The Bar Towel

This beer from the East coast is available at the Rebel Chop house on draught. Kelly our other Sales Manager keeps going on and on about it. Enjoy your fill!

It's also currently on tap at the Duke of Argyle, which is where I ended up last weekend with a couple of friends when we found Smokeless packed to the gills. It's a very good bitter, and it would be nice to see the LCBO pick it up for their general list.

If you've had this in the past, you may want to try it again. Several people in the local homebrew and beer club here in Halifax say it has been improving over the last few batches.

I have enjoyed what I have tasted of this beer so far.

Incidentally, which other beers would you recommend that are available in Halifax?

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: borderline_alcoholic on 2003-12-20 00:39 ]</font>

borderline - does that mean you're going to Halifax? Bobby and I are supposed to be getting together in Halifax next Saturday (27th) for a few pints. If you're going to be in town, let me know.

I am not going to Halifax at the moment - Toronto is cold enough for me. But I do have a lot of relatives dotted around the maritimes, so I do pop out there once in a while (when it is warm enough for me to survive).

In the past, my selection of beer there has been pretty limited. In Halifax, I know of the Granite beers, Propeller ales and Leffe blonde (the usual Interbrew selection being the only Belgian beers I found).

In NB, again I found Leffe and Propeller. I also found bottled Theakston's Old Peculiar.

And PEI was completely hopeless.

I have not been to Newfoundland as yet.

Having said that, it is entirely possible that I have just been going to the wrong places. And I always greet the finding of any good beer in Atlantic Canada as being something of a minor miracle. I would be interested to hear if there is a wider selection of decent beer available there and where I should be going to find it...

Halifax has one other microbrewery besides Propeller - <a href="http://www.garrisonbrewing.com/">Garrison Brewing</a>. And there are a couple of other brewpubs besides the Granite - <a href="http://www.splitcrow.com/shippeys/">John Shippey's</a> and <a href="http://ratebeer.com/Ratings/Beer/ShowBr ... 21">Rogues Roost</a>.

Elsewhere in Nova Scotia, you can find <a href="http://ratebeer.com/Ratings/Beer/ShowBr ... 8">Paddy's Pub</a> (Wolfville) and <a href="http://www.yarmouthweb.com/rudders/">Rudders</a> (Yarmouth).

PEI has one brewpub in Charlottetown - <a href="http://www.peimenu.com/brewing/">The Gahan House</a>.

I haven't tried beer from any of these places, but you can always check <a href="http://ratebeer.com">RateBeer</a> for opinions.

Oh yes, I have been to the Gahan House. Their beers are rubbish, unfortunately.

Thanks for the information, I will be sure to check these out next time I am in Nova Scotia.

Greg hit on all the good places here in NS. As far as the beers to try goes, Shippey's Left Coast Stout and Left Coast IPA are very good, as are Rogue's Roost's Pale Ale, Propeller Porter and Pale Ale (as well as the ESB), Garrison Brown Ale, and Paddy's Raven Ale. There's also a new Brewery/Brewpub in Truro called the Keltic Brewing Company / Muggsy McCeols. I haven't tried them yet, but Josh was there a few days ago. Overall he thought they were technically very good but light. There's also a Muggsy's in Halifax where they'll be serving the Keltic brews.

You'll also find two brewpubs in New Brunswick - The Pump House in Moncton and Tapps in Saint John - as well as Picaroons brewery in Fredericton.

Check my back articles for write-ups on pretty much all these places. I'll be doing the Rudders/Paddy's writeup next Thursday as I have a year-end piece for this week.

I never did make it to Tapps (well, once right after they opened and they'd sold out of their own beer) but Pump House has a good range, especially a nice Hefeweizen. I liked Gahan's Stout, even if it is more of a mild.

On 2003-12-28 16:05, Josh Oakes wrote:
I liked Gahan's Stout, even if it is more of a mild.

I went through their full range while there and found them all pretty uniformly dreadful. All absurdly thin. I do not maintain notes, so it is hard for me to go into more detail than that...

When I am out that way next, I will try the stout again on the off chance that it has improved. It is not like it will be taking me away from anything better. PEI has always seemed more devoid of decent beer than anywhere else I have been within Canada.