Big congrats to True Anomaly Brewing Company for taking home the big one – the 2024 Brewery of the Year award. Cheers to brewing great beer!

See the full list of Texas winners here.

The post Texas Craft Brewers Cup Awards 2024 first appeared on Houston Beer Guide.

The post Texas Craft Brewers Cup Awards 2024 appeared first on Houston Beer Guide.

Although this beer was new to us at the time, it was the very first beer that Valle Kauniste, owner and brewmaster of Vallensons’ Brewing Company has ever brewed. After serving our country abroad, Valle landed in northern California on a search to find beers similar to what he was drinking in England. At the time, Sierra Nevada and other large craft beer breweries were flooding the beer market with new beer styles but Valle could not find any beers similar in taste to those beers he was craving from overseas. Being primarily a stout and porter fan, Valle set out to recreate that familiar beer style he loved and remembered. Over the years, grains and brewing techniques have evolved but the recipe for this beer still remains unchanged. As a result, the Settler’s Oatmeal stout is leading the pack for being the ‘most decorated’ stouts in the City.

The first time this beer awarded was back in Valle’s early homebrew days. Valle entered a new brewer competition called the ‘Mississippi Mashout’ and much to his surprise, took home a gold medal. In 2000, he moved to Houston and got involved with the local homebrew scene, established a homestead with his growing family and started the plans for a family owned brewery operation with his wife, Lori Kauniste. Valle scaled up his 5 gallon electric brew system to a 30 gallon system and quickly, craft beer became a big part of the Kauniste family lifestyle. The current 3BL system is pushing overtime, brewing new beer recipes each month and will soon be replaced with a custom built 7BL brewhouse to compliment the new expansion of the taproom and new event space in April. Did someone say VIP tours? Yes, please!

Additionally, Valle’s Oatmeal Stout has won…

Gold in the US Open Beer 2019

Silver in the US Open Beer 2020

and the big one, the 2020 Great American Beer Festival “Oatmeal Stout” Category – Gold.

“This is a beer that I really enjoy making and we are so glad that the community likes it. I feel like I am the new guy on the scene so taking home a gold medal at GABF this year is mind blowing to me. Two golds and a silver in two years – I am planning to call an upcoming beer “Validation” because we must be doing something right! – Valle K.

So, how does it taste? This beer features a rich roast flavor with a touch of residual sweetness that will delight any stout drinker. The body is medium to full with a slick velvet texture making it super easy to drink. At 5.9%, this beer is a perfect companion to your morning coffee to kick start your day with a buzz. On New Year’s Day, this beer was released in 16oz cans (4-packs) for the first time and cans quickly sold out over the weekend. But don’t fret – this beer will always have a spot on the Untappd tapwall and cans are back in restock each week.

Take a trip down south to Vallensons’ Brewing in Pearland on a nice Sunday afternoon, and enjoy a tulip pour of this award winning stout. While you are there, snag a beer flight and take advantage of the creative beers Valle and his team are creating each week.

AUDIO BONUS!

For more ‘behind the scene’ discussion about the story of this beer, check the Draught Queens audio segment with Valle Kauniste available here .

The post Beer Spotlight: Settler’s Oatmeal Stout first appeared on Houston Beer Guide.

The post Beer Spotlight: Settler’s Oatmeal Stout appeared first on Houston Beer Guide.

To be fair, Texas’ haul as a whole dropped, from fifteen to twelve. But the fact that Houston failed to take home even a single Bronze evokes a lot of questions, chief among them: is the city being left behind, as far as beer is concerned?

I intend to explore this question, and other tangential thoughts, in depth in future articles, but for now I have just two thoughts to touch upon. First, it’s possible that this conclusion is spot on. After all, Saint Arnold Weedwacker has been a big winner in the past, garnering two Bronze medals and one Gold. This year, the German-Style Wheat category actually had fewer entries than in 2015, so one would expect the back-to-back-to-back medalist to place again. (Interestingly, the Gold medal went to AlpenGlow from Ohio’s Fat Head’s Brewery, a brewery that took home five medals.) Second, and perhaps more importantly, these competitions aren’t perfect. Sure, the judges this year included Saint Arnold brewer Aaron Inkrott, but like any other subjective competition, there are whims and preferences that vary from person to person.

Ultimately, I don’t personally believe that medals at events like this matter all that much. But I do think there’s something to be said about the fact that a city that previously had shown an impressive trend of improving in the medal standings each year, by either quantity or position, has just fallen off, hard. I think the silence says quite a bit.

(Featured Image Photo © Brewers Association)

The post GABF 2016 Wrap-Up: What happened to Houston? first appeared on Houston Beer Guide.

The post GABF 2016 Wrap-Up: What happened to Houston? appeared first on Houston Beer Guide.