Plainfield's Werk Force Brewing Wins National Beer Festival Award

PLAINFIELD, IL — Plainfield's Werk Force Brewing Co. is one of seven Illinois breweries to clinch awards at this year's Great American Beer Festival.

The "Barrel Aged Count Chungus" — a two-year bourbon barrel-aged imperial stout — won a bronze medal in the wood- and barrel-aged strong stout category. Once the beer was aged, brewers infused it with roasted cacao nibs sourced from Ghana.

Brandon Wright, who owns the brewery along with his wife, Amanda, described the brew as "really decadent, rich, chocolatey stout" and "super complex with lots of layers of flavors."

It was one of 120 entries to compete in its section and come out in third place — "not an easy feat to medal in such a strong category," Wright told Patch.

"It's super humbling to be able to receive an award like that especially when you're up against so much strong competition," he said.

Werk Force patrons might remember the stout — it was first released in April. As luck would have it, Wright said they only released half their "stash" at the time, so they plan to rerelease the rest on tap and in cans in the coming months.

"We were pretty lucky to have a little in reserve," Wright said.

The festival is the nation’s largest for professional brewers and hands out some of the industry’s most sought-after accolades. The festival was held Sept. 21-23 in Denver, with 250 beer experts from 10 countries serving as judges.

Judges evaluated nearly 9,445 entries from 50 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico, including collaborations between professional breweries and pro-am collaborations from professionals and amateurs. Among those, 303 medals were awarded to 263 breweries across 99 categories and 175 beer styles. Gold, silver and bronze medals were awarded.

The Count Chungus is not the only Werk Force brew to snag awards this year. Two other stouts won silver at the U.S. Open National Beer Championship.

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