Your Craft Malt Conference recap, and 2024 Malt Cup Winners

The Craft Malt Conference (aka MaltCon) took place at the University of California Davis in February. Organized by the Craft Maltsters Guild, the conference serves to gather stakeholders and grow the market for regional, artisanally-produced malted grain in geographies around North America and beyond.

The two-day event awarded six scholarship, the Soles of Malt award, and a host of Malt Cup winners, as well as networking and technical sessions with some of the industry’s leading experts. More than 150 individuals from 11 countries participated in this year’s conference across virtual and in-person formats.

Pre-conference events included a four-day Advanced Class in Craft Malt Production; a day of malt quality judging for the Malt Cup; and a welcome reception at Admiral Maltings in Alameda, where participants could tour a production-scale floor malting operation while sampling dozens of beverages made with craft malt from around the United States.

Six scholarship recipients participated in this year’s conference: Don Tse, Lee Dongwook & Katherine Olson (shared), Angelo Ruiz, Rodney Zinyemba, and LaShanda Poteat.

2024 Malt Cup Results

The Craft Maltsters Guild’s Malt Cup remains the world’s only malt quality competition, inviting maltsters of all shapes and sizes to compete for the best malt in various common categories. This year’s Malt Cup expanded to six categories: Caramel, Light Munich, Pale Malt, Pilsen, Vienna, and Wheat.

Entries in these categories came from 26 malthouses in five countries. Malt Cup entries were scored in three rounds by 70 judges, a process facilitated by the Montana State University Barley, Malt & Brewing Quality Lab, and DraughtLab.

Congratulations to Hogarth Malt, named Best in Show in the 2024 competition, who took the coveted traveling Malt Cup home with them to Alberta, Canada.

Here are the medal-winning malthouses by category:

Pilsen

• Gold – Hogarth Malt – Olds, Alberta
• Silver – Blue Ox Malthouse – Lisbon Falls, Maine
• Bronze – 3D Malt – Camrose, Alberta

Pale Malt

• Gold – Malteria Italiana Artigianale – Perugia, Italy
• Silver – Field Five Farm – Saanichton, BC
• Bronze – Root Shoot Malting – Loveland, Colorado

Vienna

• Gold – 3D Malt
• Silver – Murmuration Malts – Bloomfield, New York
• Bronze – Admiral Maltings – Alameda, California

Light Munich

• Gold – Root Shoot Malting
• Silver – Hogarth Malt
• Bronze – Field Five Farm

Caramel

• Gold – Troubadour Maltings –
• Silver – Red Shed Malting – Red Deer County, Alberta
• Bronze – Blue Ox Malthouse

Wheat

• Gold – Root Shoot Malting
• Silver – Riverbend Malt House – Asheville, North Carolina
• Bronze – LINC Malt – Spokane Valley, WA

Soles of Malt Award

Given annually over the past seven years, The Soles Of Malt award was created in memory of craft maltster William Soles and stands for selfless and philanthropic stewardship of craft malt. Each year, a selection committee considers a wide range of craft malt community members and ultimately must make a tough decision.

Congratulations to the 2024 Soles of Malt Award recipient, Dr. Patrick Hayes, Professor Emeritus at Oregon State University, who was nominated by multiple Guild members this year for his work furthering malt education, developing new barley varietals, and establishing the OSU Research Malthouse– among many other milestones in his career. Hayes says he’s been privileged to work with an evolving team of colleagues at Barley World until his retirement in 2023.