Introduction

Comet Cosmo is a fruit and field beer brewed by Sun King Brewery in Indianapolis, Indiana. It is a blend of cranberry and lemon sour ale, with a tart and refreshing flavor. It has a 5.3% ABV and 15 IBUs.

In this blog post, I will provide an in-depth analysis of Comet Cosmo, including its appearance, aroma, flavor, mouthfeel, and overall experience. I will also discuss the beer’s target audience, its availability, and its price. Finally, I will provide some concluding thoughts on Comet Cosmo and its place in the world of craft beer.

Appearance

Comet Cosmo is a clear, golden-orange color with a slight haze. The head is white and foamy, and it dissipates quickly. The beer has a small amount of carbonation.

Aroma

The aroma of Comet Cosmo is dominated by cranberry and lemon. There are also hints of tartness and sweetness. The aroma is refreshing and inviting.

Flavor

The flavor of Comet Cosmo is tart and refreshing, with a strong cranberry and lemon presence. There is also a slight sweetness from the malts. The beer has a medium body and a dry finish.

Mouthfeel

The mouthfeel of Comet Cosmo is light and refreshing. The carbonation is well-balanced, and it doesn’t overwhelm the flavor of the beer.

Overall Experience

Comet Cosmo is a well-made beer that is perfect for a hot day. It is tart enough to be refreshing, but not so tart that it is overwhelming. The cranberry and lemon flavors are delicious and well-balanced. The beer is also very easy to drink.

Target Audience

Comet Cosmo is a good beer for people who enjoy sour beers, as well as people who are new to sour beers. The cranberry and lemon flavors make it a refreshing and approachable beer.

Availability

Comet Cosmo is a limited-edition beer, so it is not always available. However, it is usually available at Sun King Brewery’s taproom and at select retailers in Indiana.

Price

Comet Cosmo typically retails for around $5 per 16-ounce can.

Conclusion

Comet Cosmo is a delicious and refreshing sour beer that is perfect for a hot day. It is a good beer for people who enjoy sour beers, as well as people who are new to sour beers. The cranberry and lemon flavors make it a refreshing and approachable beer.

If you are looking for a new sour beer to try, I highly recommend Comet Cosmo. It is a well-made beer that is sure to please.

Stats

Beer: Comet Cosmo
Brewery: Sun King Brewery
Style: Other
ABV: 5.3%
IBU: 20
Untappd Description: Comet Cosmo is an Cosmopolitan Cocktail-Inspired Ale with cranberry and lemon character.
My Untappd Rating: ***.75
Global Untappd Rating: 3.38 (as of 4.23.23)

Some Of Our Articles About Sun King Brewery

• The Trip to Indy – Day Four Recap: Landfall is Made (Kurt Vonnegut Museum, TwoDEEP Brewing, Sun King Brewery, Bluebeard, Chilly Water Brewing, Ellison City Brewing)

Thank You For Reading

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Voting Polls for Round Two

(Edited: March 8th, 9:02AM). Since this is the landing page when exiting the polls, I am posting the links here for both poll locations, so you can easily jump to the next poll to vote.

• HEELs Conference: Round Two Voting
• FACEs Conference: Round Two Voting

Round One Has Finished

Thank you everyone who has voted in round one. We got 3422 votes in one week and thus has ended round one of the tournament! We have gone from 48 breweries and competitors down to 24 breweries left.

First a word on going forward: due to how I have set-up the brackets and how its not a typical “32” or “64” or “128” tournament, that means we will now go from divisions to two conferences. (We’ll keep the wrestling theme going and still call them the HEELs and FACEs conferences.) At this point we will also re-seed the conferences. Just like before, total global average rating on Untappd will be used to seed the breweries.

But first up, some statistics from the first round:

Round One Statistics

Voting statistics:

• Total votes for round one: 3422
• Total votes for Triple H Division: 388
• Total votes for Ric Flair Division: 305
• Total votes for HEELs conference: 693
• Total “upsets” (any higher seed defeating a lower seed) in HEELs conference: 2
• Total votes for Stone Cold Steve Austin Division: 870
• Total votes for The Rock Division: 823
• Total votes for FACEs conference: 1693
• Total “upsets” (any higher seed defeating a lower seed) in FACEs conference: 7

Upsets:

HEELs Conference:

• Gearhouse Brewing Company (9) defeating Levity Brewing (4)
• Desperate Times Brewing Company (10) defeating Yellow Bridge Brewing (3)
• Chatty Monks Brewing (7) defeating Cox Brewing Company (6)

FACEs Conference:

• Three Heads Brewing (11) defeating Idiom Brewing (2)
• Rubber Soul Brewing Company (10) defeating Breaker Brewing (3)
• Tattered Flag (9) defeating ShuBrew Brewing Company (4)
• Rough Edges Brewing (8) defeating Wolfs Ridge Brewing Company (5)
• The Church Brew Works (12) defeating Cushwa Brewing (1)
• The Isle of Que Brewing (11) defeating Jackie O’s Brewery (2)
• Molly Pitcher Brewing Company (8) defeating Mellow Mink Brewing (5)

Results of Round One

HEELs Conference: Triple H Division:

• Fourscore Brewing Company (1 seed) (52 votes) defeated Black Forest Brewing (12 seed) (15 votes)
• Urban Artifact (2 seed) (41 votes) defeated The Ministry of Brewing (11 seed) (23 votes)
• Mad Chef Brewing (3 seed) (39 votes) defeated ZeroDay Brewing Company (10 seed) (25 votes)
• GearHouse Brewing Company (9 seed) (39 votes) defeated Levity Brewing (4 seed) (33 votes)
• Swiftwater Brewing Company (5 seed) (43 votes) defeated Highway Manor (8 seed) (18 votes)
• Sun King Brewery (6 seed) (33 votes) defeated Braxton Brewing Company (7 seed) (27 votes)

HEELs Conference: Ric Flair Division:

• Dewey Beer Company (1 seed) (35 votes) defeated Couch Brewery (12 seed) (16 votes)
• Rotunda Brewing Company (2 seed) (37 votes) defeated Snitz Creek Brewing Company (11 seed) (14 votes)
• Desperate Times Brewing (10 seed) (30 votes) defeated Yellow Bridge Brewing (3 seed) (19 votes)
• Troegs Craft Independent Brewing Company (4 seed) (48 votes) defeated Saucony Creek Brewing Company (9 seed) (9 votes)
• Twisted Bine Brewing Company (5 seed) (30 votes) defeated Land-Grant Brewing Company (8 seed) (17 votes)
• Chatty Monks Brewing (7 seed) (30 votes) defeated Cox Brewing Company (6 seed) (20 votes)

FACEs Conference: Stone Cold Steve Austin Division:

• Ever Grain Brewing Company (1 seed) (85 votes) defeated Mt. Gretna Craft Brewery (12 seed) (49 votes)
• Three Heads Brewing (11 seed) (65 votes) defeated Idiom Brewing (2 seed) (59 votes)
• Rubber Soul Brewing Company (10 seed) (65 votes) defeated Breaker Brewing (3 seed) (57 votes)
• Tattered Flag (9 seed) (102 votes) defeated ShuBrew Brewing (4 seed) (34 votes)
• Rough Edges Brewing (8 seed) (177 votes) defeated Wolf’s Ridge Brewing (5 seed) (40 votes)
• Boneshire Brew Works (6 seed) (70 votes) defeated Liquid Noise Brewing Company (7 seed) (67 votes)

FACEs Conference: The Rock Division:

• The Church Brew Works (12 seed) (82 votes) defeated Cushwa Brewing (1 seed) (43 votes)
• The Isle of Que Brewing Company (11 seed) (146 votes) defeated Jackie O’s Brewery (2 seed) (31 votes)
• Pizza Boy Brewing Company (Al’s of Hampden) (3 seed) (106 votes) defeated Taft’s Brewing Company (Taft’s Ale House) (10 seed) (29 votes)
• Funk Brewing Company (4 seed) (95 votes) defeated Olde Bedford Brewing Company (9 seed) (34 votes)
• Molly Pitcher Brewing Company (8 seed) (79 votes) defeated Mellow Mink Brewing (5 seed) (51 votes)
• Moo-Duck Brewing Company (6 seed) (81 votes) defeated Logyard Brewing Company (7 seed) (46 votes)

Round Two

Round two now begins and will run until next Sunday night at Midnight – eastern time. (March 14th – March 15th Midnight). We now do away with the divisions and just go into conferences. So there is now two conferences of 12 breweries / competitors each. The conferences are reseeded (again using Untappd rankings) to create the new brackets for each conference.

Round Two Match-Ups

The new brackets for the conferences, and The Battle of the Breweries (2021) March Madness going forward now looks like this:

HEELs Conference:

• Fourscore Beer Company (1) (4.09) vs. GearHouse Brewing Company (12) (3.68)
• Dewey Beer Company (2) (4.08) vs. Desperate Times Brewing (11) (3.69)
• Rotunda Brewing Company (3) (3.96) vs. Chatty Monks Brewing (10) (3.71)
• Urban Artifact (4) (3.90) vs. Sun King Brewery (9) (3.71)
• Troegs Craft Independent Brewing Company (5) (3.79) vs. Swiftwater Brewing Company (8) (3.77)
• Mad Chef Brewing Company (6) (3.79) vs. Twisted Bine Brewing Company (7) (3.79)

FACEs Conference:

• Ever Grain Brewing Company (1) (3.93) vs. The Church Brew Works (12) (3.56)
• Pizza Boy Brewing Company (Al’s of Hampden) (2) (3.88) vs. The Isle of Que Brewing Company (11) (3.69)
• Funk Brewing Company (3) (3.86) vs. Three Heads Brewing Company (10) (3.71)
• Moo-Duck Brewing Company (4) (3.83) vs. Rubber Soul Brewing Company (9) (3.74)
• Boneshire Brew Works (5) (3.83) vs. Molly Pitcher Brewing Company (8) (3.75)
• Rough Edges Brewing (6) (3.82) vs. Tattered Flag (7) (3.79)

Voting Begins Now

The polls will be going up shortly after this post goes live (about 8:30AM EST). Make sure to share the polls to help your favorite breweries in! And hopefully we can beat round one’s total of votes! (We need 3423 votes to break the first week’s numbers.)

Thank you all for participating in the polls!

For past results and information on the brackets, you can check out the following links:

• March Madness – The Battle of the Breweries (2021)

Round One Voting Polls:

• HEELs Conference:
  * Triple H Division: Round One
  * Ric Flair Division: Round One
• FACEs Conference:
  * Stone Cold Steve Austin Division: Round One
  * The Rock Division: Round One

As always, please like us and follow us here and on our social media pages to stay up to date on The Beer Thrillers. We have plenty of content to check out, so be sure to stop by often to see what we have coming out. Beer reviews, brewery reviews, travelogues, events, news, and more!

Thanks for reading everyone!

Cheers!

-B. Kline

Please be sure to follow us on our social media accounts – Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Influence. Please be sure to also follow, like, subscribe to the blog here itself to keep updated. We love to hear from you guys, so be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you think.

This is the poll for the HEELs Conference – Triple H Division – Round One. You can vote once per day, and you can vote once per poll (there is a poll for each division in round one). Be sure to share and send to your friends and breweries to let everyone vote!

Voting runs until March 7th, 11:59PM (EST).

To read more about The Battle of the Breweries (2021) you can read the initial post here: The Battle of the Breweries (2021) – March Madness – The Beer Thrillers way.

Any questions, concerns, or comments about the brackets, or tournament, or breweries in question, you can leave in the comment section or message us directly through our Contact Page.

Please be sure to follow us on our social media accounts – Facebook, Facebook Group, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Influence. Please be sure to also follow, like, subscribe to the blog here itself to keep updated. We love to hear from you guys, so be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you think!

The Battle of the Breweries (2021) – VOTING LINKS

Since this is the landing page post – survey, I will keep all of the voting links here for quick reference and jumping point, and so they don’t get lost in all the muddle.

• HEELs Conference:
  * Triple H Division: Round One
  * Ric Flair Division: Round One
• FACEs Conference:
  * Stone Cold Steve Austin Division: Round One
  * The Rock Division: Round One

(Updated: 10AM – March 1st, 2021. Continue on for the original introduction to The Battle of the Breweries [2021] – March Madness tournament – article.)

Who’s ready for some March Madness? Like everyone else, in March, that means we need to fill out some brackets! And we here at The Beer Thrillers are no different!

BUT….

Instead of filling out NCAA or college basketball brackets, we are doing our own take on it – The Battle of the Breweries (2021)!

The Battle of the Breweries (2021)

So how’s this going to work? Who all is invited? What all breweries are going to be in it? How many breweries? How’s voting going to work? Who decides whose in and whose out? Whats the seeding? Why is Rick such a jerk to Morty? Why is Jurassic Bark the saddest episode of Futurama ever? Why is it also B. Kline’s favorite episode? What does that say about him? Why is the sky blue?

Ok…. enough with the questions!

The procedure for this ‘tournament’ will be similar to most other March Madness style tournaments. Similar to the ones you’ve seen Untappd and Breweries in PA have done, but with a bit of a twist. Because we here at The Beer Thrillers have a terrible time making full fledged decisions, the list of competitors will be 48 instead of the normal 32.

How did I decide what breweries will be involved? Simple. Only breweries that I have physically visited in person. The voting is based on the brewery and their beers; but to be included on this list, I personally had to have been to one of their locations.

How is seeding decided? Thats also pretty simple, the seeding is based on global average Untappd ratings. So the decision of the seeding is out of my hands. Also, bonus, you can’t get mad at me for the seeding. “Why is X above Y? Why is Z below D?” Its all decided by Untappd.

So whats the tournament structure? One total grouping of 48 breweries (in lieu of teams), divided by two conferences of 24 each, which is divided further into a total of four divisions of 12 each. So break down is simple: 4 divisions of 12 each, with two divisions per conference, of 24 teams in each, for a total of 48 competitors / teams / breweries.

How did we decide on who is in what division? Simple – random number generator. I rolled the dice (a D4 to be exact, thank you to my old nerdy DnD days, I just ‘happened’ to have one of these lying about). Rolled the dice for each brewery to locate them into a division. If one division was understaffed and another overstaffed, I re-rolled until they were evened out.

Let’s Meet Our Competitors

So who all do we have facing off in this crazy free for all of brewing expertise? Quite an assembly of breweries actually. There are a heavy abundance of local (Central PA local) breweries but there is an assortment of breweries from my various travels and across a few states. We have a few breweries from the Rochester area of New York; some breweries from Maryland, a Delaware brewery, some from Ohio, one from Indiana, and one from Kentucky as well.

Surprisingly; it actually took a while to curate the list. At even 48 entries, I still had many more to include, and even removed a few to make it a bit more diverse. I wanted to try and make this as diverse as possible (so removed a local brewery for one out of state, etc.). Possibly in the future, maybe the 2022 iteration of this, or the 2023, who knows, it’ll expand to even more breweries.

This has taken up pretty much my entire night to create the list, and to roll the dice for their divisions, and then checking their Untappd scores to get them into the correct seedings. In the case of matching Untappd scores, I did make my own decision, and that was primarily based on my thoughts of their size, notoriety, branding; so there is a few judgment calls due to a few ties, but there isn’t too many of them.

Conferences and division names…. I had to decide on what to pick. I was going to go by hop names, but I saw at last second, that the Breweries in PA have done that this year, instead of their normal divisions based on geography, it appears they decided to use hop names for their divisions, so thats out. I debated doing Jedi and Sith for the conferences and then doing different Jedi or Sith Masters for the division names…. but… instead decided to go with WWF/E names due to WrestleMania 37 approaching.

So I present you two conferences. One is based on HEELs and one is based on FACEs. The names of the breweries are listed in the order of their seedings, and will have their location and their Untappd (global average) rating behind their names.

The Heels Conference

First up, is divisions one and two of the HEELS conference. Triple H and Ric Flair.

Division One: Triple H

• Fourscore Beer Company (Gettysburg, PA) (4.09)
• Urban Artifact (Cincinnati, OH) (3.90)
• Mad Chef (East Petersburg, PA) (3.79)
• Levity Brewing (Indiana, PA) (3.77)
• Swiftwater Brewing Company (Rochester, NY) (3.77)
• Braxton Brewing Company (Covington, KY) (3.75)
• Sun King Brewery (Indianapolis, IN) (3.71)
• Highway Manor (Camp Hill, PA) (3.70)
• Gearhouse Brewing (Chambersburg, PA) (3.68)
• ZeroDay Brewing (Harrisburg, PA) (3.69)
• The Ministry of Brewing (Baltimore, MD) (3.64)
• Black Forest Brewing (Ephrata, PA) (3.62)

Division Two: Ric Flair

• Dewey Beer Company (Dewey Beach, DE) (4.08)
• Rotunda Brewing Company (Annville, PA) (3.96)
• Yellow Bridge Brewing (Pittsburgh, PA) (3.88)
• Troegs Independent Brewing (Hershey, PA) (3.79)
• Twisted Bine Brewing Company (Mount Joy, PA) (3.79)
• Cox Brewing Company (Elizabethtown, PA) (3.71)
• Chatty Monks (Reading, PA) (3.71)
• Land-Grant Brewing Company (Columbus, OH) (3.70)
• Saucony Creek Brewing Company (Kutztown, PA) (3.70)
• Desperate Times Brewing (Carlisle, PA) (3.69)
• Couch Brewery (Pittsburgh, PA) (3.60)

The Faces Conference

The faces conference is made up of two divisions led by Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Rock. First up, is Division Three, Stone Cold Steve Austin.

Division Three: Stone Cold Steve Austin

• Ever Grain Brewing (Mechanicsburg, PA) (3.93)
• Idiom Brewery (Frederick, MD) (3.90)
• Breaker Brewing (Wilkes-Barre, PA) (3.85)
• ShuBrew (Zelionople, PA) (3.85)
• Wolf’s Ridge Brewing Company (Columbus, OH) (3.84)
• Liquid Noise (Marysville, PA) (3.84)
• Boneshire Brew Works (Harrisburg, PA) (3.83)
• Rough Edges (Waynesboro, PA) (3.82)
• Tattered Flag (Middletown, PA) (3.79)
• Rubber Soul Brewing Company (Hummelstown, PA) (3.74)
• Three Heads Brewing (Rochester, NY) (3.71)
• Mount Gretna Craft Brewery (Palmyra, PA) (3.58)

Division Four: The Rock

• Cushwa Brewing (Williamsport, MD) (4.11)
• Jackie O’s Brewery (Athens, OH) (4.02)
• Pizza Boy Brewing Company (Al’s of Hampden) (Enola, PA) (3.88)
• Mellow Mink (Mechanicsburg, PA) (3.84)
• Moo-Duck Brewing (Elizabethtown, PA) (3.83)
• Logyard Brewing Company (Kane, PA) (3.78)
• Molly Pitcher Brewing (Carlisle, PA) (3.75)
• Olde Bedford Brewing Company (Bedford, PA) (3.75)
• Taft’s Brewing Company (Taft’s Ale House) (Cincinnati, OH) (3.72)
• Isle of Que Brewing (Selinsgrove, PA) (3.69)
• The Church Brew Works (Pittsburgh, PA) (3.56)

Alright, that’s all 48 competitors. Tomorrow the brackets will be published and you will be allowed to vote on the first round matchups. Here’s where things get a bit screwy…. mainly because I don’t do math so good (sigh, sad subject, really, since I work at a job where I do math all day). Well, what really happened, is that I didn’t think through the breakdown. 32 breaks down easily for each round…. 48…. not so much. So…..

Week one will be divisions with 6 matches in each divisions. After that, the divisions will break for week two, and it will be by conference, with 6 matches in each conference. After this, we break apart the conferences, and do another 6 matches. This leaves us with 3 final competitors, for a triple threat for the ending.

So…. I kinda sorta walked myself into a corner…. and kinda… sorta…. walked my way out of it. Glad I chose to use wrestler themed people, so that the finale “Triple Threat” makes more sense.

*Smacks head* D’oh!

But anyway, there will be 7 days of voting for each round. With the final round taking the remainder of the month and ending on the 31st.

Voting

Each day you will be able to come to the site to make your votes in the polls. It will be set-up by IPS, so it limits you to voting just once per day per vote. You can vote as many times as you want per round, but only once per day.

Following each round, I will update the brackets and post them and make up the new polls for voting. Round one begins on March 1st, 2021 and will last until March 7th at Midnight, when it will then become the next round.

I suggest helping your breweries out and sharing the poll pages so that as many of your friends and brewery lovers can vote as well. Good luck to all of the competitors… err… breweries!

As always, please like us and follow us here and on our social media pages to stay up to date on The Beer Thrillers. We have plenty of content to check out, so be sure to stop by often to see what we have coming out. Beer reviews, brewery reviews, travelogues, events, news, and more!

Thanks for reading everyone!

Cheers!

-B. Kline

I woke up early outside of Dayton Ohio, and get my shower for the day at my La Quinta Hotel…. to find my room’s hot water isn’t working. (The check out lady gave me a run around saying I should have turned the knob a bit to the left, then back to the right to bypass something…. yea, ok lady.) So that was my wake-up for the day. Then it was on the road for what Google Maps had listed as a 1 Hour 18 Minute Drive….. which turned into a 2 Hour and 34 Minute Drive….. because Google Maps didn’t reload until I was on the road that I-70 was having massive road work done for a giant long stretch.

Whatever.

I made it to Indianapolis and to the Vonnegut Museum at 12-noon, just in time for everything to start. In my full detailed travelogue I’ll discuss it, but the reason for the trip was to get here on Wednesday (today) – November 11th, – Armistice Day – Veteran’s Day – Kurt Vonnegut’s birthday. He would have turned 98 years old today.

Like I said, I’ll go into much more detail about the museum and library, but suffice it to say it was fantastic, and any fan of Vonnegut owes it to themselves to come out and check out the museum and library at least once in their lives. I’m looking to come back in two years for his 100th Birthday.

After the Museum, my first Indianapolis brewery was TwoDEEP Brewing. Fun little brewery, beautiful inside. I had a roasted amber ale and a pilsner. (No flights, just drafts.) Both were fantastic.

I of course had to drive and stop (illegally parked – at a meter – might I add) and get out and grab a picture of this. I also later in my day stopped by his childhood home and then the cemetery where he was buried. (I was unable to find his grave, but I did find President Benjamin Harrison’s gravesite.)

An absolute must stop for everyone in Indianapolis. This is THEE brewery in the city, and it shows. They’ve won a ton of awards in the past, and several more this year at the 2020 GABF. Amazing beers, not a single bad one. Even my least favorite from them was nearly a four cap beer. The nacho and taco place inside was also really great. Be sure to visit Sun King if you are ever even remotely in the area.

So after driving out to his childhood home and grabbing a picture, and going up to the cemetery and driving around looking for ‘him’, I had to stop at BLUEBEARD for dinner. Why? Well, the tavern is named after his novel ‘Bluebeard’ and even has a picture of him with a replica of a typewriter he used. This is a very hoighty-toighty place, (baby octopus was 28$) and very heavy sea-food (which when you are deathly allergic, is a slight scare). But I had a fantastic beer from a local brewery in can and great pasta.

About three businesses down from Bluebeard was a brewery (just happened on it by walking to / from my parked car). So I ducked in for a pint, and picked up a four pack to go.

I ended my night (as far as breweries go) at Ellison City Brewing. Looked like an old apartment building reimagined, not quite sure though in the dark. When I entered they had two food trucks or two kind of party trucks or something outside, and a lot of younger (20s) dancing and carrying on by them. After I had my pint and read, which I nursed a bit, and came out, the revelers and trucks were gone. Shrug.

Then it was off to another hotel for the night, where I wanted to finish A Man With No Country by Vonnegut, but sadly, I stayed on the phone with a co-worker til about 12:30AM and then soon passed out watching Chappelle Show on Netflix.

Tomorrow’s itinerary is Cincinnati, with a dip into Kentucky. Then moving on towards Hocking Hills, Athens, and Ohiopyl and back home to Central Pennsylvania. Nearing the home stretch of the trip and tour. We’ve gone, now we’re coming back.

Cheers!

-B. Kline

Please be sure to follow us on our social media accounts – Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Influence. Please be sure to also follow, like, subscribe to the blog here itself to keep updated. We love to hear from you guys, so be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you think!

The Trip to Indianapolis:

• The Trip to Indy
• The Trip to Indy – Day One Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Two Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Three Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Four Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Five Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Six Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Seven Recap
• Recap and Stats

2020 has been a challenging year (to say the least) for all kinds of events, conventions, brew fests, and other large beer related activities. Hell, Oktoberfest in Germany was cancelled this year. That alone should tell you everything you need to know about this year right there.

So the 2020 edition of GABF was not the normal (great) event it normally is. This year it went virtual (due to the pandemic) rather than being the fantastic event that brings in thousands of people and millions of gallons of beer to Colorado.

This was a rather lackluster year for awards in Pennsylvania as well. Sadly; this year, Pennsylvania only won three awards. One gold, and two silvers. Contrast that to last year’s seven awards won by Pennsylvania breweries (three gold, three silver, and one bronze). Hopefully 2021 will be a better year for Pennsylvania breweries (and not just in medalling at the GABF).

The results for Pennsylvania are below:

GOLD:

Category: Gluten-Free Beer
Brewery: Aurochs Brewing
Beer: Aurochs Hazy IPA

SILVER:

Category: English Mild or Bitter
Brewery: Wallenpaupack Brewing
Beer: English Pale Mild Ale

Category: English-Style Brown Ale
Brewery: Attic Brewing
Beer: Bloodhound Brown Ale

In 2019, Pennsylvania breweries that won included: New Trail Brewing Co, The Church Brew Works, 2SP Brewing, Free Will Brewing, Cellar Works Brewing, Swashbuckler Brewing Co, and Helltown Brewing Company.

You can read about the 2019 results here: 2019 GABF Winners: Pennsylvania.

For more information on the winners, of all of the different categories, you can read the Brewers Association press release on it, with a detailed analysis at the following link: Winners of 2020 Great American Beer Festival (Brewer’s Association Press). 272 medals were decided for 240 different breweries this year, which was the 34th edition of the event.

“Judges for the 34th edition of the celebrated competition evaluated 8,806 entries from 1,720 breweries from all 50 states plus Washington, D.C. Socially distanced judging took place in 35 sessions over 18 days with strict safety measures in place. The awards ceremony was held virtually on Friday evening, kicking off the two-day online programming portion of the Great American Beer Festival.  

“This year’s GABF competition may have looked a little different, but the beers entered into the competition were as impressive and innovative as ever,” said Chris Swersey, competition manager, Great American Beer Festival. “This has arguably been one of the most challenging years breweries have ever faced, so we hope these awards serve as a symbol not only of brewing excellence but also the resiliency of the craft brewing community as a whole.” (Brewer’s Association)

As per the above article, a quick run-down of statistics from the 2020 GABF Event:

GABF Competition Statistics

• 34th edition of the GABF competition  
• 8,806 beers judged 
• 1,720 breweries in the competition from all 50 states plus Washington, D.C. 
• 115 judges from 21 states 
• Average number of competition beers entered in each category: 97 
• Category with the highest number of entries: Juicy or Hazy India Pale Ale (377) 
• 272 total medals awarded  
• 240 medal-winning breweries  
• 337 first-time GABF entrants 
• 19 first-time GABF winners 

Sun King Brewery in Indianapolis, Indiana, won the most awards at this year’s event with 4 awards total. (One gold, and three bronzes.) In November, I am making a road trip out of Pennsylvania and through Western PA, Ohio, and into Indianapolis to visit the Vonnegut Museum and Library. I can definitely tell you that Sun King Brewery will be a stop for me at some point on that trip (they’ve been on my radar for quite a bit).

Cheers and here’s to hoping that 2021 is a much better year for our home state breweries in Pennsylvania. Let me know in the comments if you’ve tried any of the 2020 award winning beers. And check out the full article and let us know what you think of the results from around the country.

Please be sure to follow us on our social media accounts – Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Influence. Please be sure to also follow, like, subscribe to the blog here itself to keep updated. We love to hear from you guys, so be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you think!

Cheers!

-B. Kline