Battle For Certified Beer Server (UPDATED)

For any semi-serious or serious craft beer fan, one word rises above them all:

Cicerone

For years now, I’ve had it on my bucket list to become a Certified Cicerone, but with each journey comes a single step. A first. We all must begin somewhere.

My beer journey started with a Cherry Wheat from Mountain Town Brewing Company out of Mount Pleasant. My marriage started with the simple act of helping the cute girl across the hall from me move her stuff into her dorm room. Now, my Cicerone journey starts with one, simple step as well: becoming a Certified Beer Server.

UPDATE: Read the end of the post to see how I did!

What Is A Certified Beer Server?

If the end goal is to become a Cicerone, I have to assume that not everyone knows what that is. I’ll keep it short and let the program speak for itself:

The word Cicerone (sis-uh-rohn) designates hospitality professionals with proven experience in selecting, acquiring and serving today’s wide range of beers.

Cicerone.org¹

These are basically the Sommeliers of the beer world. As of March 2023, only 4,672 people had completed their Cicerone certification. The numbers go down from there when it comes to advanced certifications. 167 have passed the Advanced exam, and only 22 have passed the Master’s exam.²

If I’m setting lofty goals, it’d be pretty cool to be a Master Cicerone. This is a long way down the road, however. To get there, you must go through the first step, becoming a Certified Beer Server.

There is more detailed information on the Cicerone website, but here’s a quick rundown of what a CBS needs to know: ³

• How to keep beer clean glassware
• Pour a proper beer
• Keep beer in good condition with proper use of draft systems
• A detailed understanding of the basic beer styles
• How to describe beer flavors in a meaningful way
• How beer may be ruined and how to prevent it

To earn this certification, you must complete an online exam. This exam is 60 questions long and covers all the topics above. Cicerone offers a syllabus to help you prepare for this exam; over 100,000 have already completed it.

Well, duh. I hear you thinking. If it’s online, then people are just cheating their way through by searching up the answers online.

While I’m sure that happens to a certain extent, they’ve decided to combat this by making the exam 60 questions long over a 30-minute period. This means we’re looking at 30 seconds per question. If you plan on cheating your way through it, you won’t have the time to look up every answer!

How Am I Preparing For The Certified Beer Server Exam?

From what I’ve read on Reddit, this exam isn’t too hard, but you must know quite a bit about beer styles and a little about beer draft systems to pass it with ease. You need 75% or higher of a score to pass. This means you’re looking at getting 45 questions correct.

To do my best on this test (and I only like to do my best!), I plan on tackling this in ## steps:

1. Watch Through Certified Beer Server Pep Talks
2. Study My Cicerone Flashcards
3. Read Tasting Beer by Randy Mosher

Watch Through Certified Beer Server Pep Talks

During the onset of the COVID shutdown in 2020, Cicerone thoughtfully decided to release a series of videos to help spread beer content and information.

This 12-part video series covers some of the information the CBS exam will cover. I watched it once before, a couple of years ago, and I remember finding it fascinating. I’ll watch and listen to it again before I take the exam. I’ve actually already started on it, and I’m sitting at video 4.

I suspect these videos offer enough information on the history and serving portions of the test, and I believe it will give enough information on the different beer styles too. However, the issues lies in memorizing the beer style requirements. To this end…

Study Ciceron Flashcards

Cicerone sells flashcards that cover all the information you need to know about the different beer styles. These are very specific and cover everything you need to know. They are all based on the Beer Judge Certification Program’s style guidelines.

I picked up the Certified Beer Server set a year ago and have flipped through them, but never studied them intently. They have a digital version of the flashcards for sale now too (something they didn’t have back when I got them). At a quick glance, the cards have the following information on them:

• Color / Appearance
• IBU
• ABV
• Aromas
• Flavors
• History
• Glass
• Related Styles

I plan on studying this more intently before I take the test. I may use Quizlet or some other flashcard app or study app to help me memorize these. From what I’ve heard, I don’t need to have everything memorized for this exam, but since I want to go onto Ciceron Certification someday, I might as well start now!

Read Tasting Beer

Randy Mosher is known as the beer king! He’s been a beer writer and researcher for quite a while and is a legend in the industry, mostly for his work elevating beer tasting.

I picked up his book for something to read last year, and it blew my mind! It has so much good information, from how to enhance your tasting experience, how beer is brewed, the history of beer, and a description of many beer styles! I can’t wait to reread this to learn more about this delightful liquid.

Taking The Certified Beer Server Exam

As of this writing (July of 2024 originally), I plan on taking the exam by the end of August. I’ve been studying, and I believe I’m just about ready. To be honest, I think I’ve casually learned about beer enough over the past couple of years to pass it now, but I don’t want to simply pass; I want to crush it!

After I take the test, pass or fail. I’ll update this section with my experiences. This way, other interested parties know what to expect! (Don’t worry; I’m not posting any answers!) Wish me luck!

Update: I passed!

Well, as the headline here says… I passed!

The exam was quick to take and not too hard. I ended up finishing in around 12 minutes with a score of 95%! This doesn’t mean it was easy, though. I think back to what I actually knew about beer a couple of years ago, and I’m proud of the studying I’ve done to get to this point.

I didn’t want to simply pass the test. I wanted to excel. If my goal is to become a Certified Cicerone and possible BJCP Judge, then I knew that any extra work I put in now was going to help me in the long run.

A Few Takeaways…

Phew, it’s done! Time to relax and have a beer (or two!). Not quite. I wanted to jot down some thoughts for anyone who wants to take this exam.

#1 Study the keeping and serving of beer. Seriously!

According to the Cicerone website, these questions make up 40% of the overall score, and they’re not exaggerating. As someone who has never actually worked in the beer industry and with no experience with draft systems, this is where I had to spend more time studying. If you work in the service space, you may already know this stuff, but it’s important in this exam.

#2 Beer styles, yes! But also in comparison with other beer styles.

Creating Quizlets for myself and using the Cicerone flashcards was a must for this content area. However, the truth is that I probably overstudied for these questions. The majority of Beer style questions were either comparative or easily fell to process of elimination.

Here are a couple of examples (NOT taken from the test; these are completely made up by me):

An ale has amber to brown color, low perceived bitterness, and elevated to high ABV (65.10%). What beer is it?

• Witbier
• American Amber Ale
• Wee Heavy
• Sweet Stout

Witbier isn’t the right color. American Amber isn’t quite the right color and definitely not the right ABV. Sweet Stout is typically darker and also much lower in ABV. So it’s a Wee Heavy!

Which of these beer styles has the lowest perceived bitterness?

• Double IPA
• Belgian Blond Ale
• Best Bitter
• American Stout

With a passing of knowledge of beer style, you may be able to figure this one out too. Double IPA and Best Bitter are clearly more bitter. If you’re not truly familiar with Belgian Blonds, you may still be able to guess that it’s similar to other Blonds and usually pretty light, crisp, and not assertively bitter. It is the Belgian Blond!

All of this is to say: you don’t need to study these for weeks and weeks if all you want to do is pass. But if you have your sights set higher, it’s going to be useful later on.

#3 Don’t stress about Ingredients and Process

For ingredients and the brewing process, you only need a passing knowledge of how beer is brewed and the stereotypical flavors of hops from different areas. Honestly, just watch the Cicerone Prep Video on the topic a couple of times, and you’ll be more than fine for this. I don’t brew (yet), and I found these questions to be now problem.

#4 Certified Beer Server Prep Videos Are Gold

You’ve heard me mention them a few times in this update section, but the videos I linked toward the top of the post are critical for this specific exam. I’m not saying it’s the only study resource you need, but it’ll go a long way into getting you ready.

All in all, don’t be scared. Do a bit of studying in your weak areas and watch those videos, and you’ll be just fine!

Now, I’m off to study for the Certified Cicerone Exam for at least a year, and for this, I’ll keep you posted!

1. https://www.cicerone.org/us-en/what-is-a-cicerone-1 ↩︎
2. https://support.cicerone.org/en/support/solutions/articles/69000835186-how-many-cicerones-are-there- ↩︎
3. https://www.cicerone.org/us-en/certifications/certified-beer-server ↩︎