It’s been a banner year for Matt Cole, the master brewer and co-founder of
Fat Head’s Brewery in Middleburg Hts.
In May of this year, Fat Head’s snagged a gold medal for its flagship beer, Head Hunter IPA, at the World Beer Cup in Nashville, dubbed "the Most Prestigious Beer Competition in the World." On its way to the winner’s circle, the beer had to beat out 411 other American-style IPAs.
A few months later, the same beer took top honors at the Great American Beer Festival (GABF) in Denver, leaving 205 other American-style IPAs in the dust. It was a back-to-back honor that no other brewery could claim.
“Nobody has ever won gold medals for American-style IPA within the same year at the Great American Beer Festival and the World Beer Cup, so it does set a bit of a precedent,” Cole explains.
If that was the end of the industry buzz for Fat Head’s in 2023, Cole would be more than content. But two days ago he woke to another honor, this time coming from
Craft Beer & Brewing Magazine, an industry leader when it comes to reviews, news and insider know-how. The magazine just released its latest roundup of the “
Best 20 Beers in America,” a list that began with more than 1,000 entries before getting whittled down by multiple rounds of blind tasting.
The wild thing about Head Hunter landing on the list is that the judges pretty much confessed to having no room at the proverbial inn for another IPA.
“Listen, we didn’t have to put this beer here,” the entry reads. “It’s won its share of accolades, including several medals at the World Beer Cup and the Great American Beer Festival going back to 2010. Its most recent was GABF gold, just a few days before it appeared before us in a blind tasting. We already had top-scoring nominees from our Spring IPA issue. This beer had almost no chance.”
But all it took was a fresh sip for the editors to reach their hoppy consensus:
“Its profile is classic, but it feels bright and fresh for today’s drinkers: Luminescent gold with robust foam and lace, the aroma offers Sunkist orange candies, lemon drops, candied citrus peels, and drops of pear. On the palate, that round juiciness gets a fleeting moment in the sun—the clean malt sweetness provides the picnic blanket—before it all quickly morphs into nostalgic, shady-pines bitterness.”
Cole, of course, was beaming like a proud papa.
“It’s kind of a big deal, you know," he says. "There are 1,000 beers that get judged and Head Hunter fell in the top 20. It’s a pretty big feat.”
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