Chicago Breweries Win 5 Medals at Great American Beer Festival

By Amy Cavanaugh in Food on Oct 2, 2011 6:00PM

Chicago breweries made an excellent showing at the Great American Beer Festival in Denver this weekend, scooping up five medals across a range of categories. The annual festival, which is put on by the Brewers Association, offers samples of 2,200 beers from more than 450 breweries across the country (remind us to attend next year). Besides getting to sample an array of brews, the festival gives gold, silver, and bronze medals in each of 75 categories, which are divided by types of beer.

Showing for Chicago were Goose Island Beer Company, 5 Rabbit Cerveceria, Hamburger Mary’s, Haymarket Pub and Brewery, Metropolitan Brewing, Piece Brewery, and Revolution Brewing.

5 Rabbit Cerveceria placed first in the Fruit Wheat Beer category, taking the gold for its 5 Lizard (we just had this a couple weeks ago and loved the refreshing passion fruit flavor). Haymarket Pub and Brewery took the gold in the American-Belgo-Style Ale category for its Angry Birds beer. Piece Brewery took the bronze medal in the German-Style Wheat Ale category for its Dark-n-Curvy. Goose Island took bronze in the French- and Belgian-Style Saison category for its Sofie beer, as well as a bronze in the Extra Special Bitter category for its Harvest Ale.

Indianapolis' Sun King Brewing Co. took home eight medals. Check out the full list of winners here.