Two dark horse candidates medaled at this year’s Great American Beer Festival. Milwaukee’s Best (some know it as The Beast) took gold in the American Style Cream Ale or Lager category. It beat out 23 other entries (mostly from craft breweries) on its way to the podium. Olde English 800 took silver in the International Style Pilsener category. It bested 11 other entrants.

Of course, the Big Three (Miller, Bud, Coors) took most of the American Style medals, but the moral of the story is that fine beverage can be found in surprising packages. So go ahead folks, drop two bones on a quart of one of these tasties and toast their victory!

“2009 Graphic Design USA presents an American Graphic Design Award to Plumbline Studios for Mutineer Magazine Subscription Ad” (Beverage Kaleidoscope Ad)

That’s right folks. The team over at Plumbline Studios has been officially recognized and awarded by Graphic Design USA for the graphic design work they have done for Mutineer Magazine. Mutineer Magazine can now proudly say it has award winning graphics in the magazine. You can check out our existing subscription artwork at our Mutineer Magazine Ads set on Flickr. We’ll continue to update the set with new subscription ads as they come out.

At the last minute Mutineer became aware that Wine 2.0 and Vator.tv were holding a business plan competition and decided to join in the fray. In an adrenaline fueled rush we were able to gather our forces and attain a second place finish in only a few days of competing. This competition was to win a one-hour session with the judges to pitch our business plan and attain additional funding for our company. Last year’s winner Crushpad attained 9 million dollars and was the host of this year’s event. Smoke Wallin Chairman of Wine 2.0 referred to Mutineer as, “the dark horse of the competition” and was astounded at our rocket to second place. We congratulate Curiosk Marketing on their win and hope them the best of fortune.

Click here to see the video recapping the competition.

The winners of the 2009 American Wine Blog Awards were announced on Tom Wark’s Fermentation Blog today and are as follows:

Best Wine Writing On a Blog: Vinography

Best Overall Blog: Vinography

Congratulations to all of the winning blogs. Pick up Mutineer Magazine at bookstores throughout the United States beginning March 31 for a feature article on the winners and finalists of the 2009 American Wine Blog Awards.