is still plenty of room for Pres., VP, and Treasurer nomination!

Secondly, Tomorrow is the Golf Day Outing hosted by our new Activities Director, Brett Willson. if anyone is interested in golfing there still might be a chance to squeeze you in. Email Brett at [email protected].

Also we will have a Bottle share after party at the Trux Stop, hosted by Tomm Carroll, aka his place. Tomm said last night that if you don’t have any bottles to share don’t worry he has it covered!! also if anyone is interested in bringing any homebrew kegs as well we will have taps set up!! feel free to email me if you do: [email protected] and I will let Tomm know. As well Ian will be cooking up some brats, but with a beer bath technique I’m told so it should be awesome as always. All are welcome to Tomm’s stating at 3pm tomorrow!

Lastly check out the new First Friday schedule for the months of November and December that has been updated for the rest of the year.

Here’s a bit of Recap of Last nights October meeting:

We had a ton of Kegs line up at last nights meeting, all sorts of styles and a couple for the Style of the Month. Everything from Strong Ales, to Smoked Porters, Fresh Harvest IPA’s and NE IPA’s. Plus some great beers being passed around like Rueben’s Smash Hopped Dorado IPA and a American sour blend dry hopped with Mosaic form one of the New Members that signed up last night! There where a ton of new faces and it was great to see and meet you all. I hope you enjoyed the meeting and will be back for more of our events!

Tim J. hosted the Commercial Tasting and did a great job finding all sorts of English Strong Ales and some American Barleywines. We also had a great Raffle with a lot of classics like “A beer and a Glass”, but also gave away some Fresh Cascade Hops from Carls garden, a new and rare LA Ale Works hat and a beer, some PG glassware swag and a beer, a Brewery 750ml, and ended with a grand prize of a 6.5 gal. Glass Carboy donated form Porter at Smog City.

We did our last 2 off flavor tastings last night, hosted by Michael Patterson. Thank you Michael for hosting all the set ups this year. Last night ended on some fun ones Earthy and Spicy. The Earthy one tasted like you just took a shot of dirt mixed in with some grass clippings. Great Stuff!

Club Member Parker Waechter once again this year took home the Best Beer of the Night price of a $25 gift certificate at Culver City Homebrew Shop with his Wee Heavy. He has consistently brewed not only the style of the month, but has done it in away that has improved his skill immensely. I encourage all to be like Parker and brew those beers! The Style of the Month has been there to encourage people to step out of their boundaries. To brew and learn about different styles. Parker has done that, admitting last night how brewing the style of the month has been a great and fulfilling challenge for him this past year and it show in his awesome beers he brings every month. Great Job Parker!

Below are some pics form last night. Cant see the pics on the email?? go to this post link: http://pacificgravity.com/2016/10/last-nights-club-meeting-reminders/