On October 13th, 2012 the Third Annual British Columbia Beer Awards & CAMRA Harvest Cask Festival was held at Chapel Arts in Vancouver BC.  This event was put on by a partnership of British Columbia Beer Awards, British Columbia Craft Beer Month and CAMRA British Columbia.  This is an amazing event put on to celebrate all the amazing beer being produced across this vast Province!

   

First off I would also like to thank the following people!

“Brewery Creek Liquor Store (for their support)

CAMRA BC / CAMRA Vancouver (for their hard work)

BC Craft Beer Month (for their partnership)

Chrislan Ceramics (for the amazing handles)

Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts (for providing space for judging)

Chapel Arts (for being an amazing venue)

Jonathan Lloyd Walker (for being an engaging host)”

Both Steve and I attended this event for the first time and did not know what to expect.  The doors to the event opened at 1pm on the first real torrential downpour of the year (what a good day to stay in and drink!).  The day started off with the Cask Festival which included beer from the following breweries: Big Ridge, Coal Harbour, Driftwood, Granville Island, Howe Sound, Hoyne, Lighthouse, Old Yale, Parallel 49, Phillips, R&B, Red Racer (Central City), Red Truck, Spinnakers, Steamworks, Storm, Townsite, Tree, Vancouver Island and Yaletown.  At events like this you will never find a more friendly and interesting crowd that loves to mingle and chat about craft beer.  Be it Brewmasters, CAMRA Directors or just good old beer enthusiasts, there was always great conversation to go along with the amazing beer.  Every beer was available for tasting excluding the one cask of Driftwood’s “Sartori Harvest IPA” seemingly the current holy grail of BC beer.  This beer was only available to CAMRA BC members.  I joined CAMRA just for the taste (Glad I did too!) as well as all the other benefits.  Breakdowns of all the beer tasted at this event will trickle onto the blog as it is written.  Thank you to everyone that took the time to stop and chat, you all made for a great time!  It was especially great to meet and talk with both Sean Hoyne and Gary Lohin for the first time, two amazing brewmasters and all around great people.

The award ceremony started at 3:45pm in the main hall area of Chapel Arts.  The award presenter was Jonathan Lloyd Walker a BC/LA based actor, screen writer and creative producer.  During the proceedings Jonathan Walker had some great jokes and made the proceedings go very smoothly but it was a good thing the event was 19+.  This year hosted a record number of entrants from Breweries to Brew Pubs.  The Judging was done on September 29th 2012 at the Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts.  12 beer categories were judged by certified Beer Judges, Cicerones, Sommeliers and noted beer and food lovers according to the program.

Without further ado here are this years winners of the BC Beer Awards:Best of Show – Steamworks Pilsner -Conrad Gmoser of Steamworks Brewing Company

Lager/Pilsner – 22 Beers

1.) Steamworks Pilsner – Conrad Gmoser of Steamworks Brewing Company

 2.) Beach Blonde Lager – Stefan Buhl of Tree Brewing Company

 3.) Kelowna Pilsner – Stefan Buhl of Tree Brewing Company

 

Special Lager – 8 Beers

1.) Brewmaster’s Black – Stefan Tobler of Okanagan Spring Brewery

 2.) Hermann’s Dark Lager – Ralf Pittroff of Vancouver Island Brewery

 3.) Iron Plow Harvest Marzen – Ralf Pittroff of Vancouver Island Brewery

 

Session – 17 Beers

1.) High Country Kolsch -Bart Larson of Mt. Begbie Brewing Company

 2.) Seadog Amber Ale – Ralf Pittroff of Vancouver Island Brewery

 3.) Begbie Cream Ale -Bart Larson of Mt. Begbie Brewing Company

 

Wheat/Rye – 22 Beers

1.) Belgian White – Dean Mcleod of Lighthouse Brewing Company

 2.) King Heffy Imperial Hefeweizen – Paul Wilson and Franco Corno of Howe Sound Brewing Company

 3.) White Bark Ale – Jason Meyer and Kevin Hearsum of Driftwood Brewing Company

 

Pale – 41 Beers

1.) Red Racer Classic Pale Ale – Gary Lohin of Central City Brewing Company

 2.) Salt Spring ESB – Murray Hunter of Gulf Island Brewing

 3.) River Rock Bitter – Daniel Murphy of Canoe Brewpub

 

Cascadian Dark Ale – 4 Beers

1.) Skookum Cascadian Brown Ale – Matt Phillips of Phillips Brewing Company

 2.) Gathering Storm Cascadian Dark Ale – Paul Wilson and Franco Corno of Howe Sound Brewing Company

 3.) Cascadia Dark Ale – Tommie Grant of Spinnakers Brewpub and GuestHouses

 

Porter/Brown – 24 Beers

1.) Pow Town – Cedric Dauchot of Townsite Brewing Inc

 2.) Dark Chocolate Porter – Dean Mcleod of Lighthouse Brewing Company

 3.) Longboat Chocolate Porter – Matt Phillips of Phillips Brewing Company

 

Scottish/Irish – 3 Beers

1.) Big Caboose Red Ale – Gord Demaniuk of Fernie Brewing Company

 

Fruit – 15 Beers

1.) Blackberry Festivale – Cedric Dauchot of Townsite Brewing Inc

 2.) 4 Way Fruit Ale – Paul Wilson and Franco Corno of Howe Sound Brewing Company

 3.) Seedspitter Watermelon Wit – Graham With of Parallel 49 Brewing Company

 

Stout – 14 Beers

1.) Keepers Stout – Dean Mcleod of Lighthouse Brewing Company

 2.) Pothole Filler Imperial Stout – Paul Wilson and Franco Corno of Howe Sound Brewing Company

 3.) Singularity – Jason Meyer and Kevin Hearsum of Driftwood Brewing Company

 

IPA – 36 Beers

1.) 5 Rings IPA – Derrick Franche of High Mountian Brewing Company

 2.) Central City Imperial IPA – Gary Lohin of Central City Brewing Company

 3.) Red Racer IPA – Gary Lohin of Central City Brewing Company

 

Sour/Brett – 4 Beers

1.) Oud Bruin – Iain Hill of Yaletown Brewing Company

 2.) Bird Of Prey Flanders Red – Jason Meyer and Kevin Hearsum of Driftwood Brewing Company

 3.) Imperial Flanders – James Walton of Storm Brewing Ltd

 

Specialty – 20 Beers

1.) Smoke & Mirrors Imperial Smoked Ale – Kevin Emms of Coal Harbour Brewing

 2.) Serendipity #5 – Stefan Buhl of Tree Brewing Company

 3.) Schadenfreude Pumpkin Oktoberfest – Graham With of Parallel 49 Brewing Company

 

Strong – 7 Beers

1.) Hermannator Ice Bock – Ralf Pittroff of Vancouver Island Brewery

 2.) Old Cellar Dweller 2012 – Jason Meyer and Kevin Hearsum of Driftwood Brewing Company

 3.) Bourbon Barrel Aged Thor’s Hammer – Gary Lohin of Central City Brewing Company

And the People’s Choice Award went to

Belgian Quince IPA Cask – Lighthouse Brewing

After the awards were all handed out the cask festival went right back into full swing and ran until 7pm.  This left lots of time to congratulate all the deserving winners on their awards.  I would also like to congratulate both Parallel 49 Brewing and Townsite Brewing on both winning awards in their first year of operation.  Keep up the amazing work!

Sorry I did not bring my good camera to this event so the photos are not quite as good.

Thanks for reading!

Larger photos can be found her
https://plus.google.com/?hl=en-GB&gpsrc=gplp0#109863378309652904212/posts