Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Record Number of Texas Breweries at 2014 GABF

The brewery registration process was tweaked a little for this year's Great American Beer Festival to try and avoid the "race to register" process that initially locked some breweries out of attendance last year (most were eventually accommodated). Instead, of the first come, first served process, all breweries wanting to enter beer for judging were able to register and indicate if they also wanted a booth on the convention floor. After the registration period closed, the total number of competition beers each brewery was allowed to enter was determined by dividing the number of competition entries that can be judged by the number of breweries that applied. And if demand for booth space exceeded supply, booth selection would be determined by lottery for each region. 

These changes should have made sure that all breweries who wanted to enter beers in the competition were able to enter, but there may be booths from a few of your favourite breweries missing if the number of requests exceeded the maximum and they didn't win the lottery. But, these are the issues that have to be dealt with then there are now over 3,000 operating craft breweries (and almost 2,000 more in planning stages) in the country.

Perhaps due in some part to the changes in the registration process, Texas has it's largest showing of craft breweries again this year:

(512) Brewing Company Austin
903 Brewers Sherman
Adelbert's Brewery Austin
Armadillo Ale Works Denton
Austin Beerworks Austin
Big Bend Brewing Co. Alpine
Black Star Co-op Pub and Brewery Austin
Branchline Brewing Co.  San Antonio
Brazos Valley Brewing Company Brenham
Buffalo Bayou Brewing Co. Houston
Circle Brewing Co. Austin
Community Beer Co. Dallas
Cornel's Brewing Company Beaumont
Deep Ellum Brewing Company Dallas
Flix Brewhouse Round Rock
Four Corners Brewing Co Dallas
Hops & Grain Brewing Austin
Independence Brewing Co.  Austin
Kamala Brewing at the Whip In Austin
Karbach Brewing Co Houston
Lakewood Brewing Company Garland
Live Oak Brewing Company Austin
Martin House Brewing Company Fort Worth
Middleton Brewing Driftwood
No Label Brewing Co Katy
North by Northwest Austin
Oasis, Texas Brewing Company Austin
Pappy Slokum Brewing Co. Abilene
Pedernales Brewing Co. Fredericksburg
Peticolas Brewing Company Dallas
Pinthouse Pizza Craft Brewpub Austin
Rahr&Sons Brewing Co. Fort Worth
Real Ale Brewing Company Blanco
Revolver Brewing Granbury
Saint Arnold Brewing Company Houston
South Austin Brewery Austin
Spoetzl Brewery Shiner
Texas Beer Refinery League City
Texian Brewing Co Richmond
The Austin Beer Garden Brewing Company Austin
Twin Peaks Brewing Company  Dallas
Twisted X Brewing Company Dripping Springs
Uncle Billy's Brewery & Smokehouse Austin
Zio Carlo Magnolia Brewpub Fort Worth

Assuming this list is correct, there will be 47 Texas breweries this year, up from 36 in 2013, 30 in 2012 and 22 in 2011.  As a recap, the following Texas breweries won medals in the 2013 GABF competition:

Medal Beer Name Brewery Style
Gold Black Thunder Austin Beerworks German-Style Schwarzbier
Bronze Elba Black Star Co-op Pub and Brewery Herb and Spice Beer
Gold Cedar Creek Belgian Style Dubbel Cedar Creek Brewery Belgian-Style Abbey Ale
Gold Public Ale Community Beer Co. Extra Special Bitter
Bronze Atrial Rubicite Jester King Brewery Belgian-Style Lambic or Sour Ale
Gold Bitterama Namaste Brewing at the Whip In Herb and Spice Beer
Bronze Blind Jake Pinthouse Pizza Brown Porter
Silver Brewers Cut Altbier Real Ale Brewing Co. German-Style Altbier
Bronze Saint Arnold Weedwacker Saint Arnold Brewing Co. German-Style Wheat Ale
Silver Saint Arnold Summer Pils Saint Arnold Brewing Co. Munich-Style Helles

Good luck to all breweries who have beer entered in the competition this year and I look forward to sampling your beers on the convention floor.

Monday, July 21, 2014

July Beer Dinner at Rudyard's Pub Featuring Independence Brewing

This month's beer dinner at Rudyard's Pub will be featuring beer from Independence Brewing of Austin, TX. Joe Apa, formerly of T’afia and Plum Easy Kitchens, will be carefully crafting 5 courses paired with 5 different Independence beers, including White Rabbit, Stash IPA, Austin Amber, Convict Hill Stout and the recently released Hell or High Lager (brewed to commemorate their 3,000 batch of beer). This month's dinner is also a pet food drive for a local homeless pet shelter, so please bring along a bag or a few cans of pet food so the animals can eat too.

The dinner takes place on Thursday, July 24th at 7:00pm and tickets are available online for $50 each or you can contact Rudyard's at (713) 521-0521 for more info.