On Monday I retook the Certified Cicerone© tasting exam at North Park Brewing Co. It was nerve-wracking, and a runny nose didn’t help, but I powered through. 13 two-ounce pours of beer doesn’t seem like much until they are staring you in the face. However, I think I passed!

At the end of the 45 minute exam the Proctor and a Certified Cicerone lead examinees through the tasting since this is ultimately a learning experience. The Proctor knows the answers ahead of time, having made the decisions, purchased the beer, and doctored the beer. The Certified Cicerone helps set everything up but sits for the exam blind to ensure that the beers do not have any defect or weirdness. Fortunately, both the Proctor and the Certified Cicerone agreed on the answers. While there are 12 samples, there are 16 possible points on the exam to balance if a certain sample was more difficult or flavor was muted. You need 70% or greater to pass, so 11.2 points. I cannot crow from the rooftops that I passed yet because my memory was fried by the end, so it’s possible I did not remember my answers accurately, but I think I only missed three questions.

Since there are no phones or cameras allowed in the exam, and I signed a waiver that I would not disclose test answers, I am writing this up with general information already available through Cicerone. The tasting exam consists of three sections. I made an illustration of how I laid out my samples since you get them all at the same time.

Section one is to identify off flavors compared to a control sample. One of the four samples in clean. So that’s four ounces of clean beer and six ounces of less-than-desirable beer. I think I got two right and mixed two up. I debated for a long time between the two, but decided to go with my first impression. I should not have done that.

Section two is to discriminate between two given styles for each sample. The examples in sample exam are German Pils vs Munich Helles, American Pale Ale vs Strong Bitter, Belgian Dubbel vs British Brown Ale, Doppelbock vs Wee Heavy. I believe I got four for four on this section just as I did on the first go-around of the exam. I had one really tough sample but I was able to pull it off. This section is the most fun since it is eight ounces of clean beer.

Section three is to assess quality of the beer at service. In this section you are given the beer brand, style, and service mode (draft, bottle, can), asked if it should be pulled from service, and if so, why. I believe I went three for four on this section. I incorrectly sensed that one sample was off, and in talking with other examinees afterward they also found something off with it. I guess we didn’t like or weren’t as familiar with the style. Or, more likely, we were expecting something to be off in the testing situation and our brains filled in the absence of errors for us. This section can have clean beer but doesn’t necessarily. So that up to eight ounces of yuck or eight ounces of liquid joy.

At the end, I probably drank half of the total volume of beer. The flavors that were toughest to decipher were the ones I had to taste the most, unfortunately, while the clean (and enjoyable) beer needed the least revisits. It was interesting seeing how other examinees organized their samples differently and how the samples they struggled with differed. I heard some folks got all the off flavors but struggled with the styles. Some folks (myself included) got too far into their heads and second guessed their impressions. Of the ten test takers I was the only one who did not work for a brewery, so the other folks are coming at the test with varying levels of experiences and expectations.

But I am really proud of how well I think I did. I’ll let you know in six to eight weeks. In the meanwhile I’m off to dive deeper into the BJCP Beer Style Guidelines for the BJCP online entrance exam and meeting up with a study group for the BJCP beer judging exam. Once I gain some sanity I’ll write more about different tasting strategies, especially as I start studying next year for the Advance Cicerone© exam, which has 42 samples in the tasting portion and the style differentiation give four options instead of two. The Master Cicerone exam has two days of blind tastings. I may get there some day, but not today. Today I get to enjoy a beer with nary a reference book or flashcard in sight.