SO, YOU THINK you know a lot about beer? Here's a quiz:
A) What is the name of the device attached to a keg to allow for the input of gas and the output of beer?
B) What trait in beer do measurements in degrees of SRM represent?
C) What Munich style of beer is known for the flavor of 4-vinyl guaiacol?
Stumped? Those are just three of more than 140 questions on what may be the world's toughest beer test, the final exam for the Craft Beer Institute's Cicerone Certification Program.
So far, just 23 people have passed the test; twice that many have failed.
Me? I had to Google the definition of "cicerone."
That's the term (pronounced sis-uh-rohn) that the institute's president, Ray Daniels, has adopted to describe what might otherwise be called a "beer sommelier," a professional who helps you select the proper beer for your meal.
It's an old word for a museum guide - an appropriate choice, said Daniels, because "a Cicerone will possess the knowledge and skills to guide those interested in beer culture, including its historic and artistic aspects."
If all that sounds a bit snooty for the Everyman's drink, well, you haven't shopped for beer lately. It's not just the daunting variety of labels that can confound you: As brewers continually crank out new riffs on traditional styles, it's almost impossible to predict what's inside that corked $20 bottle.
"That's one of the reactions I got initially: 'Don't make beer snobby, we don't want to be like the wine guys,' " Daniels said of his year-old program. "I don't think we're in much danger of that. I don't think beer people are snobby at all."
Besides, the program isn't a test of beer trivia, he said. It's designed mainly to help restaurants, wholesalers and breweries provide consistent, high-quality beer to patrons.
For example, because so many people enjoy draft beer, 20 percent of the exam is about the mechanics of tapping systems.
"Almost anyone who has ever gone to a kegger thinks he knows how to operate a draft system," Daniels said. "The truth is, it requires some real study and sophisticated knowledge of a polyglot of nomenclature."
It was questions about draft equipment that thwarted Carolyn Smagalski the first time she took the exam. A knowledgeable online writer known as the Beer Fox and a certified beer judge (another tough exam), Smagalski missed a passing grade by just 5 points.
