Beer Madness: 32 American craft brews in the brackets

Here are the 32 American craft beers featured in this year’s Beer Madness competition, separated into four flavor brackets and listed alphabetically. They are all available year-round in the Washington area, in either bottles or cans.

Last year’s Malt category has been replaced with Crisp, to level the playing field a bit for (pale) lagers and lower ABV (alcohol by volume) brews.

Video

Greg Engert, Beer Director of the Neighborhood Restaurant group, breaks down the judging process for Washington Post Beer Madness 2012.

More Beer Madness

Vote for your favorite

Select your choice for Beer Madness champion through our online bracket.

Meet the Beer Madness judges

Bonnie S. Benwick

Four experts and four readers (including one congressman) make up our 2012 tasting panel.

Beer recipes

If knocking back a cold one doesn’t appeal, you can still tap into the spirit of Beer Madness by cooking with beer.

Full coverage

More on this Story

• Full coverage: Beer Madness 2012
• Annual Beer Madness begins with 32
• Descriptions: 32 American craft brews
• Glossary: A style guide to this year's field

View all Items in this Story

• Meet the Beer Madness judges
• Recipes: Beer works in dishes and glasses
• Raise a glass to the poetry of beer

CRISP

Fordham Helles Lager

Fordham Brewing Co., Dover, Del.

This golden, malt-accented lager is patterned after the everyday brews that lederhosen-clad Bavarians quaff out of their liter steins.

Bell’s Lager Beer

Bell’s Brewery, Galesburg, Mich.

Noted for its cult favorite Hopslam and its panoply of stouts, Bell’s Brewery also offers this well-balanced pale lager mellowed by a six-week maturation in the tanks.

Eliot Ness Amber Lager

Great Lakes Brewing Co., Cleveland, Ohio

The lawman of Untouchables fame served for seven years as Cleveland’s safety director; hence the brewery honored him with this ruddy amber lager in the Vienna style.

Festie Amber Lager

Starr Hill Brewing Co. Crozet, Va.

Originally brewed for the Oktoberfest season, this malty, slightly grainy Marzen-style lager has been promoted to a year-around brew and now comes in cans.

Prima Pils

Victory Brewing Co., Downingtown, Pa.

Back by invitation for a second crack at the title, this unusually hoppy and complex Pilsener derives its bite from German and Czech whole-flower hops.

Joe’s Premium American Pilsner

Avery Brewing Co., Boulder, Colo.

That’s brewery owner Adam Avery’s grandfather on the label of this well-hopped pale Pilsener, which is packaged in cans only.

Small Craft Warning Uber Pils

Clipper City Brewing Co., Baltimore

Hoppy and strong (about 7 percent alcohol by volume), this pungent pils from Clipper City’s Pyrate Fleet series returns for another engagement.

Coney Island Sword Swallower

Shmaltz Brewing Co., San Francisco and New York)

The company is best known for its He’Brew the Chosen Beer label, but it also markets a Coney Island series of offbeat lagers, including this IPA-influenced Pilsener.

FRUIT AND SPICE

Optimal Wit

Port City Brewing Co., Alexandria

Port City’s first-ever offering was this traditional Belgian-style wheat beer, made with unmalted wheat and oats and spiced with coriander, orange peel and grains of paradise.

DreamWeaver Wheat Beer

Troegs Brewing Co., Hershey, Pa.

Now ensconced in a new state-of-the-art brewery in Hershey, Troegs continues to offer this unfiltered, German-style wheat beer, with characteristic banana and clove notes.

Rayon Vert

Green Flash Brewing Co., San Diego, Calif.

After touring Belgium for “hands-on inspiration,” the Green Flash brew crew came up with this refreshing pale ale bottle-conditioned with the wild yeast Brettanomyces.

Saison Rue

The Bruery, Placentia, Calif.

Brewer Patrick Rue’s take on a rustic Franco-Belgian farmhouse ale incorporates rye for an extra spicy character and a wild yeast to add “notes of leather and earth” over time.