Indiana Beer Week culminates July 19 at Broad Ripple’s Opti Park, just east of College Avenue on 66th Street, with the Brewers of Indiana Guild Microbrewers Festival from 3-7 p.m. Approximately 3,100 people attended the 2007 festival, which raised $30,500 for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and Optimist International. Tickets are $35 at the door. All attendees must be 21 years of age.

Twenty-six Indiana breweries, including several that opened in the past year, and 20 breweries from around America will pour samples of their new and beloved brews. Brewers will be on hand to converse about them.

A special treat from about a dozen of Indiana’s breweries is their particular version of this year’s ReplicAle, Scottish 70/-beer. They all follow the same wort recipe according to beer judge certification guidelines, but even the slightest tweaking can make for discernible differences.

New this year is the July 18, 6-9 p.m. Brewers of Indiana Guild VIP Brewmaster’s Dinner to benefit the Red Cross Indiana flood relief effort. Chef Greg Hardesty is pairing the elaborate seven-course meal with craft brewed beer for each specialty including appetizers, salads, entrees and desserts. Tickets are available for $75 per person at Broad Ripple Brewpub and Brugge Brasserie.

Log on to www.brewersofindianaguild.com for more information.

Also new is an Indiana brewery beer swap so craft beer lovers can get a taste of what’s brewed in another corner of the state and brewpubs all around are offering a full schedule of freshly brewed beer on tap and bottled.

July 16: Oaken Barrel Brewing in Greenwood will tap their Berliner Weisse, www.oakenbarrel.com.

July 17: Downtown Indianapolis 4-pub Crawl runs 6-10 p.m., with special releases at Alcatraz, Ram, Rock Bottom and J. Gumbo’s. Start at any of the four.

Bloomington’s Upland Brewing releases its new Preservation Pilsner at Chumley’s in Broad Ripple, 7-9 p.m. to benefit Central Indiana Land Trust, www.uplandbeer.com.

Payless Liquors, I-69 and 96th Street, Fishers, offers a free tasting of Fort Wayne’s Warbird and Mad Anthony beers, 5-7 p.m.

July 18: Crown Liquors offers a free tasting of Indiana beers, 5-8 p.m. at four locations: Carmel Drive and Meridian, Brooks School Road, 62nd and Allisonville and 37 and 146th. Come back Saturday for $1 off all Indiana microbrew six-packs and 22-ounce beers.

July 19: Party on the Square in Danville from 8:30 p.m.-midnight with five select Indiana beers and music by The Bittersweets.

July 24: Indiana ReplicAle Face-off at Spencer’s Stadium Tavern. Patrons get to vote for the best of the best that were tapped at the July 19 B.I.G. Microbrewers Festival at Opti Park.

July 29: Granite City is opening another restaurant and brewery in Indiana. Mishawaka joins their Fort Wayne location, which opened earlier this year.

Brew honors

Michael Pearson earned “Homebrewer of the Year” at the ninth annual Indiana State Fair Brewers’ Cup held July 11-12 at the State Fairgrounds. Anderson resident Pearson thus retains top honors for MECA Homebrew Club. Bill Ballinger has been Indiana’s reigning homebrewer since last year’s ceremony. Oaken Barrel of Greenwood was named “Indiana Brewery of the Year,” just edging out Upland of Bloomington.

Homebrewer Aaron Evilsizer, Noblesville, gained the “Best of Show Award” for his Russian Imperial Stout, which will be brewed and served at Broad Ripple Brew Pub later this year.

Orlando Park, Ill.-based Rock Bottom won “Best of Show” in the professional division with Line Drive Light Lager.

Seventy judges from across the U.S. tasted 867 beers to name first, second and third place winners in each of 23 categories. A new 24th “hop-less” category marks the 2008 hops shortage.

Judges, who abide by strict category guidelines, undertook a 37 percent increase in entries from 2007. All winning beers will be displayed in the Ball State Agriculture/Horticulture Building throughout the Aug. 6-17 Indiana State Fair. Log on to www.brewerscup.org for the full list of winners.

A month earlier, Tom Wallbank of Indianapolis and the Foam Blowers of  Indiana Homebrew Club took top honors at the American Homebrewers Association national convention in Cincinnati. Wallbank won a gold medal for his Dusseldorf Altbier.

Reporting from Cincinnati, Wallbank wrote, “At the legendary Club Night, 12 of us decked out in the FBI black suits, hats and shades uniform. Six spouses dressed in racy FBI prisoner outfits. We had ‘24’ kegs on tap all at the same time, including six historic recipes from once outlawed beers (our theme). The lineup and overall quality of our beer had perhaps 1,000 people coming back again and again. We were voted Club with the Best Beer. This was out of 42 clubs in attendance from all over the country. This was an incredible surprise and an awesome honor.”