Champion Beer Of East Anglia 2008

After a lengthy tasting process during last year, culminating with a final tasting at the Colchester Fat Cat in early December (see article below), the Chairman of the East Anglian Tasting committee, Dave Sherman was able to present certificates to several brewers at the 2nd Colchester Winter Beer festival (Jan 2009). [click on images to view larger]

Gold (Overall Champion Beer) = Mauldons Black Adder

Silver = Wolf Woild Moild

Bronze = Milton Marcus Aurelius

Farmers (Maldon) won the Bitter Category with a Drop of Nelson's Blood (Nigel Farmer seen collecting certificate)	Buntingford (Essex) won the Best Bitter Category with Britannia	Adnams (Southwold) won the Golden Ale Category with Explorer (Fergus Fitzgerald, brewer, seen collecting his certificate)
Nethergate (Essex) won the Speciality Beer Category with Umbel Magna (Roger Clark seen collecting certificate)	Wolf (Attleborough) won the Mild Category and OVERALL SILVER with Woild Moild	Mauldons (Sudbury) won the Porter/Stout Category and was OVERALL CHAMPION with Black Adder (Steve Sims seen collecting certificate)
	6 Brewers gather for a certificate parade after their presentations by Dave Sherman.	(photos by Nigel Smith)

CAMRA’s Champion Beer of East Anglia Final 2008

On Monday 1st. December I arrived in the Fat Cat and once again enjoyed the rugged décor and the company. James Keatley, was mine host, and there were moments when he must have wondered what he had volunteered for as the last Tasting Panel Team of the year assembled. The accompanying photo will reveal the villains who worked their way methodically through David Sherman ‘s secret list without a clue as to what was what. James was superb as (almost) single handedly he came up with the correct beer to order, ensured that the glasses were ready and that the quirky bunch of tasters were purring with contentment! So cool that no one would have known that he was presiding over the panel that was to declare the first East Anglian dark ale champion after all their deliberations . Slowly the tables filled with empty glasses, the conversation turned to the qualities of the relative candidates for the title and finally Mr Sherman, entered the cloistered bar with pen and paper (and calculator if required). All relaxed and none more so than James who must have felt at times he was taking a test. I have good news for him. He passed with flying colours – well alright as many different colours of black as you can imagine.

And as they say on the tele… the Overall winner was Mauldon’s Blackadder (5.3%) from the brewery now of the same name – well done to Steve & Alison Simms. And it was nice to see Wolf Woild Moild (4.8%) another fine dark beer in second place. With Milton Marcus Aurelius (7.5%) a very strong third.

And a special thanks to James for making the day so successful.

Mike Harvey