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Now a regular item at the LCBO, I asked at Cooper St.
I find I can drink at least two of these (8%) so easily but then I'm ready for a nap. Best enjoyed AFTER you need to drive somewhere.
Speaking of La Terrible, the 10% ABV was gratingly present for me (compared to the Sinha's silky 8%) and I found the fruity Belgian stylings in LT's flavor lacked some integration. I will give it another chance. It's always wise to try again.
Last edited by Belgian on Wed Aug 10, 2005 4:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Again, I respect all opinions. Mine, having tasted Terrible numerous times and various Imperial stouts for some 25 years, is that Terrible resembles strongly a stout in style and in particular, an Imperial or double stout. I would note that Terrible lacks the "Belgian" taste of most of the other Unibroue beers. It is made with black or highly roasted malts; it is spiced with licorice (as many 19th century strong porters were); it is top-fermented. To me that spells something very much like a traditional strong stout. But hey, no one has to agree with me and I don't (honestly) take contrary views the wrong way.
old faithful wrote:Again, I respect all opinions. Mine, having tasted Terrible numerous times and various Imperial stouts for some 25 years, is that Terrible resembles strongly a stout in style and in particular, an Imperial or double stout. I would note that Terrible lacks the "Belgian" taste of most of the other Unibroue beers. It is made with black or highly roasted malts; it is spiced with licorice (as many 19th century strong porters were); it is top-fermented. To me that spells something very much like a traditional strong stout. But hey, no one has to agree with me and I don't (honestly) take contrary views the wrong way.
Gary
I think I understand.
And while Terrible isn't the first thing that comes to my mind when I think of a stout, I definitely see how you can make those comparisons.
Take Terrible and subtract some of the yeasty esters, spicyness, and give it a little less carbonation.......you could have a stout on your hands.
Just my $.02
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Carbonation is easy to adjust since if you pour hard, let the head rise high and wait, the beer will be half as carbonated as before. I view that like temperature, something I can adjust. You can even adjust carbonation upwards by adding sparkling water or another beer: this is what the old light and bitter was in England, where light ale or lager (bottled beers) were added to draught bitter to zip it up.
Esters are a hallmark of top-fermented beers, so you don't need to take them out to enhance the stout analogy, au contraire.
There is a spicy note to La Terrible although I find it less so than in the other Unibroue beers. Part of that comes from the licorice - an old porter hallmark as I said. Part may come from multi-strain yeasts. I think 19th century porters may have tasted like many Abbey or Trappist doubles of today because all yeast strains at the time were probably multi-strain and semi-wild.
Anyway a lot of this is looking at it after the fact for me, when I first had La Terrible it reminded me of a strong stout, that's all.
I think the reason they can't (or don't want to) call it Lion stout is due to the Huether Hotel in Waterloo having an attached brewery called "The Lion Brewery", maybe they have/had a stout?
clasher wrote:I think the reason they can't (or don't want to) call it Lion stout is due to the Huether Hotel in Waterloo having an attached brewery called "The Lion Brewery", maybe they have/had a stout?
There's a Lion Stout from Jamaica currently sold at LCBO, that's why.
I must try La Terrible again - not EXPECTing so much of a Belgian character this time, expectations confound experiences and your comments are interesting OF.
There certainly can be crossovers and hybrid characteristics among beers, and this is what North American innovation is all about. Unibroue could definitely get away with a few rascally inventions the way Dogfish Head and Rogue do.
I remember the Heuther Hotel... A little crowded when I last went but it was pretty decent... Anyway, I took a look for Sinha (Lion) Stout at the Wellington Road, Covent Market and Ridout locations in London and didn't have any luck... I received some strange looks when I mentioned that I liked stout beers....
I'll keep looking though, but in general is the selection at the Beer Store (I still like the Brewer's Retail name better) for imported beers any better? I haven't been to a beer store in a while since the LCBO carries Fuller's, Guiness, and some of the others I like....
Does anyone know more about the details of the Niagara Falls buy-out? I have not been following the industry for a while and it sounds interesting especially in light of some of the other buy-outs....
Thanks,
Andrew Paul
Belgian wrote:
There's a Lion Stout from Jamaica currently sold at LCBO, that's why.
Thinking of Dragon Stout?
GONG!!! Oh crap, and I was so sure I had a pithy, smug little answer.
There is only one "Lion Stout" on RateBeer I now see.
SINHA means "Lion" in Sinhala, the language spoken by the majority of people in Sri Lanka (I'm not kidding.) Tamil is also spoken. So Sinha would be an easy name to remember there I guess.
I'm thinking Sinha is just the real name of the beer in Ceylon (in the way Plzensky Prazdroj or Budvar are labelled as such in Czechia.) And they must figure Canadians are sophisticated enough not to get to perplexed by foreign names. How flattering.
Ceylon would be a fantastic place to visit and explore I think.
BeverageAcademy wrote:Anyway, I took a look for Sinha (Lion) Stout at the Wellington Road, Covent Market and Ridout locations in London and didn't have any luck... I received some strange looks when I mentioned that I liked stout beers....
There is an inventory search on the LCBO website that will show you which stores stock each product. It's not 100% reliable, but it's still pretty useful. A quick search shows that the only store in London stocking the Sinha is "WONDERLAND & SOUTHDALE (POWER CENTRE)", where there were 55 bottles in stock as of yesterday.
BeverageAcademy wrote:I'll keep looking though, but in general is the selection at the Beer Store (I still like the Brewer's Retail name better) for imported beers any better?
No. The Beer Store carries less than 100 imported items, and many of those are keg only or are also available at the LCBO.
This doesn’t make any sense to me. The Lion Brewery is just a brewpub in Waterloo that doesn’t brew any stouts that I know of. Why would the LCBO care about a brewpub anyway? Now I know Gold Crown (both owned by the same Adlys family) next door is a brewery and has a beer called Gold Crown Lion Lager, but I just did a search on the LCBO website and it’s currently not available at any locations. So why change the name of a stout that is well known around the world to accommodate a small brewery that barely promotes it’s beers and has very little distribution (if any) outside of its own brewery? They also have a beer that’s called Gold Crown Kings Pilsner, why was that not affected when King Brewery launched its Pilsner? I'm not sure who I'm asking all these questions to, but LCBO if your listning!!!! I guess I will never understand the LCBO....
Beer Geek wrote:This doesn’t make any sense to me. The Lion Brewery is just a brewpub in Waterloo that doesn’t brew any stouts that I know of. Why would the LCBO care about a brewpub anyway?
If the Lion Brewery has a trademark on the use of "Lion" as a beer brand in Ontario, they are within their rights to enforce that trademark. I really doubt the LCBO had anything to do with the decision.
