FOUR beers from Suffolk have been named among the top 50 in the world in the 2007 International Beer Challenge.Bury St Edmunds-based Greene King scored a double success, with Greene King IPA and Ruddles County both making the list.

By Duncan Brodie

FOUR beers from Suffolk have been named among the top 50 in the world in the 2007 International Beer Challenge.

Bury St Edmunds-based Greene King scored a double success, with Greene King IPA and Ruddles County both making the list.

Southwold-based Adnams also achieved recognition with Adnams Explorer and the success of the county's booming micro-brewery was reflected in a listing for Bartrams Brewery, at Rougham, near Bury, with Comrade Bill Bartram's Egalitarian Anti Imperialist Soviet Stout.

Greene King IPA was described by the judges as “an easy-drinking, very well-balanced, deep amber-coloured session ale with ripe barley flavours crisped up by hoppy bitterness and tinged with a vaguely liquorice-like note” while Ruddles County was praised as “packed with robust, spicy, tangy hop flavours, on top of a toffeeish malty sweetness, with an unusual fruity twist from Bramling Cross hops”.

Of Adnams Explorer, the judges wrote: “Brim-full of crisp, citrus fruit flavours, it features grapefruit zest and a pithy bitterness to the fore, backed by hints of pear and barley sugars. 'Serve chilled', says the label, and Explorer certainly has the body and character to cope with lower temperatures, making it a super summer drink.”

Apart from its name, Comrade Bill Bartram's Egalitarian Anti Imperialist Soviet Stout caught the judges' attention for its “bitter chocolate dominating other roasted grain flavours and a pleasant, peppery warmth wafting around the palate. Coffee joins bitter chocolate in the long lasting, bitter finish. Lovely airy texture in the mouth, too.”

The Supreme Champion in this year's International Beer Challenge list is The Abyss, a stout matured in Bourbon casks, from the Deschutes Brewery in Oregon, in the United States.

Award winners from the UK included the Greenwich-based Meantime Brewing Company which won the fruit beer category with Meantime Raspberry Grand Cru and the stout and porter class with Meantime Coffee. Meantime Pale Ale and Meantime London Porter also made the top 50.

Other multiple listings went to London-based Fuller's with Discovery, ESB, London Porter and London Pride and Wells & Youngs of Bedford with Young's Bitter, Special London Ale and Double Chocolate Stout.

Other well-known British beers to make the list included Hook Norton Old Hooky, Harviestoun Bitter & Twisted, Wadworth's Bishop's Tipple and Brakspear Bitter.