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Just thought it might be interesting to give an insight into what goes into sitting the Cicerone exam.In 11 hours I will sit down for 4 hours in Brewdog Shoreditch and by the end of it will hopefully have remembered enough about German lagers and Dimethylsulfide to be granted the title of certified cicerone <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="cicerone.org/content/certified-cicerone.I">cicerone.org/content/certified-cicerone.I have worked for Brewdog for 6 months and the exam has been organised by Brewdog bars as the best way of bringing staff up to a new standard of expertise.This kind of training is important in my opinion as the industry moves towards becoming more technical and sophisticated.
I have studied for about 2 months in preparation for the exam and as a warm up sat the certified beer server exam several months ago.
The exam is broken up into two parts.The first consists of 150 short answer questions mostly covering draught systems,styles and food pairings. This is relatively straight forward if you take in the wisdom of Randy Mosher and Garrett Oliver.
The hard part I've been warned is the hands on part which consists of blind taste tests to identify styles.Examples include IPA v Pale ale.Then off tastes and finally a videotaped demo where I will be handed something like a keg coupler and asked to dissemble it and explain each part and its maintenance.
Ray Daniels who heads this program has been brought over to help begin a phased introduction of the cicerone scheme in the UK and presumably Ireland as well. Hopefully programs like this will lead to the proper level of training being given to bar staff and others working with craft beer in these islands. I'm quite intimidated by the exam as I have been reassured by Ray Daniels that the pass rate is less than 50%. As a Beoir guinea pig I will reply back later with how I got on in the exam

Sounds great - I did the first stage of it (the online bit) a while back with the view of doing the next step on a trip to America that never actually materialised!

You're very lucky that the BrewDog lads have got Ray across for you, saves a hell of a lot of hassle and expense on your part!

Couple of mates of mine in the States have done it and said it was actually an enjoyable experience (they passed, so no doubt it was!)...just work the Irish charm if you get stuck, you'll be grand!

Actually, would be very interested to know if anything at all is mentioned about cask during the course of the exam... Teaching good Cellarmanship to the next generation of barstaff/landlords in the UK is vital, and that's something that BrewDog seem to have completely turned their back on.
Good luck anyhow!

It's a bit (in fact, a lot) unfair to berate Brewdog for not teaching the next generation about cask when they don't cask beers themselves.

The fact that they seem to be training their staff up to a pretty decent level should merit congratulations rather than condemnation.

Let those who cask teach staff about cellarmanship.

I was by no means condemning BrewDog - their staff are always great and it's good they've got the opportunity to gain a qualification.

What I was getting at is that the Cicerone exam is not adapted to BrewDog - it's supposed to be a general, all-encompassing test of beer related competence, so therefore cask should play a significant part (which, unfortunately IMO, it no longer does for BrewDog)

&amp;quot;duelly&amp;quot;:uzsh1hd2 wrote: therefore cask should play a significant part[/quote:uzsh1hd2]Why so? Cask represents a miniscule proportion of the world's beer and is almost unknown outside one country.

From flicking through the Cicerone.org site it looks like Master level is where they start expecting you to learn the esoteric side of things, such as how people outside North America produce and drink beer.