Featuring: The Menace of the Monastery Competition...
a fun competition celebrating beer styles traced back to the monastic brewing traditions of Belgium and Germany.
Giving Back To The Community
Each year, the Urban Knaves of Grain Homebrew Club likes to give a little back to the community. This year, a portion of the competition proceeds will be donated to the Northern Illinois Food Bank.
The vision at Northern Illinois Food Bank is for everyone in Northern Illinois to have the food they need to thrive. A nonprofit organization and proud member of Feeding America, Northern Illinois Food Bank serves our neighbors in 13 counties with dignity, equity and convenience, providing 250,000 meals a day. They bring together manufacturers, local and corporate grocers, area farmers, corporations, foundations, and individuals who donate food and funding, and each week nearly 1,000 volunteers help them evaluate, repack, and distribute food. They also proudly partner with more than 900 food pantries, soup kitchens, shelters, and youth and senior feeding programs to provide nutritious food and resources. Their distribution centers are located in Geneva, Park City, Rockford and Joliet.
Competition Information
For the latest results and past winners, please see Past Competition Results.
Special thanks to the Gnome Brew Shop for sponsoring our Best of Show with
custom engraved Drunk Monk Challenge Wooden Steins to be awarded for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place
Best of Show in both Beer and Mead/Cider categories.
The 2026 DMC Medals (artist rendering)
| Not every category earns them but, in 2017, we introduced Honorable Mention Ribbons to recognize everyone who earns a spot on the results board.
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| When: |
March 14, 2026 –
In-person judging for the 2026 DMC
Tuesday Judging – March 10, 2026 (Church Street Brewing)
Wednesday Judging – March 11, 2026 (Two Brothers Roundhouse)
Thursday Judging – March 12, 2026 (Church Street Brewing)
Friday Judging – March 13, 2026 (Two Brothers Roundhouse)
Main Judging – March 14, 2026
See the UKG Club Calendar for the full schedule. |
| Where: |
Two Brothers Roundhouse
205 North Broadway
Aurora, IL 60505
630-264-BREW (2739) or 630-393-BEER (2337)
View Map |
| Entry Fee: |
Drunk Monk Challenge (2 bottles req.) – $12.00 per entry
Menace of the Monastery - MoM (1 bottle req.) – $12.00 per entry (MoM entries do not count against your 3 entry limit.)
All entries must be pre-submitted online. No paper entries will be accepted. Payment for entries will be accepted with your entries by Zeffe online only.
Contact the organizers via email to enter a MoM entry and payment will be processed separately. |
| Entries: |
SPECIAL NEWS FOR THE 2026 COMPETITION. PLEASE READ...
We will be having our public Awards ceremony and Raffle again this year. We will also announce winners on Facebook as we have in the past during the awards ceremony and aim to have a live broadcast of the ceremony.
Important Dates
- Jan 3 – Judge registration opens.
- Jan 11 – Entry registration opens.
- Feb 16 – Entry shipping and drop-off window opens
- March 6 – last day to make changes to entries
- March 6 – last day to drop off at local homebrew stores (See entry website for drop-off cutoffs for each location, approximately 5 p.m. unless otherwise noted.)
- March 10 – Judging begins
- March 14 – Main in-person judging day... Raffle and Awards Ceremony – tentatively scheduled for 6 pm CST
Click DMC registration page or the Register button in the menu.
Shipping location:
Two Brothers Roundhouse
c/o DMC
205 North Broadway
Aurora, IL 60505
drunkmonkchallenge@knaves.org
No walk-in entries allowed.
Drop-Off Locations
(Support your local homebrew stores while you're there):
- Chicagoland Beer & Wine Makers:
11 Park Blvd, Villa Park
(630) 834-0507
- Perfect Brewing Supply:
619 E. Park Ave, Libertyville
(847) 816-7055
- Broken Brix Home Brew Shop:
225 W. Main St., St. Charles
(630) 377-1338
- Gnome Brew:
2026 W. Montrose Ave., Chicago
(773) 961-7750
[Closed Mondays]
Several homebrew stores have changing hours and days they are open. Please check with the individual stores to make sure they are open when you want to drop off your entries. |
| Competition Results: |
We will be having a public Raffle this year and our Awards ceremony will follow the judging on March 14th. Doors will open after about 5:30 p.m. for entrants to join us for the Raffle and Awards ceremony. Tickets for the raffle will be available for purchase via cash or credit card.
Join us on the Drunk Monk Challenge Facebook page for the Facebook Live presentation of awards.
Check our Competition Results page after the competition for the full listing of winners from this year's Drunk Monk Challenge and past years. |
| Categories: |
Beer, Mead, & Cider entries will be judged in classes and subcategories listed in the 2021 BJCP Style Guidelines. |
| How to Enter: |
Bottles must be free of labels or other identifying marks. Two (2) 10-14 oz. brown or green bottles with crown caps are required for each entry. Swing top bottles are NOT allowed. We will be accepting cans this year in 12 oz. or 16 oz. sizes (preferably standard silver, unmarked cans). No Crowler cans will be accepted. A printed competition label must be attached to each bottle with a rubber band. Do not tape the labels.
Entries for meads and ciders will be the exception for bottle sizes. For meads and ciders only, we will accept two (2) 375 ml bottles, corked bottles, or some of the taller thinner wine-type bottles.
Failure to follow these guidelines may result in your beer, cider or mead being judged for score only but not qualifying for a place / award.
All entries become the property of the Urban Knaves of Grain (UKG) and will not be returned to the brewer.
When registering online at http://www.knaves.org/DMC/challenge, you will be able to print your bottle labels only after entries are marked PAID in the system.
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| Menace of the Monastery (MoM) Entries: |
Judging will be done using hedonic methods rather than BJCP style guidelines. Scoresheets and feedback from MoM may be filled out in an honest but irreverant, punchy, tongue-in-cheek manner. Please do not be offended by some of the comments you may receive. It may be a competition but this part of the competition is also meant to be a little more lighthearted and fun.
Only 1 bottle/can will be required for MoM, while 2 bottles will be required for the regular categories.
Registration for the Drunk Monk Challenge is via Beer Competition Software. Special brew categories are assigned in the software for Menace of the Monastery (MOM) entries and subcategorization. Register MOM entries using these special categories and, if necessary, please specify in the comments section what style of beer you are entering. More information... |
| Judges/Stewards: |
Your assistance is needed to ensure the quality of our competition. Please check the Judge/Steward checkbox on the entry form when registering and join us for a great time.
All stewards, judges and volunteers will receive breakfast (...think bagels and coffee), a full lunch, Two Brothers beer, a good time, our appreciation and a gift!
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| Sponsors: |
If you would like to assist in the success of our competition, please contact our sponsor coordinator,
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| Questions: |
For all other questions, please contact the Drunk Monk Challenge Competition Coordinator, Dan Acheson at drunkmonkchallenge@knaves.org -
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