THE Hampton Estate hop gardens in Puttenham, which supplies hops to The Hogs Back Brewery in Tongham, have bagged a first place in the Institute of Brewing and Distilling national hop competition.

The agricultural Oscars took place at The Wimbledon Brewery, where the Wigan Cup for the best sample of fuggle hop was presented to Bill and Bridget Biddell from the Hampton Estate.

The judging had taken place earlier by a panel of master brewers who based their decisions on four qualities: trueness to variety type, quality and intensity of aroma, disease and pest free, and presentation of sample.

Bill Biddell commented that “the award is as result of the hard work and commitment to hops shown by everyone at the Hampton Estate. It is a team effort and we are very fortunate that the team is so experienced and skilled in growing this traditional agricultural crop.

“It is especially encouraging to have won this prestigious award in the year when we are expanding our hop enterprise significantly.

“We have planted another nine acres of hops and are in the process of building a new state of the art hop picking and drying facility.

“This represents a large and long-term investment by the estate into a well known Surrey crop, and will give us the capacity to meet the demand for fuggles hops locally from The Hogs Back Brewery and other breweries which we supply throughout the country.”