Bay Area Breweries Win Big at Great American Beer Festival

More than a dozen brewers across the Bay Area and Sacramento region took home awards at the Great American Beer Festival this past weekend. Presented by the Brewers Association, the Colorado event is the biggest beer competition in the world — think of it as the Oscars of beer.

GABF hands out awards for 102 different beer style categories, and competition is fierce. This year, the judges received nearly 8,500 entries from roughly 2,400 breweries in the United States.

It’s particularly exciting when a brand new brewery wins a medal — a signal of more great things to come — and this year saw two promising local starts: Original Pattern Brewing in Oakland and Alaro Craft Brewery in Sacramento. Original Pattern placed second in a Belgian-style ale category for Call of the Void, which also happens to be the second-ever beer brewed at Original Pattern. Meanwhile, Alaro won a gold medal in the English-style IPA category for its Castillo IPA.

Here are the rest of the local winners:

• Alvarado Street Brewery & Grill (Monterey): gold in international-style pale ale for Mai Tai P.A.
• Crooked Lane Brewing Co. (Auburn): gold in German-style koelsch for Veedels Bräu
• Drake’s Brewing Co. (San Leandro): gold in barrel-aged strong beer for Santa’s Brass
• Hermitage Brewing Co. (San Jose): silver in fruited barrel-aged sour beer for Sour Cherry Sour
• Moonraker Brewing Co. (Auburn): silver in imperial IPA for Northern Lights
• New Helvetia Brewing Co. (Sacramento): silver in coffee beer for Mystery Airship 4.0: Temple Cascara Golden Ale
• Russian River Brewing Co. (Santa Rosa): silver in kellerbier for STS Pils
• Santa Clara Valley Brewing (San Jose): silver in German-style wheat ale for Alviso Mills Hefeweizen
• Sudwerk Brewing Co. (Davis): silver for American-style amber lager for Märzen
• Three Mile Brewing Co. (Davis): silver in session IPA for Little Downtown Tom
• 21st Amendment Brewery (San Leandro): bronze in American-style cream ale for El Sully
• Faction Brewing Co. (Alameda): bronze in international-style pale ale for the Penske File
• Peter B’s Brewpub (Monterey): bronze in American-style fruit beer for Tropic Maelstrom
• Standard Deviant Brewing (San Francisco): bronze in south German-style hefeweizen for Hefeweizen

Update: An earlier version of this story mistakenly stated Peter B’s won a gold medal. It was actually a bronze medal.