Dark Island Reserve top of Great Taste Class with three Gold Stars
The Orkney Brewery’s speciality Dark Island Reserve ale has picked up three gold stars – the highest award possible – at this year’s Great Taste Awards.
Dark Island Reserve 330ml
Regarded as the industry Oscars, The Guild of Fine Food’s annual Great Taste Awards are the UK’s largest independent evaluation of fine food and drink. Each product entered into the competition is subjected to rigorous tasting by a panel of over 400 expert judges.
Of the 10,000 entries received for this year’s event, only 153 have been awarded the top three-star classification and will now go on to be judged for a place in the Great Taste Top 50 foods, announced next month.
This is the second time the multi-award winning Dark Island Reserve has been given a three-star classification in the Great Taste competition, cementing its position as one of the world’s finest ales. This time around it was one of only six beers entered and the sole Scottish three-star winner.
One of the first ever whisky-aged beers on the market, the 10 per cent Dark Island Reserve is created by maturing small quantities of the Orkney Brewery’s iconic Dark Island ale in locally sourced malt whisky casks for three months. Exported to over a dozen countries around the world, Dark Island Reserve is available in 75cl bottles and a new 330ml version that’s proving extremely popular with fine food and drink lovers in the UK and overseas.
“We’re really thrilled with this result for Dark Island Reserve, which follows its three-star award in 2011,” said the Orkney Brewery’s Norman Sinclair. “Achieving three-star status at the Great Taste Awards is no mean feat as the judging process is exceptionally rigorous and the competition very strong, but we were confident the quality of our product would shine through once again. We now look forward to the next stage in the judging process.”
