8 Award-Winning New England Craft Beers And Breweries

On October 19, the Great American Beer Festival, which thanks to COVID-19 was held virtually this year, announced its 2020 competition winners.

And even though the pandemic put a damper on the festivities this year, a win at the Great American Beer Festival competition is still a BIG deal.

Taking a Gold, Silver or Bronze medal in any one of this year’s beer categories can put a new brewery on the map and reaffirm the brewing skills of industry leaders that sometimes get overlooked.

This year’s judging featured 115 judges from 21 states who evaluated 8,806 entries from 1,720 US breweries. And thanks to COVID-19 2020’s judging process was a much more complex operation which took place under strict social distancing protocols in 35 sessions over 18 days.

And although the western states and the Pacific Northwest fared well, as they traditionally tend to do, New England breweries and beers were also honored.

This year the following eight New England breweries were awarded medals for their beers (up from six medals in 2019).

• True North Ale Co. (Ipswich, MA) “Cerveza,”   Silver medal in the American-Style Cream Ale category
• Lamplighter Brewing Co. (Cambridge, MA)  “Lazy Tiger,” Silver medal in the Experimental India Pale Ale category
• Springdale Beer. Co. (Framingham, MA)  “Kölsch Money,” Bronze medal in the German-Style Koelsch category
• Aeronaut Brewing Co. (Somerville, MA) “First Steps on a Sour Planet,”  Bronze medal in the German-Style Sour Ale category
• Allagash Brewing Co. (Portland, Maine) “White,” Gold medal  in the Belgian-Style Witbier category

• Lone Pine Brewing Co. (Portland, Maine) “Choco Tuesday,” Silver medal  in the Experimental Beer category
• “Lone Pine Brewing Co. (Portland, Maine) Cuvee De Funk,” Gold medal  in the Wood-and-Barrel-Aged Sour Beer category
• Counter Weight Brewing Co. (Hamden, Conn) “Counter Weight Fest Bier,” Gold medal in the Dortmunder or German-Style Oktoberfest category
• East Rock Brewing Co. (New Haven, Conn)   “Vienna Lager,” Silver medal in the Vienna-Style Lager category

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H/T Boston.com for their lead on this….