(I can't believe it has been almost four months since my last post! Man, time flies! But I am finally back and happy to be blogging again. I apologize to my followers who have been waiting for new postings during the last 4 months.)
I would like to mark my return by talking about a beer exam I took a couple months ago called the Certified Cicerone exam. Let me start with a little background information on the Certified Cicerone Program. It was started by Ray Daniels, a beer enthusiast and author of several books about beer. Due to his strong involvement in the craft beer movement, he is widely respected throughout the craft beer industry. He felt those in the beer world are not taken as seriously as they should and did not get the recognition they deserve. Seeing as wine experts are known as sommeliers, why not have the equivalent of that for the beer world? So that is what he did. He pitched the idea to various people that make up the craft beer world and agreed with the idea. So that was the birth of the Cicerone Program. The term cicerone is an old term for one who guides visitors and sightseers to museums, galleries, etc. and explains matters of historic and artistic importance. Ray Daniels believes a beer cicerone guides people into the world of beer and shows them all the intricacies of it all. And thats why he decided to use the title Cicerone. There are three levels in the program: Certified Beer Server, Certified Cicerone and Master Cicerone. You must pass the Certified Beer Server exam in order to take the Certified Cicerone exam and must pass the Cicerone exam to take the Master Cicerone exam. Each of the three certifications are on extremely different levels. FYI, the Master Cicerone exam is insanely hard and my hat goes off to the 3 or so Master Cicerones in the country.
After taking and passing the Certified Beer Server exam with ease, I decided to take a shot at the Certified Cicerone exam. A Cicerone must have expert knowledge in the various areas of beer, including brewing, beer styles, the history of different beer styles, draft systems, food and beer pairing, beer off-flavors and much more. It is a grueling exam to say the least. The exam consists of 4 sections: Short answer/fill-in-the blank questions, a few essay questions, a tasting section and a demonstration. I do not want to give too much away or go any more specific than that because I respect the test and what it represents. Anyways, I took the four hour exam in San Diego, CA after studying for about two months. It took place during the World Beer Cup that was being held at the same hotel and the exam. (I tried to sneak into the World Beer Cup after the test to no avail). There were about fifteen of us taking the test. The occupations of the test takers ranged from brewers to beer representatives and beer distributors. I did well on the written and demonstration parts of the examination, but struggled with the tasting portion, as did everyone else after discussing the exam with them after we finished. A score of 80% overall (and at least 70% in the tasting portion) is required to become a Cicerone. Overall, it is an extremely tough and humbling test. While I came up just short of becoming certified, I am scheduled to retake the tasting section hoping to improve a few percentage points to nudge my overall score into the passing range in a few weeks. So that is my experience with the exam. It was a fun thing to do and I enjoyed every minute of it, even the studying. I mean, how can I not enjoy studying when the topic is beer?! If you are interested in the Cicerone Program, visit www.cicerone.org.
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