The Bar Towel

Wells IPA in the can. Glowing copper colour, fresh smell of all-English hops (flowery, lightly herbal). Dryish but perhaps not as much as earlier samples I recall. The hops inform the flavour but do not linger on the palate. Classic English pale ale. Gary N.B. High quality canning, too. No hint of a...

Headstrong Pale Ale and Wellington County Imperial Stout 50/50, a black and tan and superb it is. The slightly burnt notes of the stout come through and the American hops of the Pale Ale blend very well with the English taste of the stout. American hops were used as part of the hop bill for porter a...

Yes, and Pinot Noir - very French in style.

Gary

Well, a Black Velvet, which originated in Victorian Britain, is stout and Champagne. The Tenfidy is almost 10% ABV, whereas 1800's brown stout was about 7% ABV. So the water brought it down to that level, approximately. The Ontario sparkling stands in very well for Champagne. It is really very good....

In a wine glass, a mixture: i) 13th Street Winery's (Jordan Station, Niagara), French-styled Cuvee 13 2005 (a sparkling wine). Lots of toasty and yeasty notes with a dry, citric twist in the finish, and ii) equal amount of Tenfidy Imperial Stout from Oscar Blues Brewery in Colorado. The stout is ric...

Carlsberg from the can, cool side of room temperature.

This is quite nice with a good malt sweetness and a drying, mineral, white wine-like quality.

The actual taste is good, I think with more hops it would be even better.

Gary

That is interesting. I believe the "unbunged" style of unfiltered German lager has a very firm bitterness. I recall Michael Jackson stating this in his works on beer. I think Creemore's kellerbier, nice as it is, would be even more impressive with a marked bitterness and would encourage th...

This beer is very good indeed. Its nose and flavour have the Creemore hallmark - to my mind a sulphur-like note - but the yeast presence enriches and makes the brew much more complex than the regular lager or pilsener. There is a roundness and completeness as it were that the regular issue doesn't h...

Incidentally, I just passed by Queen's Quay at lunch to pick up some Creemore Kellerbier. (There are a few 8 pack cases on the floor just behind the cash registers). In the back, I noticed June 16 2009-bottled Barley Days, the Harvest Pale. I tasted one of the same date from the LCBO in Wellington (...

Jon, thanks. I did not know about the German brewmaster. I was told at the brewery (over the last weekend) that the beers are top-fermented, so I felt confident in calling them ales. I know Volo sometimes gets the beers on draught and those interested might try them when next there as they are super...

Recently in Picton, I tried the dark ale (Wind and Sail) and the pale golden ale (Harvest Pale), i.e., not the 3.5% ABV light or the wheat one (if I recall the range right). These are very flavourful beers, full of malt and forward hop flavours. I may be wrong but the hops in both - flinty and metal...

My favourites were the Compass Albion Ale, the Wit from Durham, and Hop Addict and the other Durham hop-oriented beer. And Granite's beers as well. The Black Velvet (combo of Neustadt's stout and a cider) was also superb. Excellent event, well done Maz and Neil. Gary N.B. Nice to meet up again with ...

At beerbistro recently, Mikeller's Brown Ale (there is a Jim or James in there somewhere). Rich brown malt flavours with good insistent hopping of the non-aromatic type, as befits the original brown English beers. The top-note was clearly of brettanomyces. This must be an aged porter-like beer, prob...

Muskoka Cream and Dark Ales. Superb ale, rather improved in my opinion from the original offerings. The can seems to present the beers better than bottles, too. Not a hint of oxidation and the beers offer quality, well-balanced tastes. (The yeast background is excellent too). I will definitely get m...

An excellent addition to Toronto's beer and restaurant scene. The beers are well made, very similar to the French originals (which I tasted in company of Michael Jackson in Lille around 1990). I liked the white ale and brown beer the best. The blonde is good, perhaps a little less malty than I would...