By Paul Stanley

Imagine my surprise, when seeking a cold one in the lovely city of Victoria British Columbia, to encounter a relative! I’ve never done any sort of genealogical study of my family tree but perhaps the stories are true after all. Note the resemblance between Lord Stanley (Governor General of Canada, provider of the original Stanley Cup, and namesake of Stanley Park)

and Yours Truly

The Stanley Park Brewing Company, Vancouver BC, was established in 1897 and is Canada’s first “sustainable” brewery (on-site wind turbine, many innovative operations designed to conserve energy and resources). They make only Read More…

Posted under Beer personalities, beer reviews, brewpubs, places to drink beer

By Jean De Ieso

While traveling, there are many things to enjoy, scenery, music, food, and of course great beer. Our recent West Coast jaunt included a two day stay in Victoria, British Columbia, where all of the above can easily be found. A walking tour of the city, a bus ride to Butchart Gardens, and a stop at a local brewpub made our short stay delightful.

Quite by accident, we came to have lunch at the Canoe Brew Pub . Located on the city’s waterfront, we were seated at an outdoor table and greeted by a lovely New Zealand waitress. We started with a Read More…

Posted under beer reviews, brewpubs, places to drink beer

By Marc Demeule (Brewpublic’s Quebecer Beer Trekker)

Sounds like a nice challenge isn’t it?  And you should consider it for your next beer trip.  Of course, you’ll have to find your way to Montréal for the 18^th edition of le Mondial de la bière. Perhaps it’s not the beer next door, but discovering a lot of new brews in a bilingual environment is certainly an experience every beer geek should have in his life.

Le Mondial de la bière is a major Read More…

Posted under beer events, places to drink beer

By Marc Demeule

Two friends of mine released a beer guide and I would like to introduce you their work.

La route des grands crus de la Bière – Québec et Nouvelle-Angleterre showcases the best that Quebec and New England brewers have to offer. Written by David Lévesque Gendron and Martin Thibault, craft beer enthusiasts and Ratebeer.com administrators, it aims at being the ultimate French companion to the beer hunter of La Belle Province and New England.

The first section gives the readers the basic tools that will enable the reader’s capacity to find what they like and to be able to understand and describe why they like it. A second section provides a brief summary of the distinguishable aspects of the 200+ breweries on the territory. If not all the establishments were visited, most of them were and at least one beer was tasted from each. The third section constitutes the heart of the book and justifies the title. Almost 100 beers are hand-picked by the authors and elected as “Grands Crus”, meaning world-class examples of their style. Unlike on beer rating websites, the chosen ales and lagers represent an extremely broad range of flavors. It is the authors’ wager that at least one of these beers could convert anyone to appreciate craft beer. A whole page is dedicated to each of the cherished elixirs, providing a complete description of the style, the tasting profile and suggesting food pairings or similar beers should you fall in love. The fourth and last section acts more as a beer hunter companion. The reader is encouraged to look out for his own favorites. A list of breweries and beers is all well and fine, but what matters is how to get a hold of them. Here, the well-travelled authors suggest itineraries for beer runs and provide list of the best stores to be impressed by the selection.

To complement the book, Olivier Germain has accompanied the authors on many beer trips where he took delightful pictures, often seizing the artistic souls behind many of the craft beers we love. Moreover, since the beer world is dynamic, the authors have launched a blog where travel notes, Grands Crus from outside the territory or various related articles can be read. Catch up at lescoureursdesboires.blogspot.com . -David Lévesque Gendron

I assisted at two different events for the release of this book.  The first one was in collaboration with the editor of the book, Québec-Amérique.  The second event, the official beer geek one, has been hosted by Le Bénélux during their last cask night, on November 13, 2010.   I know that I’m extremely late to report it.  It was an overcrowded night where nine casks from Le Bénélux, Dieu du Ciel!, Hopfenstark, Broadway Pub, Brouhaha, Le Trou du Diable, Les Trois Mousquetaires, and Microbrasserie Charlevoix were on the menu.   As a beer geek, I always try to discover new beers.  Revisiting great beers in their cask version is a good way to give them a second life.  For, let’s say reasons like my birthday party and the friendly crowd, I have no notes about those casks and a portion of the event… but I can assure you that beers tasted there were awesome.

Fortunately, I’ll try to be more professional for the next occasion.  Another release party is set for April 16, 2011 at le Siboire in Sherbrooke.  Again, a list of exclusive casked beers will be presented there, including six tap beers from Hill Farmstead Brewery.  Be there!

Marc

Posted under Beer & Music, beer events, beer news, brewpubs, places to drink beer

This exclusive event features at least four special Belgian-style beers that are not available at the regular festival, along with a European-style brunch. Tickets are limited, and go on sale in the fall so check back as the event gets closer to guarantee yourself a spot at this exclusive event.

This will take place up above the regular Holiday Ale Festival in a heated tent. You must be 21+ to enter this venue.

2009 Menu and beer line up included……

Imperial Oatmeal Stout [Stout] • ABV: 10.9%
Okay, so it’s not Belgian, but instead Danish, and that sounds mighty worthy of the Brunch. This Imperial Oatmeal Stout is brewed with one of the world’s most expensive coffees, made from the droppings of the weasel-like civet cat. The fussy Southeastern Asian animals eat only the best and ripest coffee berries. Enzymes in their digestive system help to break down the bean. Workers collect the bean-containing droppings for Civet or Weasel Coffee. The exceedingly rare Civet coffee is around $300/lb. This beer is almost as rare, and it’s “what’s for breakfast” at the Brunch only!

Copenhagen, Denmark • mikkeller.dk • •

Posted under Oregon beer, beer and food, events, places to drink beer, vintage beers

On Friday September 24, during Toronto’s first ever Beer Week, brewers and brewery representatives from all over Canada converged on the Cool Brewery in Etobicoke, ON to attend the CBA Gala and Medal Presentation hoping to take gold, silver or bronze tap handle medals back to their respective breweries.

The 2010 edition of the awards featured Read More…

Posted under beer awards, beer events, beer news, places to drink beer, press releases

By D.J. Paul

This past weekend’s plans took me to Victoria, British Columbia to take in the 18^th Annual Great Canadian Beer Festival. This two-day festival is held each year at the Royal Athletic Field on the northern edge of downtown Victoria. This large sports complex gives ample space for the 7,000 plus attendees and 57 breweries representing over 180 beers from across Canada, Pacific Northwestern United States and Belgium. The Friday session ran from 3-8pm with an entrance fee of $30 and Saturday’s session was from Noon-6pm with a $35 fee. This fee is on top of drink tokens that cost another $1.25 each for on 4-ounce pour. Much different than how the Great American Beer Festival operates each year with their all inclusive ticket pricing. And from what I learned is that this year’s event sold out in record time, within eight minutes for the Saturday session and it only took three hours to sell out the Friday session. These Canucks like their beer!

For those that have attended the Great American Beer Festival in Denver, this festival is similar in name only.  At the GABF, only beers produced here in the States are available. However the GCBF pours beer from across Canada but of those most are predominately from British Columbia, beers from the U.S. and a few bottle offerings from Belgium. It seems as if they the organizers took hold of the name and hoped for a more broader Canadian beer selection. Of the breweries from the Pacific Northwest in the United States, Oregon had five breweries represented including Hopworks Urban Brewery (with whom I helped out pouring beer for), Upright Brewing, Double Mountain Brewery, Rogue and Deschutes.

I arrived into Victoria via the Victoria Express passenger ferry from Port Angeles, WA. This ferry gets you across the Straight of Juan de Fuca in 55 minutes, 35 minutes faster than the better-known M.V. Coho Auto Ferry and is also a bit less expensive.  The ferry even slowed down so we could take in the views of two humped back whales swimming near us. From the ferry I cleared customs and preceded to take the 2.5km trek to the fest.

Upon entering the fest I received my 4o-ounce Tasting Glass and GCBF Program that I flipped through to find out which beers looked intriguing to sample. They also throw in a free BC Transit ticket to get you back home safely. Fortunately for me I was assisting in pouring at the event so I was taken care of on my admission and tokens. (Thanks, Ben!) The layout of this festival had a very relaxed feel to it, probably most similar to the North American Organic Brewers Festival. There were 14 smaller sized tents that hosted four brewers each all spread out nicely over the entire baseball and soccer field. Then there were two larger tents that housed tables and chairs for patrons to relax or take cover if bad weather hit. Fortunately we had decent weather for both days, a bit cool on Friday but still manageable. Thankfully the rain held off until the end of the fest when we were loading up.

To feed the beer drinkers hunger there were five food vendors operating during festival hours. There were many tables available to sit down at and enjoy your beer tastings while grabbing a bite to eat. Also roaming throughout the grounds there were many carnival or circus type acts. This included a mermaid attempting to play an accordion, jugglers, marching band, and beaver costumed bagpipe players to make it a more festive atmosphere.

Now on to some of the beers that were sampled over the course of those two days: Read More…

Posted under Beer & Music, Oregon beer, beer and food, beer events, beer reviews, places to drink beer

By Marc Demeule

It is so true that simple ideas are often the best.  The Trou du Diable team simply wanted to create a “get together” with other brewers they appreciate but just don’t have the chance to visit often enough.  A total of 15 breweries shared the Willow Street for a one evening and the only competition was to serve the crowd that attending the  first (and I can surely announce it will now be annual) event simply called “La Soirée des Brasseurs” (the brewer’s night).

The setup has been reduced to the minimum:  A tent for two breweries, a table and great beers in small quantity.  All the rentals were supported by Le Trou du Diable, so no sponsors were on the site.  Two live bands, Jah Cutta and Afrodizz , gave a live show and a musical atmosphere to the evening.

What where the great beers of the event?  Here are my preferred, in a completely random order. Read More…

Posted under beer events, beer reviews, brewpubs, places to drink beer

By Marc Demeule

I like to come to Québec to visit my family, friends and their kids and also for the summer festival.  We had a real good edition with plenty of concerts from artists like Iron Maiden, Dream Theater, Rush, Social Distortion, GBH, Jello Biafra and so on.  But what about the beer?  Unfortunately, the festival was sponsored by Molson and the only products available on the site were Molson Dry, Molson M and Aquafina, which is the only bottled water that has an ugly taste because it is bottled from tap water  (thanks Pepsi).  Well, I can understand that only macro breweries have the money to sponsor such a big event, but it is always boring to attend a rock concert without anything good to drink.

Nevertheless, I took the weekend to pubcrawl Québec’s breweries, too.  Here’s where I went:

La Korrigane
The name of La Korrigane comes from an Icelandic codfisher transformed into an exploration ship.  Their expedition in 1934-1936 brings back a collection of 2000 ethnic objects of Polynesia, Indonesia and Egypt.

I have been very lucky and a bit insolent to attempt to the newest brewery in town, La Korrigane.  In fact, the place wasn’t really opened.  It was just a practice for the real opening night and only family and friends were invited to this event where the new staff was experiencing a new location, with new equipment and the first batch of recipes that hasn’t been tested with the water of the city.  So, okay, I promised to the owner to be objective in my comments and I wrote one page for the suggestion box.  The renovations of this huge building present a location easy to access (Corner of St-Joseph and Dorchester) with a terrace and eventually a kitchen (please offer more than burgers).  It will certainly help for the revitalization of St-Roch neighbourhood.

Beers tasted there revealed much potential.  I will surely return to measure the evolution when the installations will be fine tuned.  The only thing I could notice was that the beers had a mouth felt too thin.  I experienced a witbier (Mary Morgan) with good aroma of banana, citrus and a bit of yeast. The blueberry beer (Emiliy Carter) didn’t impress me because I found it too acidic.  The red and the oatmeal stout (Cornik) presented a some acidic taste, too, but where quite interesting.  The blonde (Vila) was my preference with a light touch of flowers and honey.

L’Inox
As I remember, this brewpub is the oldest (1987) that is still opened in Québec.  They recently move to a new location, so the occasion was perfect for a visit.  Only three beers were on tap because the affluence of the summer festival.  Simply called Blanche, Blonde and Rousse (white, blonde and red), I had glasses (no tasters available) of beers that respected the standards.  The white presented touches of citrus and the red some caramel malts.  The best was the blonde, American pale ale that presented a hoppy taste from five different hops.  It was simply great on a sunny terrace.  I shall visit this place when seasonal beers will be available, but on such a touristic street (la Grande Allée), I think this brewpub will now have the happy problem to fill up the mass of tourists instead of the local beer geeks.  Good for the volume, but please don’t forget to brew funky things.

Microbrasserie Le Corsaire
Le Corsaire is located in Lévis, just next to the ferry boat of the St-Lawrence River.  So the best way to access it is to take this ferry which gives an exceptional view of Québec and his Frontenac Castle.  The brewer, Martin Vaillancourt, made some of his classes at the aforementioned L’Inox as well as in England, so this brewing style is strongly and well represented here since 2008.  Here is what I’ve tried:

Tanaka blanche, wheat ale with ginger,  Seeräuber Pilsner,  Galère pale ale,  Bristol ESB, Maya blanche au miel, Corsaire Alt, Davy Jones Stout, Session bitter and Session bitter on cask.  Unfortunately, no IPA was on the board, but I had something very hoppy with the Session Bitter on cask.  What a great beer!  80 IBU and only 3,5 % of alcohol.  I would have took pints and pints of it but had to leave to take the last ferry back to the north shore.

I’ve been lucky (and lonely) because I was the only passenger for this travel on a ferry that can carry close to 40 cars and a bunch of pedestrians.  David Suzuki would have certainly not agreed with this, but there were no other options.   A good thing is that this session bitter will probably be Le Corsaire’s next beer to be canned (no bottles, but cans for this brewery).  At least, this travel didn’t produce five tons of CO2 for nothing…  Sorry Mr. Suzuki and Mrs. Earth.

To conclude, well I have to admit that the Québec City beer scene is away from what we can have in Montréal.  Of course, the quality is improving, but with the exception of the cask bitter, I haven’t tasted a lot of really exceptional beers.  On the other side, all the tasted beers were correctly brewed and did not present any technical defaults.

If you’ve  already come to Québec, you’ve probably taken note that I’ve forget to visit a brewery.  No, I haven’t forgotten.  I visited it but won’t talk much of it.  When you have a tasting tray and three of the beers are totally acidic, it is not normal.  The worst is when you mention it to the staff, they agree but still continue to pour it, because the place is full and people just don’t make the difference.  I don’t like that.  Instead of giving my money for default batches, I would prefer to make a donation for cancer research.

Brewpublican Marc Demeule lives and quaffs craft beer near Montreal, Québec and is an honorary citizen of Beervana. Marc@Brewpublic.com

Posted under beer reviews, places to drink beer

Today is the Québec’s National Holiday. Everyone is welcomed to raise his glass with us to our great province. Please, have a good beer for the occasion.

Santé à tous

Bonne St-Jean Baptiste !

Marc@Brewpublic.com

Posted under beer events