Review Roundup

Homebrewing is a form of mental illness, of that there is no doubt. My free time is currently being devoured by researching hop filters, attending yeast lectures, and watching time-lapse youtubes of fermentation. An anthropologist from Alpha Centuri would freak out trying to make sense of it all.

In order to restore some normalcy, let's drink some palatable commercial beers and write a blog post, just like the old days.

First up, fresh off of Phillips' increasingly frenetic production line, is the Michael Lewis Pilsner. Phillips' output is of such prolific mediocrity that — I must admit — I do not even get too excited to sample them anymore (do I really need to drink an India Pale Lager to know a. it's gonna make me mad and b. it's not going to be as good as Brooklyn Lager?).

But the MLPilsner is an exception. This beer is based on a recipe designed by the winner of the 2011 CAMRA Amateur Brewing Competition—Michael Lewis—who is a fellow member of Island home brewers club BrewVIC, an all-round nice guy, and a dinner guest at my house tonight. The pilsner has "that Phillips taste" to it, I'm guessing due to their house yeast. It's a decent pilsner with a somewhat green-tea bitterness and the odour of a well-leafed paperback. Pleasant, and all the more so because a mate had a hand in it.

Second is a beer I was very excited to try: La Roja from Jolly Pumpkin. JP are my favourite 'wild' beer specialists if only because of Oro de Calabaza (the "Bam" series are also fantastic). La Roja is an amber ale given the spontaneous fermentation treatment, and it is a success. The beer is a radiant reddish hue, perhaps unexpectedly so given that it is an amber. It tastes characteristically tart and vinegary, but a lot cleaner and less horsey than the Oro. A glimmer of hops manage to shine through the champagne dryness, making this a beautifully refreshing, not-so-challenging sour. Great stuff.

Third is a triptych of newer Driftwood beers. All fantastic, which rids me of the dirty feeling I've had ever since I panned their double IPA. You might argue that Fat Tug is two years old now, but not to my mind. Fat Tug was pretty stellar when it first came out, but there was always something slightly brutish and heavy-in-the-mouth about it that makes the prospect of a bomber seem quite an ordeal.  I often hovered my hand over the 'Tug in the liquor store before choosing something more straightforward — like if someone offers you crazy whips'n'chains sex when all you really feel like is a quickie.

But the last 5–6 bottles of Fat Tug have been different. More refined, richer in aromatic hops, less syrup and orange peel, a dash of melon. It could all come down to perception or fluctuation of ingredient qualities, but I find myself unbuckling at the site of it these days, which can only be good.

Sartori has always been the best fresh-hop IPA we can get. First year was incredible; consensus is that last years' was pretty good; this year's is once again awesome. For the first time, this year's Sartori is brewed solely from local maltster Mike Doehnel's (read this) malt, which is a nice way to round off the local vibe imparted by Christian Sartori's Chilliwack(ish)-born hops. Forthright, smooth and exploding with hop aroma. Wonderful.

Finally, the much-anticipated Bird of Prey series (it's a f***king SERIES!) Flanders Red Ale. I knew this was in the works a year ago. Every time I asked Jason about it he'd make mystical sounds about it being sort of ready but not quite ready. Patience has clearly paid off because this is a lovely, lovely sour ale. Not as sweet as I have come to expect from a Flanders Red (blame Duchesse), the Bird of Prey is actually not a million miles away from La Roja. It is an assertive sour, but not a mouth-gusher. The strength (7.5% apparently) is completely disguised by a beguiling palate of sour cherry, lychee and dry cider. Others have attributed "complex" and "oaky" to it, but I identify with neither description (I am curious as to what it would have tasted like were it not aged in barrels for a year). The biggest charm of this beer is its straightforward refreshment and addictiveness. No palate fatigue whatsoever, which is incredible for the style. My advice: find a falconer and invest in a decent sized aviary. Fast.

Review: Driftwood Twenty Pounder Double IPA

I had only recently finished typing a comment on someone else's blog about how to deal with bad beer experiences as a beer blogger when I found myself — like a character in a Charlie Kaufman movie — intimately enmeshed in the very world I was describing.

I am drinking Twenty Pounder IPA, which is a much-awaited beer from my absolute favourite local brewery. It was released today. It is one of my favourite styles. And I'm not enjoying it at all really.

The blog post I alluded to earlier was one of a series, really. A few British beer bloggers have been tossing back and forth about how to deal with bad beers. Should you be honest? Should you even review them? Is it fair to say bad things about good people who have crafted a beer that you just happen to hate? That sort of thing.

I have no answers to those fundamental questions. I focused on what I consider to be the blogger's duty to his reader(s?). This is my bit:

One overlooked variable in the quandary of how to approach negative criticism is the nature of your blog itself. No one is a mere "blogger" — our blogs are driven by different aims and angles. A blogger identifying as a straight reviewer or appraiser absolutely has the responsibility to be frank about poor experience, whereas the philosopher or geek of beer minutae can dodge even having to think about how to handle it.

Bloggers who consider themselves more generic or personal in their approach are obliged in other ways. You build up a relationship with your reader who — in turn — trusts you and expects things of you. If you have spoken candidly on poor experiences in the past, or made gestures at cutting through the crap, then you would serve your reader best by spilling the beans. But if your tone is overtly sympathetic and your readers view you as a convivial proponent of the whole good beer scene — then you would not be misleading anyone if you were to damn with feint praise now and then…

SO where does that leave me with the Driftwood beer? Well, I've always screamed at the top of my lungs about how much I love them, and I've always been honest. I feel I have no choice.

The beer pours a mid orange, with a chunky head that leaves some persistent, patchy lacing. It is a crystal clear DIPA, which may or may not have something to do with the fact that Driftwood have begun to filter a little.* The aroma is very reminiscent of the Fat Tug IPA, which isn't my favourite Driftwood beer, nor is it my favourite local IPA, but it is a worthy brew that I often order and enjoy.

The nose is powerful, orangey, thick, tropical, somewhat cloying, but pleasant. Initially it tastes like a barley wine: syrupy and luscious, but with fairly sharp hop notes. The hops never really get going for me; they are excessive in no particular direction, lending to a rather characterless effect. Stewed apricots come through, but that's about it. I think that malt-lovers would be disappointed, hop-heads alienated.

Then the worst bit: a brutally astringent, chemically finish with all the grace and élan of a nail varnish jell-o-shot. Bad enough to be called flawed; so much so that I'd chalk this off as a bad bottle had it not only just come off the line. If this is 20lb-er as intended, it definitely falls somewhere between "not-for-me" and plain old "gross".

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*I don't know why I wrote that Driftwood have begun to filter their beer. I think I got my wires crossed somehow based on the fact they have recently introduced an "unfiltered" sticker to some of their beers. Pure confabulation. AFAIK they do not and never have filtered. 

Sumpin's Up with the Wacky Hops

Last time I had a Lagunitas it was the weird Brown Shugga — kind of a schizoid beer with a mess of hops and malts and no real character. I was ready to call foul after the first bottle, but as it came in a sixer I had five more to get through. By the end of the pack it had grown on me. It was a similar experience to listening to Soulfly or Merzbow or some other thrashy, distortion artists — blunt and unapproachable until you let your inhibitions down and go with the madness.

The Little Sumpin' was a refreshing contrast. Billed on the bottle as a straight out "ale", this is a zingy fresh IPA with a lemony backbone. Recipe is very close to Central City's Red Racer, I'd guess. Just the right thing for my homemade beef and chocolate chili. I wouldn't usually be concocting such a sledge-hammer of a meal this time of the year, but Victoria seems to have forgotten what season it is. Here are a couple of pictures of young T pouring me a perfect Lagunitas to go with dinner.

Lovely stuff, but I'm a cantankerous type and I'm going to whine about the label. There's a trend these days to add a jaunty twist to ingredient lists, and it is cheesy and boring. "Hops, Malt, Hops, Hops, Yeast, Hops, Water, and Hops" reads the label. Haha. How WACKY! It would be fine if it were just a few guffawing brewers pulling each others' fingers at the back of the classroom, but the temptation to add a cheeky riff to an otherwise worthy bit of packaging is proving too much for today's brewer.  Even the generally dignified Driftwood recently felt the need to add "Shwack 'o Hops" to their cute ingredient icons.

I understand that beer labels are important, especially in a saturated craft market increasingly fuelled by hipsters, social media bandwagoners and other image-receptive types. Sure, the need to stand out has prompted some beautiful label designs (the awesome pourcurator.com knows). But I get tired of the pun-ridden names, derivative graphics, and particularly the pornographization of the humble hop.

Hops really are the double-D tits of beer these days. If there's a beer in a brewers' stable that has a ker-azy label or a hyperbolic name — it's generally the IPA. Some of them are pretty well-done, but for every Perpetual IPA there's a dozen that are less-than-inspired: Hop Circle,  Total Eclipse of the Hop (I'm sorry Howe Sound, it just makes no sense!), Hop-a-Doodle-Do (oh please). For any brewery marketing types hunting for an easy selling name, might I suggest a few ideas from my own inner-Loaded Magazine-reader "Hopic of Cancer", "Bilbo the Hoppit", "Hop Killah", or, my personal favourite, "A-Hop-Bop-a-Loo-Hop-a-Hop-Bam-Boom" — unless these are already taken. I mean it's just so completely childish and unoriginal and cheapening and...

...Woah, hang on. I just saw this.

I take it all back.

Get yer hops out love.

Top Ten Beers of 2010 That I Can Remember Tonight

Flavius, bless the sultry princess, posted a nice top ten of his favourite beers of 2010. I'm always impressed by people who can decide on top tens. I would struggle to list my ten favourite numbers under "11". I'm also too fickle (or spineless) to give a percentage grade to a beer. I just don't think I could present a compelling argument as to why this beer is precisely 1/100th better than that beer. And if I can't manage that, I'd just be lying to everyone if I pretended I could. Experience into numbers just doesn't go.

But I do think some beers are great, and under most circumstances I'd take them over others. Problem is, "some beers I like" is a weak opening gambit for any article, so I'm happy to play the top ten game for the sake of the new year spirit. Each one of the beers listed (in no particular order) below is at least 46% more delicious than a can of Carling, and up to 3 times more lovely than a Molson Canadian Cold Shots.

#1 Driftwood - Belle Royale
If I start talking about how much I loved this I won't stop. Read old review.

#2 Jolly Pumpkin - Oro de Calabaza
This was one of the first wilder ales I ever tried, and I have yet to top it. I took a bottle on recommendation from someone at Vancouver's Brewery Creek beer store. It was one of those staff recommendations where the guy held out the bottle, knowing he was doing the right thing in steering a loyal customer toward a great beer experience, but at the same time hating me for taking it out of his store because he loved it so damn much it HURTS. The most mysterious, disorienting beer I've ever tried.

#3 Oakham - Citra
Had this on tap at the Malt Shovel in England. A single-hopped golden ale brewed to session strength (low 4s I think), served out of a cask. Juicy lychees and marijuana hops, syrupy but not sweet, impeccable bitterness waters the mouth for endless sips. Just the most adorable all-dayer you will ever come across (pictured on the right, next to the also divine Hoggley's Solstice Stout).

#4 Pretty Things - Baby Tree
The world's second best "fruit" beer, possibly, from the always-outstanding Pretty Things gypsy brewery. I loved the rum-and-raisin character of this quad, which is brewed with dried California plums in the kettle. Quads are darkly fruity in any case, but the fruit treatment is far from superficial, and brings a chocolate-shiraz note to an otherwise perfectly made traditional quad.

#5 Brooklyn Brewery - Lager
Surprise factor played a part in this one. Novice to "vienna-style" lagers, I believed for a moment that this hop-heavy lager was an incorrectly labelled pale ale. Brooklyn have done a really good job with this beer, which delivers all the pucker and ether of a middleweight IPA, but with a clinically clean finish.

#6 Moon Under Water - Blue Moon Bitter (first batch)

Victoria's most recently-opened brewpub allowed me to take several bombers of their first batch of bitter home with me after I interviewed them on their premises. Three batches later, I returned to the brewpub to find the brewers still drinking the first batch because it was so darn good. Blue Moon Bitter is a wonderful session bitter in its final incarnation, but the fermentation gods smiled on that first batch and I still crave it from time to time. It was a lightly peppery, very dry bitter, with the most persistently earthy hop flavour I've ever come across. Smelled like fresh soil dug up with your hands. 

#7 Dominus Vobiscum - Hibernus
The sister beer to this one — the lovely "Belgian IPA" Lupulus — almost sneaked into this spot, but the Hibernus just tips it for me. Quebec's Charlevoix microbrasserie are generating a formidable reputation for big-but-classy beers, trading on the increasingly crowded genre of European traditional recipes given a North American twist. The Hibernus is a 10% Belgian strong ale with real character. The beer has a very velvety texture, and a really fat slug of dark fruits, mild mulled-wine spices, and a touch of absinthe. A beer for a special night.

#8 Pelican Brewpub - India Pelican Ale
The best of a very good bunch of IPAs that I generally obsess over. I already reviewed this one as part of my in-no-way-numerically-oriented "Top Ten IPAs of the Year" article.

#9 Brewdog - Sink the Bismark
I wouldn't say I wanted to hate this, but I expected it to be a throwaway experience, akin to a visit to a Victorian beer freak show, manned by a leering Scottish vagabond in a ringmaster's top hat, if only there were such a thing. How could a 41% abv IPA even resemble a "beer", let alone merit serious appreciation? I was very surprised. The Brewdog beer is the essence of IPA, and a remarkable liquer in its own right. If it were more affordable, I'd go as far as to say it should be in any well-stocked liquor cabinet. Raunchy with hops and syrup and searing heat, the Bismark is a fine drink.

#10 Brasserie Dieu du Ciel - Peche Mortel
I tried this gargantuan coffee-infused imperial stout in December 2009, but the aftertaste lingered well into the spring of 2010 so it warrants a place here. This is my favourite "dessert" beer. It is decadent, sweet, and mouth-invading. Many beers that go all out for impact, as 'Mortel (or "Mortal Sin") surely does, end up hopelessly muddled or just plain offensive. This one is manna.

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So there you have it. I'm likely to give a different list if you asked me tomorrow, but I can say with 99% certainty that these are all outstanding beers and well worth your time. Happy New Year.

My 10 IPAs of the year

I wish I were special, but I'm not: IPA is, all in all, probably my favourite beer style.  This love is relatively new. The first IPA that really turned me on was Anderson Valley's Hop 'Ottin — which I drank in October of 2009. Immediately afterwards Driftwood released their first batch of Sartori Harvest IPA, BC Liquor stores started selling Dogfish 60 minute, and I was hooked. Up until then I'd take a stout or a tripel over an IPA any day.

I've had countless IPAs since, including doubles, triples, imperials, wet-hopped, belgian, etc etc. The downside is I'm not really sure what an IPA is any more, but I know when I've got a good one. Here are some of the highlights of my year of IPA lust. I've no doubt omitted some I liked more than these, but these ones stand out as I type this post.

#10 Black Oak - Ten Bitter Years
The enjoyment I got from this one might be due to a convergence of factors, including stumbling across Chancey Smith's in London, meeting barman extraordinaire Milos Kral, and finally getting a drink after a brutal flight schedule. Ten Bitter Years is Black Oak's 10th anniversary beer, brewed to the discerning tastes of BO president Ken Woods. The one I tried had been aged a few months, and was bursting with mellow apricots and lavender. There is a really complicated hop character to this beer: rich but not overpowering. This is a sipper and should be nurtured until warm in the hand.

#9 Phillips - Hop Circle IPA

Legend has it that Matt Phillips dumped a case of Central City's Red Racer on the boardroom table and informed his skilled staff that "this is the one we have to beat." Sooo close, but not quite. This is an excellent IPA nonetheless, and probably my favourite Phillips beer along with the Skookum. I was lucky enough to try it fresh at the brewery as it was released, and the powerful melony-hops and an intoxicating blast of marijuana this beer delivers left a lasting impression on me.

#8 Avery - Maharaja Imperial IPA
Avery brews "big artful beers" and this 10% brute is as big as they come. A dirty, almost filthy, orange colour, with a slug of tangerine hops and an estery smell that really works. This isn't a zingy, fresh IPA — but one of those sweetish, heavy ones that really wallows in the mouth. Intensely aromatic and excoriating, very recommended.

#7 Anderson Valley - 20th Anniversary Imperial IPA

After their Hop 'Ottin, I knew this would be a good one, and it really delivered. As powerful as the Maharaja, but in a completely different direction. This one bursts with citrus fruit, vanilla and grape juice. Very lightly carbonated but thick — the way imperial IPAs should be. The hops do not dominate the flavour, making this less of a hop bomb and more of a comforter.

#6 Driftwood - Sartori Harvest IPA 2009
This beer really sold me on wet-hopped IPAs, and I have been trying (unsuccessfully) to replicate this experience ever since. The balance of pine and orange was exceptional in this release, but what really got me was a near-medicinal camphor zing that made it the most mysterious IPA I've ever had.

#5 Paddock Wood - Loki

I was in two minds whether to put this or Dogfish Head's 90 minute IPA in this spot, as for me, they both represent the same kind of strong IPA. Neither is a slave to its hops, but brings huge complexities in malt flavours — something many IPAs overlook. The Loki tasted like raisins, rice pudding and pepper, but cut through with just the right amount of grapefruit hops to satisfy the IPA lust. A very underrated beer, this one, and a label to die for.

#4 Central City - Red Racer
Enough has been said about this beer already. It is currently BC's finest IPA, and it is deservedly hyped-to-all-hell on beer review sites. At the Great Canadian Beer Festival I tried a casked imperial version which was also sublime, but nothing really beats the tropical gorgeousness of regular Red Racer. A great beer.

#3 Moylans - Hopsickle

First time I had this I thought "ok, enough is enough." This is one of those relentlessly hoppy IPAs that prompted Garrett Oliver of Brooklyn Brewery to quip: “It’s a fairly idiotic pursuit, like a chef saying, ‘This is the saltiest dish.’ Anyone can toss hops in a pot, but can you make it beautiful?” Well, after 4-5 bottles of this stuff, I truly believe it IS beautiful. The "hop-bomb" dismissal slung around by the IPA-backlash brigade is a reverse snobbery that detracts from how damn good some of these hop-heavy beers really are. Hopsickle is a distillation of hops, which, curiously, shares an almost identical flavour profile to Brew Dog's oneupmanship vessel Sink the Bismark (the 41% IPA to end all IPAs). Drink this beer last. (I used FrothyHead's image because, well,  it's way cooler than my picture)

#2 Southern Tier - Unearthly Imperial IPA
This beer leaves me giddy. At 11%, that's hardly surprising. Unearthly is a devastatingly hoppy beer, but in that deep, stewed grapefruit kind of way that makes a beer truly sexy. Pretty sweet, thick, and soupy. Loads of herbal, peppery stuff is going on in this beer. I recently tried the Oak-Aged and it's a distraction — the original is much better. This beer should be served after an hour out of the fridge and allowed to warm fully before you finish it. A lesson in hops.

#1 Pelican Brewpub - India Pelican Ale
It isn't imperial, particularly hoppy, rare, or distinguished in any way other than being the most perfectly balanced IPA I have enjoyed to date. This beer is like listening to a well recorded band on some expensive hi-fi equipment: every element of it is clearly discernable and accessible to the taste. The beer has an intensely bready aroma, with equal measures of pine and citrus hops. The taste has an almost soap-like mineral backbone to it that I think is what allows all the other flavours to express themselves so clearly. There is mildly warm sweetness, a very substantial bitterness, and a little spice — all three of which fade at the same rate through the aftertaste, leaving a tiny trace of salt that has you reaching immediately for another sip, another glass, another bottle, and another trip to the bank to get the $9 you need to buy one here in Victoria. Dammit.

Honourable Mentions

Ballast Point - Big Eye IPA

Green Flash - Imperial IPA

Driftwood - Big Tug IPA

New Belgium - Ranger IPA

Anderson Valley - Hop 'Ottin IPA

Duggan - #9 IPA

Dogfish Head - 90min IPA

Stone - Ruination IPA
Moylans - Moylander Double IPA
Edit: Phillips - Nine Donkeys of the Hopocalypse

Cask Away

Our latest article for the Monday Magazine is in print. We talked about the local cask ale culture, which is vibrant. The article was written before the Great Canadian Beer Festival, otherwise we would have been able to wax lyrical about some of the other great casks on offer.

Spinnakers responded to the article to point out that they have been offering cask events for years. This is true, and Spinnakers efforts should not be ignored. We chose to focus on Vancouver Island Brewery (VIB) because, well, I think that their regular lineup is a little bit tame. Good quality — but conservative. I was hoping that getting some discussion going about the totally non-tame casks VIB are producing might help put pressure on the powers-that-be at VIB to let their creative talents spread to the bottle fridge.

Speaking of casks, there will be a unique casking event this Friday at the Beagle Pub in Cook St. Village. For non-Victorians or those who don't know, Driftwood's Sartori Harvest IPA was a sensational release last year. So much so that they are brewing twice as much this year.

Sartori will still only be available in limited quantities, so get down the Beagle if you have the chance,  or camp outside a decent liquor store as bottling is underway and it will hit the stores soon. Because it is a fresh hop IPA it is probably best drunk as soon as possible before the volatile and short-lived flavours imparted by the fresh hops fade away.

Fresh hopping (shown left, courtesy of the Double Mountain Brewery) is a seasonal practice. Hop harvests come in at this time of the year and are usually pressed into pellets or processed in other ways to maintain their shelf-life or enhance their usability for brewers. Hop pellets maintain the flavour of the hop very well, but some brewers swear that only fresh hopped beers are capable of imparting the full range of sensations that these little herbs have to offer.

At the Great Canadian Beer Festival I found parts of a hop in  my Central City imperial IPA. I'd been warned against chowing down on one of these for fear of ruining my palate for the night. But, let's be honest, after several hours at a beer fest your palate is pretty much beat in any case.

Chomped down I did. Not great. Definitely better in the beer itself. Head to the Beagle tomorrow night to find out what I mean.

Great Canadian Beer Festival Roundup

The Great Canadian Beer Festival came and went. I won't argue with any of the four words in its title. My biggest disappointment was enjoying it so immensely that I almost completely neglected to take notes and pictures. Que sera. Above is a shot I did manage to get of one of the festival beer tokens that you handed over in exchange for a 4oz taster (unless you wanted to drink Merridale's cider, in which case the cheeky swines demanded two tokens per scrumpy!)

The bits I do remember will be written up in the next few blog posts. Today I wanted to talk about the beer. I find that tasting notes are useless unless you can actually summon the memory of the drinking itself. These are memories that go stale fairly quickly. Best to write 'em while you got 'em.

My list of beers I was looking forward to didn't all turn out to be the ones I loved the most. Let's tackle them first:

1. Vancouver Island - Chipotle Rauchbier
Now this had potential and was appropriate for a beer fest but I wouldn't drink it again unless the recipe was altered a little. Brutally spicy, droolingly citric, and not too strong on the smoke front. It was a real eye-waterer. I spoke with the brewer Chris Graham and I was impressed. I also got the idea that he knew this one was a bit OTT. His upcoming casks will no doubt be great and I can't wait to get hold of some.

2. Driftwood - Old Cellar Dweller
Wonderful. I knew I'd love this. I already had the 2009 in a bottle, but this cask-aged version was sumptuous. Thickly bitter with rich sherry-flavour. The hops really shine in this old beer. Tastes like a good tonic for a winter morning.

3. Central City - Red Racer Imperial IPA
Probably the best imperial IPA I had at the festival, although I prefer their regular IPA. This is one of those really chewy impIPAs with a bit of sweetness and some spice too. The aftertaste went mildy sour for me, but the front end was just great.

4. Howe Sound - Total Eclipse of the Hop
I didn't drink this one. I can't remember if it was only offered on Saturday or if it was one of the breweries whose line-ups were so long I kept thinking I'd get to it later. I was scarcely conscious of the passing time once I'd been there six hours, so a few beers sadly passed me by.

5. Swan's - Brewcifer IPA with Jalapeno, Pepper and Lime
Just bad. Didn't taste much like an IPA to me. Similar to the VIB effort, the spice was well overdone. This might be a subjective thing, but remember I love curries and enthusiastically munch on habaneros, so I'm inclined to think I wasn't alone in being put off by the power of this one. Not much room left for the beer.

6. Moon Under Water - Pale Ale
I really liked it, as I suspected I would. Richer than the low ABV would suggest, and like their bitter it was not scared of the hops. A real quencher with a lingering hazelnuttiness, and not quite as dry as the bitter.

7. Three Skulls - Blood Orange Wit
There was one beer that tasted and smelled like hydrogen peroxide (as our friend Adam astutely pointed out). I am fairly sure it was this one. Just dreadful. You can't think about the flavour with a face full of hair-dye.

Next blog post, I'll deal with the other beers that left an impression on me. I'll leave you with this picture taken while Dave, Adam and I took an early break to sip the Driftwood barley wine. It is my last truly cogent memory of the day, but what a great beer to say goodbye to reality with. Cheers.

Homebrew Tips from the Masters#3: Sanitation

The third installment of homebrewing tips, which I bugged some Canadian brewers to dish out, covers sanitation. Brewing is basically the art of selective neglect. Your wort is a rich environment for any number of cultures to feed upon. But tasty beer can only be made by allowing a fairly narrow spectrum of yeast strains — or a handful of bacteria, in the case of some wild or sour beers — to ferment your wort. If you're not careful, undesirable cultures will infiltrate and utterly corrupt what you are trying to achieve. In a nutshell: your wort is Iran, and if you allow a single mullet to gain entry, the whole place will explode into a decadent cesspool of repulsive culture.

Sanitation refers not only to keeping your brewing equipment a. clean (as in, free of dirt) and b. sterile (free from bacteria or unwanted yeasts), but also to controlling the whole environment in which you brew. You might think you're a clean-freak, but your dwelling place harbours countless organisms that are easily transferred to your homebrew if you don't handle everything carefully. Prior to boiling, your wort may also contain unwelcome bugs, so you're up against it from the start. Here are a few tips from Canadian brewmasters for keeping on top of things.

Protect yourself from unwanted cultures

Sanitation
All of the brewers advocate stringent cleaning procedures. Your kit must be rigorously scrubbed and free of any dirt of particles before you can even start thinking about sanitizing it. This means that you must be vigilant about the condition of your equipment. If any cracks, fissures, nooks, or other recessed areas develop in your carboys, tubes, airlocks, etc etc, they must be replaced immediately. Bacteria is remarkably resistant when it has a place to hide.

Jason Meyer (Driftwood):

Keep it clean, or you’re wasting your time. Iodophore is a pretty good sanitizer, but you need to ensure the equipment is scrupulously clean before you can sanitize it.

Sanitation itself usually involves the use of certain chemicals that eradicate bugs without leaving tough-to-remove residues that can also make your beer taste like crap. All forms of home-fermenting (including wine and cider making) will need a sanitizing agent for best products, but some chemicals are better suited to beer-making than others:

Steve Cavan (Paddock Wood):

sanitize!!!  Do not use metabisulphate. It is fine for wine, but disaster waiting for  beer. Iodophor is a start, but really Star San is the only one that I would consider.  We have stuff mixed in the brewery which we give away to homebrewers.

Choice of containers is important too. Second-hand carboys are cheap, but make sure you know that they were only used for brewing beer, and not wine-making or penny collections, prior to purchase.

Terry Schoffer (Cannery):

If you have a love for wine that’s great, but remember, your beer doesn’t! Beer should never be brewed in the same containers as wine has been made in. Small cracks can harbor Lactobacillus, which will totally destroy all your hard work making that perfect brew. 

Again, if you are unsure how to properly sanitize your kit, call your local brewer. They will tell you what to use, where to get it, and if they are as saintly as this lot claim to be — they might even hand you some for free. Remember, cleanliness is next to hopliness.

Homebrew Tips from the Masters#2: Yeast

In the second in a series of posts containing homebrew advice I solicited from Canadian brewmasters, we look at yeast. Yeast is the fermenting agent that turns sugars into alcohol and sculpts the flavour of the beer.  It is also a living organism that must be stored, fed and used correctly. Brewmasters tend to get obsessive about it.

Yeast
Yeast is available in dry or liquid forms. Most professional brewers will use liquid yeast, and usually cultivate and store the same strains for use over and over again. The yeast that falls to the bottom of the fermenter once its work is done (flocculation) is not "spent", but merely dormant, awaiting a fresh meal of wort sugars that will restart the fermentation process.

To keep yeast viable for future use, brewers can store it under beer or water (which is becoming more common), although its potency will drop off over time unless the brewer is skilled and resourceful. Because it is such a picky creature to keep happy and potent, Jason Meyer of Driftwood Brewery advises "use pure culture liquid yeast only, and pitch lots of it!" Dry strains of yeast may be stored for much longer, but the results are not held in as high regard:

Steve Cavan (Paddock Wood): 

Liquid yeast. Yeast can account for 40% of the flavour compounds. Pick the right yeast for the style. (in the last 15 years, dry yeast has come a long way, although there is still limited variety)

Terry Schoffer (Cannery Brewing):

For increased flavor and body always use liquid yeast. Most micro brewery’s will welcome home brewers and give them yeast and sometimes tips for free. Show your appreciation and bring them a sample of your home brew or buy something from their gift shop.

For those who must or want to use dry yeast, Terry Schoffer flags the importance of rehydrating the yeast properly before use, "make sure you re-hydrate it by heating 1 cup of water to 40C, adding your dry yeast and letting it stand for fifteen minutes before pitching. This will promote healthy yeast growth and keep the nasty bacteria count down. Never use wort to hydrate your yeast."

Dry yeast can produce decent results. However, BA member Homebrew42 warns us about homebrew kits that come with packets of "generic 'ale yeast' that is typically of low quality. You're never going to brew a fantastic English bitter with an old, stale packet of characterless 'ale yeast'."

Overall, the message seems to be if you take the time to understand what yeast is and how it works, and get in touch with local beer makers who are experienced in handling yeast, your beer will turn out better. And you might even score some free yeast in the process.

Homebrew Tips from the Masters#1: Malt

I recently sent out twenty emails to Canadian breweries, asking for some homebrew advice for beginners. I anticipated a few responses, hopefully enough to fill a blog post. The response was unbelievable. I'm very thankful to several brewers who took the time out of their busy schedules to provide extensive, thoughtful advice. I also want to thank "Homebrew42" — a BeerAdvocate member who responded to my forum post about extract-versus-grain boils with a veritable essay's worth of great tips.

I will therefore be publishing their words of wisdom in a series of blog posts dedicated to giving newb-brewers a headstart. Today I'll cover Malt; over the coming weeks I'll address the topics of yeast, sanitation, method, water and the social side of homebrewing.

Malt
Malted barley is one of the core components of beer (along with water, yeast and hops). Malt is partly germinated barley, rich in maltose and other goodies that turn into alcohol and flavour during brewing. Homebrewers face the choice of whether to use full grain or malt extract to create the wort that will become the backbone of the beer. Extract is said to be easier to handle, whereas grain should produce the best results. That's as far as my knowledge goes. What do the pros say?

Whichever way you go, Steve Cavan (Paddock Wood, SK) advises against supplementing malt with other sources of sugars, "All malt. That 1kg of corn sugar and a can of extract doesn't work." Overwhelmingly, the brewers who replied to me frown on adjuncts like corn syrup, and strongly favour full grain boils. As Jason Meyer (Driftwood Brewing, BC) sums it up, "All-grain only, screw that extract stuff".

That's not to say good beers cannot be made with extract. If you're nervous about mashing and boiling grain, or simply don't have the extra equipment you'd need to do this, Homebrew42 has some advice:

1) FULL WORT BOIL.
If you're doing concentrated boils, you're never going to produce flawless beers. If you're brewing 5 gallons of beer, you MUST start with at least 6-6.5 gallons of wort, and this is ESPECIALLY true for very pale colored or very hoppy beers.
2) Use only high quality, extra light, light, or pilsen extracts, and I much prefer dry extracts over liquid, as they tend to be fresher and lighter in color.
Every extract beer that I brew is based on either extra light DME, or pilsen DME. When an all grain brewer builds a recipe, they start with a pale base malt and work from there, even for the darkest beers, and a great extract brewer should do the same. Extra light extract is nothing but basic good quality 2-ro, and a touch of carapils, while pilsen extract is 100% pilsner malt, and either of these are a fantastic slate on which to build any amazing beer.
3) Use only FRESH extract!
Don't buy extract kits that have been sitting on a store shelf for who knows how man millennia. This is especially true with liquid extract, which has a much shorter shelf life than dry and tends to darken and taste stale over time. This alone is a good reason to completely avoid liquid as far as I'm concerned. And try to find a retailer that moves their product and always has fresh inventory. For example a larger online homebrew supply may be better at providing fresh products than your stagnant local shop.

Finally, if all-grain is the way for you, make sure you handle the grains correctly. Terry Schoffer (Cannery Brewing, BC) says:

If you are an all grain brewer beware of HSA (Hot Side Aeration). HSA takes place in the mash tun from over splashing when mashing in as well as from vigorous stirring. HSA will bring out off flavors when maturing in the bottle.

Homebrew42 adds:

Do NOT scorch your extract! This is yet another reason why I prefer DME over LME, as DME floats while LME sinks to the bottom of the kettle. If you decide to use LME however, remove the kettle from the burner and FULLY dissolve your extract before putting it back on the heat.

Thanks to all the brewers for their advice. Next time we'll look into yeast — acquiring, handling and pitching

Review: Driftwood Belle Royale

Now and again a beer comes along that sticks in your mind. I'm not talking about the great or the godawful: these are simple to file away. It's the weird ones that haunt you.

Startling new flavours, remarkable brews from crappy beermakers, or dreadful stuff from great ones: these beers can nag at you like an itch, as your once–coherent universe of expectations expands and distorts.

Driftwood's Belle Royale has had that effect on me, prompting me to write a rare review.

I admit Driftwood's new(-ish) Belgian cherry ale was always going to make an impression on me. I'm a bit of a Driftwood cheerleader and I was there as they prepared it for release. But six bottles of this impossibly-red nectar later and I still find myself going "damn" every time I drink (and smell) one.

The beer is a triple golden ale brewed with spicy belgian yeast and masses of sour cherries. As you'd expect, it has a pronounced (though not at all wild) sour tang that waters the mouth. The body is reminiscent of dry sherry or retsina, peppered with raunchy yeast and not as sweet as you'd think. The cherries are mostly about zing, but they also lend an underlying cloying richness, and pleasingly "off" blue notes that make the Belle a mysterious pleasure.

Normally a review starts with the smell, but I've saved it for last. The excoriating sour cherry whiff is spot-on, but beneath it comes a powerful corporeal aroma: to my nose carrion-esque and woody, like the open oak door of a crypt. It took me five bottles to identify this — and it's not a delightful comparison — but the precise odour it reminds me of is the meat-processing plant that hits you as your car emerges on the Liverpool side of the Mersey tunnel in England.

This sounds fatally bad, but I should say it in no way prevents me from loving the beer. There's something entirely appropriate about it (and if it's any consolation, others find it to be more akin to altogether-more-pleasant smoked-salmon). It's a massive beer and you should try one while you still can.

In fact, the vampiric pleasure it gives me ensures I'll be hoovering the Victoria stores for the last remaining Belles lurking darkly on the shelf, beckoning to me...

Oh, and as if it couldn't get more creepy, Belle Royale is also completely headless.

Beertography

I take a lot of photos of Beer. Part of my motivation for blogging was to write some reviews, so I've been careful to document almost every brew with a pic. However, because Dave and Left4Beer already provide such great coverage of BC beers and others beside, I have settled into a different blog-niche:  mainly whingeing and hassling local beer-industry folk for a few word-bites.

Therefore, if digital photos could gather dust, my photo album would resemble the Gobi Desert. 

Taking photographs of beer is a lot harder than it seems. With a bit of practice, anyone can squeeze bottle and glass into the shot, keep things in focus, and whatnot. But there lies half the problem. If your aim is to document the beer (this site is the finest example of this that I know of), you need only master one shot. Getting the photo to look fresh or interesting after hundreds of mug-shots (heh) is much more challenging.

I'm no master. Here are a few of my luckiest beer photographs of recent months. I hope you enjoy them. They are, in order: Brooklyn IPA, Russell's IP'Eh, Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout, Driftwood Belle Royale, Central City Winter Warmer, Phillips Hop Circle, and Phillips Amnesiac Double IPA.

Reader request:

If you live/drink in Victoria, and you would like to recommend a pub or liquor store that you feel has an as-good-as-or-better-selection of local and international beers than the following, please comment. It is for an upcoming article, and your help would be gratefully appreciated.
Pubs: Christie's Carriage House, Spinnaker's Brewpub, The Beagle
Liquor Stores: Hillside Liquor Store, Spinnakers James Bay store, Cook Street Village Liquor Store.
Thanks again kind readers.

Driftwood Interview Part 2: North American Brewing and Beer for Breakfast

In this second installation of my recent interview with Jason Meyer and Kevin Hearsum at the Driftwood Brewery in Victoria, BC, we discuss the North American brewing scene, CAMRA activities in Victoria, and the wild drinking habits of a brewer.

Our pints finished, Driftwood's Jason gives me a mini-tour of the brewery. There's a grist mill, grist hydrater, mash tun, jacketed kettle, and several other machines with supernatural qualities I do not understand. At the heart of the brewery are two fermenters — one for clean-yeast beer and one for Belgian. Jason and Kevin tell me that the Belgian beers (White Bark and Farmhand) take a lot more work, not least because they tend to yield a lot more sulphur which requires additional time to ferment out.

I ask if other, wilder yeast-based beers could be on the cards? Jason nervously suggests that he could use the regular fermenters, or he could always use the home-brew setup. Jason indicates his home-brew kit — 30 feet off the ground on a pallet. "Most of the Driftwood beers were worked out on that thing. If we were to do anything experimental we'd fire up the home-brew again".

- Speaking of experimental...the North American brew-scene is often renowned for its innovation, is this justified?
JM: Well...in my opinion, the North American craft-brew scene was started by the New Albion Brewery in North California in the 1980s. They were inspired by a trip to England, and they brought all their equipment over from England and brewed English beer. But some time in the 1990s they found their own voice — and I include us in that, as we're all part of the same culture. We started using more citrusy north-western hops, mixing ingredients, brewing unique stuff. It's not that it's "better", but we do stuff in North America that a German brewery would just never do.

- Aside from being daring, what else sets NA brewers apart from Europeans?
JM: "Daring" is a nice way to put it. Let me see...there's a celebratory culture about the NA scene. You could generalize Europe in terms of well-established approaches, it's steeped in brewing history. They are fiercely proud of it, the Belgians, English and Germans. But it's like an old comfortable pair of jeans. It's good, but it just "is". They don't have the equivalent of the Great American Beer Festival over there, where everyone's like "woo-hoo check US". That self-celebration is unique.

- It seems to me that folklore and mystique play a great part in the NA beer-scene. Certain beers develop an almost cult-like status, and people expend a lot of effort and money to acquire them.
JM: You always want what you can't have. A lot of these beers that seem unobtainable are not. Word of mouth, the zeitgeist, shrewd marketing, quality of the beer — where the smokiness of those ideas come together produces the cult status. There is that element, but truth is if you do not have a modicum of good distribution you're done. Unless you're super small.
KH: Recently a few artisan foody places came specifically looking for our product, and we are proud of it. But we're also aware that some places want to be able to say "we've got the Driftwood!"

The Driftwood guys' comments make me reflect on the English beer scene. As a Brit, I am aware of the ongoing fight to rescue the image of craft beer from the arena of the "old fart". In contrast — from my experience working at the liquor store — BC craft beer drinkers seem to enjoy the aura of the young and informed: beers like Driftwood and Phillips are very much hipster-hooch. So as craft beer continues its recession-defying growth in popularity in North America, I wonder what challenges beer industry advocates in Canada and the US are facing:

- The BC craft beer industry is thriving, so what does the Victoria chapter of CAMRA actually do?
JM: Well...we're paid-up members of CAMRA Victoria and BC. They've disassociated themselves from the stodgy, "old dude" issues brewers face in Britain. They're more a set of general beer advocates, looking out for the industry. But they're still concerned with measures and prices. When we're putting together a CAMRA meeting, the biggest questions are always "Where do we meet? How much does a pint cost there? Is it a real pint?" For the record (Jason indicates his empty Driftwood-branded pint glass) we do twenty ounces!

- Drinking must be part of your job, how much do you drink?
JM: We make a point of having a pint or two after a shift. Sometimes we have a bit of "sensory" first thing in the morning, believe it or not...

- Does it ruin social drinking for you?
JM: Oh, not at all. Social drinking is very much detached from the kind of appraisal drinking we do here.

- So you still go out and drink a lot of other people's beers?
JM: Oh fuck yeah. And that's why we do so many seasonals. We assume our customers are drinkers like us and they want new stuff. I sure as shit don't drink the same thing every day. Kevin went down to Portland recently and came back with a couple of boxes of great new stuff, I'd have been mad if he hadn't!

The final part of this interview will be published soon

Driftwood Interview Part 1: Philosophy, Craft Beer, and Chicken Cordon Bleu

Victoria's own Driftwood Beer kindly granted me an interview at their brewery on Monday night. Driftwood is a relatively new brewery in Victoria, but it already has an enviable reputation as a serious craft brewery who deliver traditional styles to high standards, and seasonal brews that sell-out immediately.

It was either my excitement, or the bottle of Brookyln Brewery Local One I had beforehand, but I kept brewers Jason Meyer (CEO of Driftwood) and Kevin Hearsum (president) talking for over an hour. Loathe to leave much on the editor's floor, I will publish the interview in three parts. Today I'll cover the Driftwood way™ as well as Jason's and Kevin's ideas about the beer industry on Vancouver island and beyond.

The exterior of Driftwood is about as anonymous as it gets, tucked into the corner of an industrial complex with only a small sign distinguishing it from a cluster of warehouses. Jason welcomes me in to the 3,500 square-foot space that has housed Driftwood since it was launched in 2008. Kevin is busy hosing something down between two enormous tanks. I feel aware I know next-to-nothing about the brewing process, and am bewildered by the array of tanks, machines, and sheer noise I am witnessing. "Can I get you a beer?" asks Jason. Ah. Familiar ground. I receive a lively pint of Farmhand Ale from a tap mounted in the side of their on-site chiller, and the interview begins.

I ask about the Driftwood philosophy. Jason pours himself a pint and tells me that he and Kevin recognized an opportunity to establish the only producer of traditional Belgian-style beers in BC. In addition to the Southern-Belgian Farmhouse Ale I am happily drinking as we talk, Driftwood's permanent four-strong line-up comprises a Belgian wheat beer (White Bark), an Alt-style amber ale (Crooked Coast), and a "quintessential" Northwest ale with dry malts and bold hops (Driftwood Ale).

Respect for tradition hasn't prevented Driftwood producing some interesting seasonal beers (the Sartori Harvest Wet-hopped IPA being a standout). But Jason is quick to distinguish innovation from gimmickry, something that clearly irks him about current production trends.

JM: This bullshit of honey beers. You gotta use so much honey to make it taste like beer. It's uber-fermentable, it's fructose, it's gonna ferment out. It's just marketing, to me it's kind of crass. It's not sincere or authentic. Our whole MO is authenticity. We don't filter our beers. Yet we don't run around saying "we don't filter our beers," we just don't filter it.

– So you're opposed to trends?
JM: I'm in favour of a trend toward double IPAs and imperial pilsners!

– Driftwood's beers contain special ingredients, don't they?
JM: We brew to traditional Belgian recipes, which include Curacao orange peel and pepper. That's not to say that if an intriguing ingredient presented itself to us we wouldn't be prepared to use it. But there's a line between finding an interesting new botanical or a spice, and choosing an ingredient so you can overtly fly a flag about the fact this shit is in your beer.

Driftwood was established on the principles of providing fresh, quality beer for local people. Jason's enthusiasm is palpable as he recounts how he began brewing at age 19, was influenced by a creative brewing scene in Edmonton ("they were doing stuff like triple decoction mashes, stuff that no commercial brewery can do, it was just incredible"), and gained experience working in several breweries, including Victoria's Lighthouse Brewing where he and Kevin hatched the plan for Driftwood.

It was their experiences working in commercial brewing operations that inspired Jason and Kevin to build a brewery with the needs of workers very much in mind.

JM: We wanted to produce a space, a nice place to be, we wanted the people who work here to be proud of what they do, to promote this because they believe they are doing something meaningful. [At Lighthouse] Kevin spent three years hunched over a plate and frame filter inside a giant walk-in cooler, filtering beer, in the dark.
KH: It sucked.
JM: So when we built this place we designed it with lined walls, to create a decent, open, warm space for everyone. We don't have people working at weekends. We don't want people working graveyard shifts. That puts a limit on how big you can get. But it's a moral and good and fun place to be in.

"Getting big" is not the aim, but commercial success is clearly important when an operation on Driftwood's scale will cost upward of half a million Canadian dollars to get going. I ask whether well-publicized hikes in the cost of hops and other brewing-related crops are a challenge to the sustainability of craft beer outfits, but Jason and Kevin dismiss raw material prices as a lesser issue. Craft brewers might not generally get rich, but a good living is still there to be made with hard work, passion, and most importantly a receptive market.

– So what is the Vancouver Island beer market like?
KH: It's a more sophisticated drinking culture here these days. There are so many taps in this city and pubs are putting new ones in all the time. They're more than happy to put out every new product we make.
JM: In Victoria 20 years ago chicken cordon-bleu was the most exotic food item you could get! But it's all changed now. The internet age has made us more sophisticated, more suspicious of manufactured messages, of commercialism. Now there's a really active support for local producers and we're lucky we fit right into that.

Part two of this interview will be published soon