Coal Country competition selects winners

ELKINS, WV — Christopher Kerns of the Infamous Parkersburg Alers homebrew club took top honors at the 10th anniversary of the Coal Country Brewers Cup competition, which was held Sunday. Kerns’ beer took first place in the Specialty Stouts and Porters category and then was also judged Best of Show. Kerns entered a Russian Imperial Stout aged in a bourbon barrel with vanilla beans and coffee.

The homebrew competition awarded medals in two dark beer categories. Winners included:

Category 1, Stouts and Porters

First Place – Preston Lane (Appalachian Brew Club) for “Dark Turtle” Oatmeal Stout;

Second Place – Jonathan Richie (Fairmont Homebrewer’s Club) for “Stolen Smoke” Smoked Porter;

Third Place – Chris Butler (Kanawha Valley Homebrew Club) for “Blarney Stout” Irish Stout.

Category 2, Specialty Stouts and Porters (Barrel aged, flavored, smoked, etc)

First Place – Christopher Kerns (Infamous Parkersburg Alers) for “Bubby Rhys”, a Russian Imperial Stout aged in bourbon barrel with vanilla beans and coffee;

Second Place – Scott Biola (Appalachian Brew Club) for “Steve Straley Is A Better Brewer Than All Y’all Combined” Imperial Stout with vanilla bean, cacao nibs, brown sugar, and lactose;

Third Place – Steve Straley (Appalachian Brew Club) with his “Hey, At Least I Tried” Imperial Stout with lactose, cacao, marshmallow, vanilla, and cinnamon.

Homebrew Club Champion – Appalachian Brew Club, Elkins, WV. This award goes to the club having the most medalists. The winning club is tasked with hosting the next year’s competition.

Coal country Cup an annual event

The 2022 Coal Country Brewers Cup was held on Sunday, February 27 by the Appalachian Brew Club in Elkins, WV.  The Coal Country Cup was established in 2012 in Cumberland, MD as a competition among neighboring homebrew clubs.  Over the years the scope of the competition has grown to include any homebrew club in the state of West Virginia plus the founding Queen City Homebrew Club in Cumberland.

Due to Covid, this year’s event was held using distant judging protocols, and no in-person social event was held.  Next year we hope to get back to the long established custom of this contest being an excuse for members of the various clubs to get together as the beers are being judged.

The competition is historically all about dark beers. The categories this year were Stouts and Porters and Specialty Stouts and Porters.  A total of 29 entries, almost evenly divided between these two categories were evaluated by a group of Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP) judges from Pittsburgh in a blind tasting. Judging coordinator Rick Newsom noted that this year’s judges were the most experienced panel to ever judge the Coal Cup, and consisted of several judges with BJCP advanced ranks as high as the Grand Master level. anniversary