Yesterday a group of four judges, Tom Doorley, Tony Brookes from [url=
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="
www.theheadofsteam.com/">
www.theheadofsteam.com/]The Head of Steam[/url] in the UK, Séan Billings and myself from ICB tasted our way through 23 Irish craft beers.
4 Lagers, 12 Ales, 4 Stouts and 3 Specialty Beers were all tasted and evaluated. A difficult job and in some categories especially the ale one a big debate was needed to decide between them.
Here's the winners:
Best Lager:
Porterhouse Hersbrucker
Best Stout:
Porterhouse Wrasslers XXXX
Best Ale:
Messers Maguire Bock
Best Specialty:
Porterhouse Chocolate Truffle Stout
Overall Winner and winner of the Michael Jackson Award:
Messers Maguire Bock
Thanks to the Porterhouse for organizing this and asking me to judge, it was a great afternoon.