Bosque Brewing prevails with a nice total of votes in 2023 NM IPA Challenge

Brewers Guild executive director Ebbie Edmonston, right, hands the IPA Challenge trophy to the staff from Bosque Brewing.

After eight years, the New Mexico IPA Challenge trophy will return to Bosque Brewing.

With 69 total votes, Bosque claimed a nice title this year, beating out a field of 15 other IPAs submitted by breweries across New Mexico.

Steel Bender took second with 47 votes, followed by Bow & Arrow (43) and Hidden Mountain (39). Host Flix Brewhouse (36) and Icebox (35), the round two winner, round out the top of the list.

The final voting totals from all three rounds, with beer numbers on the tray in parentheses.

“I’ll tell you, Bosque needed this,” said longtime Bosque sales rep and friend-of-the-Crew Jason Otero, with a bit of a wink-wink, tongue-in-cheek vibe. “We’ve been a brewery for years, but we haven’t had any awards for quite a while. I think we needed a win. As much as anyone needs a win, we needed a win to be able to go up there and still tell people we’re still a cool brewery, we’re still making good beer. We’re still around. Bosque has not gone anywhere.”

The final round was held over three sessions inside Flix Theater No. 4. It was, admittedly, one of the best possible venues in a scorching summer.

“Different sessions had different vibes,” said New Mexico Brewers Guild executive director Ebbie Edmonston. “The first session definitely had the largest attendance. The second was the lowest in attendance. This was much more mellow. I think people really enjoyed being indoors, with air conditioning, these very comfy seats. All of those things led to a good experience. The beers came out quickly. That is definitely thanks to our volunteers.”

The process went about as smoothly as imagined. Hopheads entered the building, walked back to the theater, and were handed their trays as they entered. Then it was a simple task of whittling down 16 to the one favorite.

A meta moment of taking a pic of the IPA trays while someone else was taking a picture.

For Edmontson, her first IPA Challenge as Guild director was by no means a simple task to organize, but from our perspective, she and the rest of the board of directors made this annual event go about as smoothly as we can ever remember it going.

“I’m so relieved,” she said. “I was really excited for this challenge. It was a challenge for me personally, as well as all the people who participated, all the breweries. It went really well. I’m really happy with how it turned out.”

Notably absent from the winning Bosque team was head brewer John Bullard. We asked what lake John was currently fishing upon, but Otero did not know. We will be rather amused to learn his reaction upon his return to civilization.

“We were just talking about John,” Otero said. “We joked that he would not show his face in public. (But) he is still there, leading the team, leading everyone at Bosque.”

Otero said that with the biggest smile, so John, congrats, wherever you are in New Mexico or points beyond.

A huge thank you to Ebbie and every member of the Guild board of directors, plus all the brewery volunteers at each and every location. From Bosque’s The Drinkery staff to the Public House 28 staff in Anthony to the staff at Flix Brewhouse, you all kicked ass over the last month.

One more photo with the Bosque staff before they took off with the trophy. That’s Jason Otero on the right.

This is the closest thing we’ve had to an IPA Challenge going off without a hitch or a spot of controversy (save for the couple of people online who still cannot understand why Boxing Bear and/or La Cumbre failed to advance out of the brewer-judged preliminary round; see us in our DMs on social media).

Congratulations to Bosque Brewing on taking the trophy back to Bernalillo. Let us all enjoy our favorite brewery’s year-round and specialty IPAs for the rest of 2023 and beyond. This is all for fun, so raise a glass to all of our state’s incredible breweries.

Keep supporting local!

— Stoutmeister