The Bar Towel

So inspired by a beer blog post asking for beer critiques:

https://www.totalales.co.uk/blog/2025/3 ... -criticism

And our friend Gary's (@G.M. Gillman) insightful post about that nobody makes British IPAs even though brewers obsess over other classic styles:

https://www.beeretseq.com/the-session-145-march-2025/

What are some critiques (or pet peeves? we don't need to follow the same rules) of beer & brewing? I don't see a point in complaining about prices and things that aren't always easy to control, like the LCBO or red tape about the system. Let's focus on things in beer that could be addressed.

Here's some of mine:

1. Calling a beer something it isn't. Don't say it's a West Coast IPA when it is clearly something else.

2. Fill the glass that you're selling me. I moan about this constantly.

3. Don't tell me you close "late". Late means I can show up at 11:30pm expecting a beer. Usually people that say "late" as a closing time don't stay open late at all.

I think about these when I am out and about exploring beer scenes. What are yours?

Restaurants that celebrate their artisan menu and local ingredients. They might even have a good wine list, but the beers on offer are just banal macro choices. What a disrespect for beer. Shame on the culinary colleges that perpetuate this.

As for "open late", I would add kitchens that close early. Especially when the excuse is "we don't get any customers after x". Translation: "We don't invite customers after x". Rent is one one of the biggest input costs in running a hospitality business, so why not maximize the investment? Just dumb. Really dumb in areas with tourists and travellers. I can't count the number of times I have arrived somewhere hungry after a long trip and there is nothing decent to eat. Even hotel restaurants closing at 8 or 9PM. Arghh.

Lactose in beer. Especially when undeclared. I gotta rail on that every chance I get.

The thing that gets me is when a beer is simply labelled "IPA" or "lager" without telling you what kind it is. It especially bothers me with IPAs now, since so many of them are hazy.

Any brewery that doesn't have a Tap List available somewhere (on their website, on Untappd, etc)

Most recent local (to me) example for this is Left Field Brewery.

They used to show a full list of beers on their homepage, and what was available online, at Liberty Village, and at Wagstaff.

Numerous times I checked that, saw a beer was available, and decided to visit them.

Now...who the hell knows.

Oh, I'm also annoyed by how kettle sours pretty much completely took over the sours market and pushed out all the much better (IMO) traditional sour styles.

I have way too many of these....

But the one that makes me crazy is brewery staff who don't know anything about their beer. I've lost count of the times I've asked something like "which hops are in that IPA?" and get completely blank stares.

Tapsucker wrote: ↑Tue Apr 01, 2025 1:48 pm Rent is one one of the biggest input costs in running a hospitality business, so why not maximize the investment? Just dumb. Really dumb in areas with tourists and travellers. I can't count the number of times I have arrived somewhere hungry after a long trip and there is nothing decent to eat. Even hotel restaurants closing at 8 or 9PM. Arghh.

I always respected C'est What for this (at least pre-pandemic). They were open all the time, even on Christmas. IIRC George told me this very thing, that you stay open as much as possible to keep revenue coming in the door. And as a patron, knowing it was reliably open made me go there over other places.

I get all the reasons why brewery taprooms don't want to be like bars (less late-night trouble, etc.) but I wonder if acting more bar-like may help some through these challenging times.

Cass wrote: ↑Tue Apr 01, 2025 7:54 pm
I always respected C'est What for this (at least pre-pandemic). They were open all the time, even on Christmas. IIRC George told me this very thing, that you stay open as much as possible to keep revenue coming in the door. And as a patron, knowing it was reliably open made me go there over other places.

I get all the reasons why brewery taprooms don't want to be like bars (less late-night trouble, etc.) but I wonder if acting more bar-like may help some through these challenging times.

Taprooms are a different kind of business, so their choices on this don't bother me.

I will say that we might have appreciated on our last visit to C'est What if someone had tapped us on the shoulder and pointed out how late we were still there.
Such patient staff...

Cass wrote: ↑Tue Apr 01, 2025 7:54 pm

Tapsucker wrote: ↑Tue Apr 01, 2025 1:48 pm Rent is one one of the biggest input costs in running a hospitality business, so why not maximize the investment? Just dumb. Really dumb in areas with tourists and travellers. I can't count the number of times I have arrived somewhere hungry after a long trip and there is nothing decent to eat. Even hotel restaurants closing at 8 or 9PM. Arghh.

I always respected C'est What for this (at least pre-pandemic). They were open all the time, even on Christmas. IIRC George told me this very thing, that you stay open as much as possible to keep revenue coming in the door. And as a patron, knowing it was reliably open made me go there over other places.

I get all the reasons why brewery taprooms don't want to be like bars (less late-night trouble, etc.) but I wonder if acting more bar-like may help some through these challenging times.

Great post!

Craig wrote: ↑Tue Apr 01, 2025 3:39 pm Oh, I'm also annoyed by how kettle sours pretty much completely took over the sours market and pushed out all the much better (IMO) traditional sour styles.

I was just reading today that wit beers like Hoegarden (sp) of the mid 20th century were brewed completely differently and tasted much differently from today. More traditional sour-ish wits would be great.

Hi Cass and all who remember me from previous days here. Originally I was "old faithful", then just plain Gary Gillman. I have posted for 10 years at my own site, www.beeretseq.com, and judged beer as well. I have been twice nominated for awards by the British Guild of Beer Writers, and my work extends to other brewing traditions not just Canada, especially U.K.

I go back to earliest days of Ontario craft and even before that for the interest in beer, but still like it a lot. While I haven't posted at Bartowel for a while I keep up with Cass's various activities on behalf of good beer including his short video series on various cities which is great.

He already linked my post proposing that brewers should pick up on British I.P.A. as the new hazy, the new West Coast. Modern bitter and bottled pale ales using English or noble hops (not the newer American hops) derived from Bass Pale Ale and similar beers that were sent to India and were stronger, around 6.5-7% abv like modern IPA is. So that's the kind of beer I think craft should now get behind, close to that original type.

One can use New World hops too but I would propose the bittering kind, I mentioned some in the post Cass linked, not the citric or tropical kinds. We have some English-style pale ales in Ontario, but many are around 5% abv, take Dark Streets of London, or in Quebec Unibroue's Pale Ale Anglaise, but I'm talking about a bigger brother to those, maybe with Brett, maybe dry-hopped, maybe just pale malt-based, there are many riffs you could do. Often too the craft English pale ales aren't hopped strongly enough, as they were originally, because they are emulations of modern pub bitters.

The Brewers Association has a British IPA category that could be a good start for brewers getting interested in this area. Lots of historical work has now been done, some by myself, on 19th century I.P.A. for more ideas.

https://cdn.brewersassociation.org/wp-c ... pdated.pdf

So that's my critique idea, recognizing modern craft IPA has been a great shot in the arm for craft brewers, but let's look beyond it - the criticism part - to the bigger picture. Let's honour where I.P.A. really came from and take it to a new level.

One persistent peeve is the ubiquity of Guinness at bars, often as the only dark beer. It's a respectable beer, and I like that they ensure it's always served correctly. But it's boring and often way overpriced. I find myself drawn to any bar with a non-Guinness dark beer. St-Ambroise Oatmeal Stout has seemingly disappeared from Toronto bars (still at LCBO).

I also long for bitter Belgian ales a la De Ranke XXX or De Dolle Arabier, rare creatures in Ontario. I did get a case of the latter from Gleemer a couple of years ago. And more Brett-focused ales like Burdock used to produce in its early days.

On IPA's, I'd love to see the haze craze end. It's been tricky to find exciting (non-core) west-coast IPAs. The trend seems to be shifting back westward, slowly. I'd love to see an English IPA renaissance. Outside of Granite, I don't think anyone does it much. I almost fell off my chair at Northern Maverick when they had one called "Calcutta Gazette" on tap last year.

Sorry I missed the Calcutta Gazette, great name too. Granite's IPA is a veteran in Ontario, all pale malt I believe, but 5% or so. I would place it more as a modern English pale bitter. That Timothy Taylor Landlord at LCBO currently is along same lines, imo.

Just to add, the line between India Pale Ale and just pale ale can be subjective and arbitrary, bearing in mind too when that beer was first released.

Biggest pet peeve currently is old beer being sold at the brewery. If it's still on the shelf at the lcbo, that's one thing, but when I go to the source don't sell me 6+ month old beer.

British IPA is one of my favourite styles, so having it make a comeback would be nice. Fuller's had a double IPA, which was British, and I liked it quite a bit. It was at the LCBO a few years back. I would like to see more of that type of beer, if I were drinking again. I've had to stop, unfortunately.