As almost every­one is aware Beer­vana kicks off tomor­row. It’s very excit­ing for some­one like myself who makes home­brew & has a lot to learn and it’s excit­ing for peo­ple who like beer and it’s excit­ing for peo­ple who like Welling­ton busi­ness­es doing great things and it’s just all very excit­ing!

Last year the Brew­ers Guild of New Zealand Awards had already occurred and we could tell you who had scooped up prizes. How­ev­er this year the Awards are tak­ing place as I type. I’ve seen via twit­ter that Garage Project has picked up an award, I have no idea what for, but they have an award so con­grats to them!

Tomor­row and Sat­ur­day every­one has the oppor­tu­ni­ty to head to the West­pac Sta­di­um and talk to brew­ers, taste their wares, learn about beer, taste more beer and gen­er­al­ly rev­el in one of the great­est con­coc­tions that is made from only four ingre­di­ents. Beer­vana is not just for the beer bof­fin or the hop (h)officianado, while many per­ceive ‘craft beer’ (what­ev­er that means) as elit­ist I’ve found that most Welling­ton brew­ers are more than hap­py to talk about beer and dis­cuss the mer­its of what it is they are cre­at­ing. They aren’t all try­ing to brew some­thing that tears the taste­buds from your tongue in a fit of hops, many of them are try­ing to be more cre­ative, to push bound­aries and to chal­lenge long held per­cep­tions of what beer should taste like.

Speak­ing of which — this year the Fes­ti­val Brew that many brew­eries take part in twists the foun­da­tion of what a beer should be made of with the “3 out of 4” theme, where one of the four core ingre­di­ents has to be sub­sti­tut­ed for some­thing else.

Beer­vana not only offers a great chance to taste great beer and dis­cuss it with the peo­ple who make it, it often gives peo­ple chances to drink cer­tain beers, the Fes­tive Brew and Media Brew for exam­ple that only exist for the dura­tion of the fes­ti­val.

If you do head along to Beer­vana make sure you take the time to head along to the sem­i­nars avail­able, you won’t regret it.

I’m head­ing along tomor­row and can­not wait to learn more about this beau­ti­ful bev­er­age.