Barnsley Bitter: Historic Yorkshire beer named best beer in the North as Yorkshire lands top three

Barnsley Bitter, brewed by Acorn Brewery in Wombwell just down the road from the original brewery in which it was made years ago, has taken home the Overall Champion Gold Award in the SIBA North East Independent Beer Awards, which took place at Gateshead Rugby Club over the bank holiday weekend.

The Overall Champion is the 'best of the best' and selected in a final round judging against all of the other style category winners - with Acorn’s flagship Barnsley Bitter impressing the judges most, with Huddersfield’s Magic Rock Brewing Co's Ringmaster taking overall silver and Ossett Brewing's 'Voodoo' getting bronze.

Acorn's brewer Steve Bunting said: “Barnsley Bitter was one of the first beers we ever brewed - it's one of the beers we started the brewery with - and has a long heritage, using the original yeast strain from the orignal Barnsley Brewery from the 1850s.

"It's amazing that against such a wide variety of beer styles in the awards such a traditonal style could come out on top today.”

The awards are judged by beer industry experts including master brewers, beer sommeliers and experienced beer judges, with only the best beers awarded medals in these prestigious awards. A broad range of styles are judged, from modern heavily hopped IPAs, pale ales and speciality beers, to more traditional British style bitters, stouts and porters.

Barnsley Bitter and the other beer style category winners will now go forward to the National Finals which take place at BeerX UK in Liverpool next year.

Anneli Baxter, SIBA’s Competitions Chair, congratulated the North East’s winners.

“Cask beer comes in a huge range of styles, strengths, colours and flavours, with some superb beers winning across the board - but it was great to see that a superbly brewed traditional bitter taking the top award today. Massive congratulations to Acorn brewery and all of the other winners in the SIBA North East Independent Beer Awards."