A Bavarian Kellerbier brewed in a small village in Goa has just made itself rather difficult for the American beer trade to ignore.

MAKA Di Bavarian Style Keller Beer, produced by Latambarcem Brewers, was named Best Beer by Packaging at the 2026 USA Beer Ratings, scoring 97 points for packaging. It was also named Beer of the Year – India, with an overall score of 87. The competition judges beer on Quality, Value, and Packaging, with the latter accounting for 25% of the final score.

For a brewery from Bicholim in North Goa, it is a meaningful result. But the more interesting story sits behind the medal: two brothers, an abandoned distillery, a brewery built from scratch, and a beer brand whose ambition was never to make Goa's version of just one kind of beer.

It was to make beer that could travel.

From an Abandoned Distillery to a Brewery.

Latambarcem Brewers was founded by brothers Aditya Ishan Varshnei and Anish Varshnei, who brought very different backgrounds to the business.

Aditya studied nanoengineering and materials science at the University of California, San Diego, and Columbia University before working in finance in the United States. Anish studied Culinary Science at the Culinary Institute of America.

Their route into brewing began with a piece of property in Latambarcem, a village in North Goa. The family acquired an abandoned distillery and restored the site, eventually turning it into the home of the brewery.

Anish took responsibility for brewing and R&D, while Aditya focused on sales and marketing. They spent years studying the craft beer market, working out where they could fit, sourcing equipment, and developing recipes.

The launch was supposed to happen in early 2020. Then the pandemic arrived, with brewing equipment imported from China caught up in the disruption.

Rather than abandon the project, the family used the delay to work on recipes remotely and get the brewery ready. MAKA Di eventually entered the market in October 2020.

The name itself gives the brand a distinctly Goan starting point. MAKA Di means “give me” in Konkani.

Image: Anish Varshnei (L) and Aditya Ishan Varshnei, founders of Latambarcem Brewers.

The Idea Behind Maka Di.

What makes Latambarcem interesting is that it has never treated “Indian craft beer” as a style in itself.

The brewery's beers draw from established brewing traditions, but the Varshneis are willing to move between them, bringing different ingredients, techniques and influences into the brewery in Goa.

That starts with the raw materials. The brewery has sourced malts from Poland, Germany and the United Kingdom, while other ingredients include Valencia oranges, Sicilian lemons and wild honey from Jim Corbett National Park.

The result is a portfolio that has room for Belgian, German and American references without losing the fact that every beer is being developed and brewed in Goa.

The Belgian Blanche, for example, sits at 4–5% ABV and combines the wheat-beer tradition with coriander, cumin and Sicilian lemon peels. The Honey Ale, at 7–8% ABV, uses wild honey from Jim Corbett National Park in an amber ale.

Image: Belgian Blanche and Honey Ale with different ingredients.

The Belgian Tripel, at 8% ABV, takes the brewery deeper into Belgian territory through a partnership with Brasserie Lupulus in Belgium. The American Lager, at 4–5% ABV, goes in the opposite direction: crisp, smooth, and designed with warm climates in mind.

None of these beers is intended to be a statement that Goa has suddenly invented Belgian beer, Bavarian beer, or American lager. The point is rather more interesting. Latambarcem is using those traditions as a vocabulary, then making its own beers within them.

And that is where the Bavarian Keller comes in.

The Beer That Won in America

Kellerbier is not an obvious style to associate with Goa. Traditionally unfiltered and associated with Bavarian brewing, it is a beer in which freshness and the character of the underlying ingredients matter more than the polished clarity expected from many mainstream lagers.

MAKA Di's Bavarian Keller follows that traditional German approach, using water, malt, hops, and yeast, and leaving the beer unfiltered.

The style is a particularly good illustration of what Latambarcem is trying to do. The beer does not need to be dressed up as an Indian novelty. It simply needs to be a convincing Kellerbier, made well, packaged intelligently, and given a reason to stand out.

At the 2026 USA Beer Ratings, it did exactly that.

Its 97-point Packaging score made it the competition's Best Beer by Packaging, while its overall score of 87 earned it Beer of the Year – India. It received a Silver Medal overall.

Image: 2026 USA Beer Ratings winners - MAKA Di Bavarian Style Keller Beer and MAKA Di Belgian Style Blanche Beer.

That packaging result is especially relevant because the competition is designed around the commercial reality of beer. Quality matters, but so do value and the ability of a product to catch a consumer's eye on a shelf or back bar.

For MAKA Di, the result says that a beer brewed in Goa can compete on the same commercial terms as products entering the U.S. market from much more established beer-producing countries.

Stein & Vine's Role

That is where Stein & Vine becomes part of the story.

The Florida-based company is connected to Latambarcem's exports into the United States, providing a route for MAKA Di to reach American consumers. Trade records document shipments between the companies, including MAKA Di Belgian Blanche.

It is a useful relationship at this particular point in the brand's development.

Latambarcem has already done the harder part of establishing what MAKA Di is: a Goan craft beer brand comfortable working across brewing traditions and sourcing ingredients internationally. Stein & Vine provides the commercial bridge into a market where consumers are already accustomed to exploring beers from unfamiliar brewing regions.

And the timing could hardly be more useful. The beer now has an American competition result to support its arrival.

From Goa, Without Apology

There is something quietly compelling about the fact that the beer that won in America is a Bavarian Keller.

It would have been easy to make the story about Indian ingredients or to lean heavily on Goa as an exotic backdrop. Instead, the beer won on its own terms. It was judged as a beer, its packaging was judged as packaging, and the finished product came away with one of the competition's major global titles.

That gives MAKA Di a useful position.

Its identity is not built around pretending to be European, nor around forcing Indian ingredients into every recipe. It is built around understanding beer styles well enough to work across them, while accepting that the brewery's location, ingredients and people will inevitably give the finished beers their own character.

That philosophy also explains the range. Belgian Blanche, Belgian Tripel, Honey Ale, American Lager and Bavarian Keller are not five versions of the same idea. They are evidence of a brewery comfortable moving between brewing traditions and asking what can be done with them from Goa.

The brand has since expanded its beer portfolio further, including Rocket Rice Lager, Rocket Strong Lager and Maka Shandy, while Latambarcem has grown beyond beer into other beverage categories.

Image: Hands full of beers.

But MAKA Di's international story has a particularly neat first chapter.

Two brothers returned to Goa. An abandoned distillery became a brewery. A pandemic delayed the launch. Recipes were refined. Beer began leaving the brewery. And then a Bavarian-style lager made in North Goa arrived at an American competition and walked away with Best Beer by Packaging and Beer of the Year – India.

For Stein & Vine, the opportunity now is to help take that story further into the U.S. market.

For Latambarcem, it is proof of something the Varshnei brothers appear to have believed from the beginning: Goa does not have to be a distant corner of the beer world. It can be where the beer comes from.

Also Read:
2026 USA Beer Ratings Results Announced
USA Beer Ratings Introduces Greater Judge Transparency and Detailed Feedback for Every Entry