Celebrating Excellence: Root Shoot's Remarkable 8th Malt Cup Victory and 18th Consecutive Medal
- Mar 9
- 5 min read
Every March the world fills out brackets. Basketball fans debate upsets. Offices run pools. Someone’s perfect bracket gets destroyed before lunch on the first day. Around here, we’ve got our own version of March Madness. Except instead of basketball teams, it’s malt.
The Malt Cup, organized by the Craft Maltsters Guild, brings together craft malthouses from around the world to see how their malts stack up. Brewers and distillers know great beer and spirits start with great ingredients, and this competition takes a pretty serious look at what’s actually inside the bag. Which basically means a lot of smart people doing hot steeps and looking very closely at malt.
Now in its 8th year, the Malt Cup continues to highlight the incredible quality and diversity of craft malt being produced today. Among the many outstanding malthouses competing this year, Root Shoot was fortunate to add three more medals, bringing our total to 18 Malt Cup medals overall.
Even more humbling, it means Root Shoot has medaled every year since the competition began—eight years in a row.
Not exactly something we set out to do… but something we’re incredibly grateful for.
What Is a Hot Steep?
If you’ve ever attended one of our malt tastings, you’ve probably heard us talk about hot steeps. A hot steep is essentially the malt equivalent of a tea tasting where crushed malt is steeped in hot water to quickly extract flavor, color, and aroma. Within about 15 minutes, you get a surprisingly clear picture of what that malt contributes to a beer or spirit.
Judges in competitions like the Malt Cup use hot steeps to evaluate:
Aroma and flavor
Sweetness and malt character
Color and clarity
Overall sensory balance
It’s a simple technique, but incredibly useful. Brewers can taste a malt before it ever hits the mash tun, distillers can evaluate grain character before fermentation, and maltsters can better understand how their malts express themselves.
For us, hot steeps are one of the best ways to connect the dots between grain in the field and flavor in the glass. And yes… we do them with brewers every chance we get.
2026 Malt Cup — By the Numbers
The Malt Cup continues to be the premier competition for malted barley, showcasing the best brewers malt from across North America and beyond. This year’s competition brought together maltsters, brewers, distillers, cicerones, and researchers from across the globe, including a significant panel at Montana State University, which hosted the judging. This year’s competition included:
8 categories of malt, each judged separately
117 total entries from a diverse range of malthouses
29 malthouses representing 5 countries
48 grain varieties spanning 7 grain types
Judging took place at 14 locations with 61 judges, including 22 at Montana State University where sensory evaluation and technical analysis helped determine the winners.
This wide participation reflects the growing interest in craft malt and malted barley, as brewers seek unique flavors and consistent quality for their beers and spirits.
Root Shoot’s Results (and a Streak We’re Grateful For)
This year, Root Shoot was fortunate to bring home three more medals, bringing our total to 18 Malt Cup medals. But the stat we’re most proud of is this: Root Shoot has medaled every single year since the Malt Cup began eight years ago. Eight years in a row.
We’ll be honest, when we started malting, that wasn’t the goal. The goal was pretty simple: Grow good grain. Take care of the soil. Make malt brewers and distillers actually want to use. Turns out if you focus on those things long enough… good things tend to follow.
This year’s medals went to three malts that many of our brewery and distillery partners already know well:
Gold: Munich10 (9 entries in the category)
Our Munich 10 (M-10) continues to quietly rack up medals, making it the most decorated malt we produce. Made from Odyssey barley this year, this marks the fifth Malt Cup medal for this malt over the years.
It’s rich, bready, and a favorite for brewers building depth in lagers, ambers, and malt-forward beers.
Silver: Distillers Malt/ High Enzyme (7 entries)
Our Genie-based distillers malt is built for high enzymatic power, and this malt supports efficient conversions and strong fermentations in whiskey and other grain-forward spirits.
Gold: Cara Ruby (12 entries)
Our Cara Ruby took the top spot in the caramel category. It brings deep ruby color, caramel sweetness, and layered malt complexity to beers where malt character deserves the spotlight. You’ve probably tasted it in more Colorado beers than you realize.
Overview of Category Winners
Craft malt is a small but mighty community, and we’re lucky to compete alongside some incredibly talented maltsters. Huge congratulations to everyone involved. The level of quality across craft malt keeps getting better every year.
Distillers Malt (7 entries)
- Gold: Two Track Malting
- Silver: Root Shoot Malting
- Bronze: Red Shed Malting
Light Munich (9 entries)
- Gold: Root Shoot Malting
- Silver: Blue Ox Malthouse
- Bronze: ND Malting
Wheat (14 entries)
- Gold: 3D Malt
- Silver: Rabbit Hill Malthouse
- Bronze: South Fork Malthouse
Unique Malt (24 entries)
- Gold: New York Craft Malt
- Silver: Blue Ox Malthouse
- Bronze: Gallatin Valley Malt
Vienna (13 entries)
- Gold: Troubadour Maltings
- Silver: Voyager Malt
- Bronze: Gallatin Valley Malt
Caramel (12 entries)
- Gold: Root Shoot Malting
- Silver: Red Shed Malting
- Bronze: Troubadour Maltings
Pale (17 entries)
- Gold: Red Shed Malting
- Silver: Two Track Malting
- Bronze: Linc Malt
Pilsen (21 entries)
- Gold: Loam Malt Studio
- Silver: Mitten State Malt
- Bronze: Blue Ox Malthouse
What Makes Root Shoot Stand Out?
At Root Shoot, malt starts long before the malthouse. It starts on our fifth-generation family farm in Loveland, Colorado, where we grow much of the barley we malt ourselves. Farming and malting under one roof means we get to care for the process all the way from soil to brewhouse.
Our mission has always been simple:
Sow. Grow. Malt. Deliver.
That means stewarding the land responsibly, growing grain with intention, and producing malt that reflects the place it came from.
Medals are fun. They’re a great way to benchmark quality. But what matters most is the farmers, maltsters, brewers, and distillers working together to build a better grain supply chain. That’s the real win.
Looking Ahead: Why the Malt Cup Matters
Competitions like the Malt Cup help move the entire craft malt industry forward. They give independent malthouses a chance to benchmark quality, encourage innovation, and help brewers and distillers discover new malts and suppliers. With 61 judges from across academia, brewing, distilling, and malting, the evaluation process takes a serious look at both flavor and technical performance.
For brewers and distillers, results like these reinforce something simple: great beer and spirits start with great grain. Whether it’s a malt-forward lager built on Munich 10, a beer colored by Cara Ruby, or a whiskey driven by high-enzyme distillers malt, competitions like this highlight the ingredients that make those flavors possible.
But medals aside, none of this happens without people: our farming crew, our malthouse team, and the brewers and distillers who trust our malt in their beers and spirits.
You’re the reason we get to do this.
So thank you for being part of it.
Now… if you’ll excuse us… March (Malt!) Madness and barley season is just getting started.
