Chicken City Ale Raisers
Home brewing and beer appreciation in north Georgia

The Chicken City Ale Raisers were formed in the early 1990's well before the legalization of homebrewing in GA in 1993.  Rick Foote, a founding member of Vermont's Green Mountain Mashers, and his brother Dean formed the nucleus for the first homebrewing club north of Atlanta.  Jimmy Carter may have legalized homebrewing in the nation, but in the early days, we had to keep a low profile lest we wind up cooling our heels in the County jail.  Yes, we were hardened criminals such as stock brokers, government administrators and dentists.  In fact, it was dentist and charter Ale Raiser, Mike Martin, that christened the club.  The name reflected the feeling of the day in that we needed to "raise a little ale" to get this state to legalize such a worthwhile and noble pursuit that was practiced so freely by the founders of our country. 

 So it was in 1993 that the CCAR joined the ranks of the Covert Hops Society and Ale Atlanta to loose the chains that bound us. The CCAR has changed and evolved over the years.  At one point in the late 90�s, we absorbed members of the defunct Brews Brothers, a Cumming area club.  Our new club logo took on characteristics of both former logos.  Since the merger, members have come and gone and some have even come back again.  The CCAR now has members from Gainesville, Cumming, Canton, and even two out of state.  We are small but mighty, choosing as our strength quality over quantity. 

One of our members has both a huge garage and all the welding equipment you could imagine.  We have welded seven 3-tier steel rack systems over the years complete with converted kegs and a 3 burner manifold.  We religiously brew together for National Homebrew Day and Teach a Friend to Brew.  We also have several cooks and two sausage presses. This evolved into an annual club Oktoberfest with homebrew, homemade sausage, beer tent, and an annual club homebrew challenge.  For the past half dozen years the CCAR also does an all-grain homebrewing demonstration at the Helen, GA Fest Hall as part of their Oktoberfest festivities.  Our latest activity is to attend a Spring Chicken Cookoff in the Gainesville Town Square.  This year�s event promises to be twice as large as last year�s successful inaugural.

Before you hypothesize we are straying from our roots, consider this.  After a little prior planning, we won the Peach State Open for the first time 4 years ago.  We won it again last year and this year.  We placed highly in the Mid South competition series several times and were the top Mid South club last year.  In fact, the Mid South Brewer of the Year, Master Brewer of the Year and 3 of the top 5 on both lists are CCAR members. Last year a CCAR member won Best of Show in 4 of the 6 contests and there were multiple CCAR members placing second, third or HM in the BOS round of every 2005 Mid South contest.  Not just a regional aberration, we have two BJCP National judges and two CCAR members have won AHA National medals.

�And then there is our Chicken.  Not content to have a simple mascot, the CCAR Chicken brews, drinks, and travels with us.  Brewing is both science and art, a magic combination of skill, knowledge and luck.  The Chicken was originally a beer talisman that was waved over the mash, boil, and fermentation for good luck.  In order to keep the Beer Gods smiling upon us, we are now trying to both share our good fortune and channel as much of the brewing mojo in the known Universe through our Chicken.  Since the Chicken so markedly improved our brewing, we decided we had to share him with the rest of the beer world. The Chicken�s first official out of state function was the AHA National Convention in Baltimore in 2005.  He now routinely visits breweries, brewpubs, beer bars, homebrew shops, contests, festivals, and beer events everywhere.  He is officially a citizen of Rogue Nation and your favorite brewer or beer celebrity has probably had their picture taken with him.  Take that Spuds McKensey!

About Our President

He's famous! Check out this article written by Dan Washburn of The Times in Gainesville, Georgia.