The 'Rock is Rolling

The BeerOnTheRock executive meeting took place last night. Dave, Ian and I managed to plan some changes to our Vancouver Island beer news resource before our sobriety clock ran down and we were reduced to watching a man inhaling his own boot on YouTube.

BOTR currently just does Island news and announcements, but we will start doing two other things:

1. Articles
BOTR is intended to be opinion-free (saving rants for our blogs), but our main aim is to promote our beer scene. We have decided therefore to start writing feature articles, e.g.:

• profiles of local breweries/brewers
• interviews with beer-related folk
• historical bits about the beer industry here

2. Homebrewer's guild/community
Victoria does not currently have a homebrewers' organization. We have been in touch with some guys who have been planning to start one and it is likely that we will either host it or publicize it and certainly cover it. Dave and I are building our own brew operation; Ian already brews.

If any Island drinkers want to suggest another angle we could pursue on BOTR, feel free, we're here to serve. 

OK now to the important business of what we drank last night:

Howe Sound's latest beer "Brilliant Lager" (and first in a can) is a Dortmunder-style lager. DAB — an exemplar of the style — seemed a natural comparison point. Both beers are solid, relatively malt-forward with minerally-hops. But I preferred the DAB which was crispier and more tart.

Second up was my beer-revelation of 2011 Weltenburger Kloster's Asam Bock. It is a dark doppelbock named, as far as I can tell, after the Brothers Asam — a pair of 18th Century German artisans (architect and painter, respectively). Such a lovely beer — warm and soothing, not too sweet, hint of chickory, and a clean finish. I used to pass this one by because of the antiquated label and its low price — I assumed it was a throwaway import. Since then I have had four other varieties of Weltenburger and I cannot recommend them enough.

Next was a half bottle of Dogfish Head's World Wide uber-imperial stout. Ours was a muddy brown, not black, and frankly not lovely. It had a great oily texture and all the concentrated liquorice and treacle flavours you'd want to see —but it was also a bit astringent and bitter.

The Serendipity pair were interesting. I had the bright idea of doing them in reverse order to save the oldest for last. The No.2 was much as I remembered it — a fairly nice bourbon-infused hybrid ale that could have used a more robust backbone. The No.1 was utterly infected and tasted like mouldy lime peel.

These out of the way we turned to Ian's gentle homebrew: a light, light bitter that eased the meeting to a close.