PROVIDENCE — Dave Richardson says that brewing beer is a science. It’s hard to argue with him. He has the degree to prove it.
Richardson, the brewmaster at Gardner Ale House, in Gardner, Mass., is a graduate of the brewing science and brewery engineering program at the University of California, Davis. It’s like a master’s degree in making beer, says Richardson, who majored in environmental science at the University of Vermont.
“I can relate so much of science — microbiology and chemistry — to brewing,” Richardson said on Saturday at the Great International Beer Festival in Providence, a tasting competition and showcase of beers from around the world.
Richardson knows what he’s talking about. Eight of his beers took first, second or third place medals in the competition, and people lined up in front of his booth to get a taste of one of his unfiltered brews.
The beer festival, now in its 21st year, featured 85 brewers and 260 beers. Most of the brewers were from the Northeast but some came from as far away as California and Oregon. There was a strong Rhode Island contingent that included Providence’s Trinity Brewhouse, Pawtucket’s Foolproof Brewing Company and Cranston’s Brutopia Brewer & Kitchen.
People paid $52 a ticket to get into the event at the Rhode Island Convention Center, where they could sample as much beer as they wanted. Proceeds benefit the Rhode Island Community Food Bank and other nonprofits.
The centerpiece of the day was the competition, which had some 720 entries in dozens of categories. There were wheat beers, including weizenbocks and dunkelweizens, fruit and spice beers, gluten-free beers, porters, stouts and lagers and a host of so-called “strong” beers, such as doublebocks, eisbocks, scotch ales and barleywines.
There were 80 beers alone in the IPA category.
“Which is enough,” said Charles Borkoski, one of the judges …read more