For those who might be heading down to the Royal Winter Fair this year (running until Nov 14), be sure to head to Heritage Court (the space between the Direct Energy Centre and Ricoh Coliseum) to check out the Royal Brew House. It's a tasting bar being run by the guys from the Griffin up in Bracebridge, and it features exclusively Ontario craft beers, along with a selection of Ontario VQA wines.

I didn't count all of the beers available, but there were a lot of 'em. I saw Mill Street, Amsterdam, Grand River (including the new Kolsch), Cameron's, Muskoka, Lake of Bays, Wellington, Beau's (including growlers of Night Marzen), Peeler Cider, and perhaps a few others.

I couldn't stay long, but I had samples of the Lake of Bays Mocha Porter - which was much better out of the bottle than the cask sample I tried at Volo last weekend - and the brand new Muskoka Double Chocolate Cranberry Stout. The LoB will be hitting the LCBO in the next couple of weeks (including some GTA locations), and the Muskoka soon after, both of them in 750 ml bottles.

Great to see the Royal supporting local beer more and more. This year, the only non-craft beer available anywhere on site is Carlsberg, which is being served in all of the licensed areas (except for the Brew House) along with Cameron's. According to Jed from the Griffin, he's hoping that they can get the OCB on board as an official sponsor next year, and perhaps convince the Royal to go 100% craft.