Charles Faram has chosen the occasion of SIBA’s BeerX, in Liverpool, to reveal the winners of its 2022 International Hop Awards.
Award winners with their certificates. Left to right are: Charles Faram managing director, Paul Corbett; Will Rogers, also from Charles Faram; Richard Capper, from Stocks Farm; and Mark Andrews, of Townend Farm
The awards have been established to recognise the commitment of growers in the Charles Faram Hop Development Programme. The programme was set up to develop new varieties that concentrate on new flavours, disease resistance, sustainability, and combatting environmental issues.
Besides winning the awards, the growers are given in-depth feedback from the judges.These are head brewers who have been asked to consider what type of characteristics that they are looking for. They also judge the hops on aroma and quality.
Samples range from brand new hops, where there is just one plant in existence, up to already released commercial varieties.
The Jester, Olicana, and Harlequin cups (all celebrating UK varieties) were all won by Richard Capper, of Stocks Farm in Worcestershire. The farm has been in the Capper family since 1962.
Head brewers judging the hops
The overall winner of Charles Faram’s commercial varieties competition was also Stocks Farm and Richard Capper, with Harlequin. It is apparent that out of the 70 varieties judged from different countries around the world, Richard has shown consistency in his quality and hopefully highlighted a formula that can be followed on other farms.
Richard’s wife, Ali, said: “2021 was a hard year for Richard and the whole family as he has battled both Covid impacts on the hop business and a cancer diagnosis. He is well now and these awards have been a real boost, and we all felt quite emotional as the announcements were being made.”
Harlequin also won the silver and bronze awards. Silver was won by Mark Andrews, of Townend Farm, in Herefordshire. Mark and his wife, Lesley, farm at Bosbury, near Ledbury. The farm has been in the family for three generations. Mark has worked closely with Faram’s for more than 20 years, as did his father before him.
Bronze went to Jim Barrett. Jim farms at Walsopthorne Farm, near Ashperton, Ledbury, in Herefordshire. He also works for several other farms in the area and is a well-respected hop grower.
Special mention went to Jindra Krivanek, in the Czech Republic, as he came a very close fourth place to these three Harlequin samples with his Most variety.
The early-stage variety category was won by Mark Andrews for Charles Faram experimental variety CF276. Anything un-named has a CF code. This also means that it is still in the trial plot stage. There are a number of plants being grown, but not on commercial levels. As soon as the hop hits the commercial stage then it is given a proper name.
The winning new variety category was CF321. This category is for completely new varieties where only one plant exists in the Charles Faram nursery in Herefordshire. It’s a top-secret location. Even some Faram’s team members don’t know where it is!
The feedback from this competition and judging means that Charles Faram has already instructed CF321 to be propagated ready for the trial plot stage.
Paul Corbett, Charles Faram’s managing director, said: “We’re already doing the major work, which is a continuous cycle, but brewers have a massive part to play with the ingredients they buy, purchasing practices, and their levels of development involvement.
“Brewers now have a more environmentally friendly option, with a pretty close flavour profile to those you would traditionally have found further afield. We hope that we can encourage more brewers to support the programme and buy local hops.”
