The Great American Beer Festival recently held its annual awards ceremony in Denver, Colorado and hundreds of breweries from all over the country competed to win gold, silver and bronze medals for approximiately 100 different beer styles.

For those who won gold – especially for popular styles like hazy pale ale and German pilsner – what goes into making these beers and what do they think they did to deserve such accolades?

On this episode of the All About Beer Podcast hosts Em Sauter and Don Tse talk to two medal winners: Aaron Hermanand of Minnesota based Arbeiter Brewing and Andy Joynt of Iowa based Big Grove Brewery about their process and what they believe goes into making award winning brews.

Listen to the whole conversation where you download podcasts including Apple PodcastsSpotifyAmazon, and Overcast.

For original articles or to read the vast archives check out All About Beer.  Follow us on X @allaboutbeer and Instagram @allaboutbeer. Support Journalism by visiting our Patreon Page.

This episode is sponsored by:

If you appreciate the precision of barrel-aged beer, you got to check out the Festival of Wood and Barrel-Aged Beer in Chicago

You’ll get access to more than 350 beers, ciders, meads and perrys from 13 style categories brewed by the world’s top barrel-aged brewers—all under one roof. The Festival of Wood and Barrel-Aged Beer in Chicago takes flight November 22nd and 23rd in Chicago.

Grab your crew and get your tickets now and at Fobab.com

Estrella Galicia is an independent, family-owned brewery  in northwest Spain, founded in 1906. Estrella Galicia Cerveza Especial, a world class lager is brewed with the finest malt and locally cultivated Galician hops in a state-of-the-art facility in A Coruna. Recognized around the world for quality and exceptional character. Estrella Galicia is “A beer like no other.”

Em Sauter
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Em Sauter is an Advanced Cicerone®, cartoonist, author, beer reviewer, international beer judge and public speaker who runs the award winning website Pints and Panels, which focuses on visual beer education. Her first book "Beer is for Everyone! (of Drinking Age)" was published in 2017 by One Peace Books. Her second book "Hooray for Craft Beer!" was released in April 2022 with Brewers Publications. Em is also co-host of the All About Beer Podcast. She lives in New England with her husband Matt and two cats- Milbo and The Geen.

tse
Don Tse

Living near seven malthouses, Don Tse is a freelance beer and malt writer and consultant known globally as The Don of Beer. He has been active in craft beer for over 25 years and has famously sampled and written tasting notes on almost 27,000 different beers. He is the co-host of the All About Beer podcast. Don has also written for magazines and presented on beer in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Ukraine and Singapore.  Nobody in those countries thinks his jokes are funny.