Home Brew finalists chosen

TOP DAY: Crowds enjoying the bands and the sunshine at last year's BrewDay festival in Martinborough.PHOTO/ANDREW BONALLACK

Home brewers have been getting creative for the inaugural Home Brew festival at the annual Greater Wellington BrewDay festival in Martinborough this Saturday.

BrewDay event organiser Karen Aitken said home-brewers could enter their creations in one of five categories - Lager, Pale Ale, Dark, Pilsner or other - with beers judged on aroma, appearance, flavour, mouth feel and overall impression.

"Over the last few months we've been encouraging home-brewers from throughout the region to enter the inaugural competition and think outside the square with their flavour combinations," said Miss Aitken. "We had preliminary judging and the judges were impressed by the quality and interesting flavours that have come about."

The Brewday inaugural Home Brew Comp finalists are:

Kenneth Mackenzie - Father MacKenzies extra special bitter
Miriam Sorensen - Black Rabbit Porter
Meghan Hannay & Andrew Fisk - Roaring RIPA
Aidan Jones - Manuka Smoked Pale Ale
Chris Bramwell - Bruce's Real Old Ale
Alexander Hutchings - Seasonal Saison
Darusha Wehm - La Cerveceria de Calle Cuba
Scott Russell - White Pale Ale

Judging the finals at BrewDay's Inaugural Home Brew Competition are Kelly Ryan from Fork & Brewer, Stephanie Coutts from Craft Beer College and Neil Miller, a freelance beer writer. The trio will do live judging this Saturday at the festival site and announce the winner at 2.30pm. "Since launching BrewDay in 2013 there has been a ground-swell of craft beer producers in the region and this year we're proud to announce 21 of them will be at the festival. Of those seven are new breweries."

The seven new breweries include Tiamana, Choice Bros, 9 Barn Yard Owls, Wild and Wooly Beers, Hop Hustlers, Webb Street Brewery and Duncan's Brewing Co.

Annika Naschitzki, of Tiamana, is excited about making her beer debut at the festival.

"I was born and raised in Berlin and my father was a brewer at the traditional Schultheiss brewery. With my heritage I will focus on German style beers," she said.

The seven new breweries will join established breweries and distilleries including Parrot Dog, Fork & Brewer, Black Dog, Baylands Brewery, Garage Project, PanHead Brewery, Yeastie Boys, Funk Estate, Kereru Brewing (Wellington); Tuatara, NorthEnd (Kapiti); Martinborough Brewery, Peak Brewery and Regent 58 (Wairarapa).

-Tickets for BrewDay are available through www.ticketdirect.co.nz. General admission is $46 with gate sales at $50.