Iron Duke - Wellington Brewery (Canada - Ontario - Guelph)

Iron Duke - Wellington Brewery (Canada - Ontario - Guelph) 6.5%

A deep yet red hued brown colour in a glass with a tan head of foam and a sweet, sticky malty aroma.

This malty beauty has a sweet, toasty, chewy dark fruit, molasses and lightly caramel flavour with some light smoky wood tones. There are some hops detectable, especially with the first few sips (hop aromatics and flavours come from more volatile compounds than sugars so they tend to be most noticeable at first especially in the head on the beer), but this is a malt forward beer for sure. This strong ale reminds me a little of a Wee Heavy and is just plain good.

Holy Smoke - Church-Key Brewing (Canada - Ontario - Campbellford)

Holy Smoke - Church-Key Brewing (Canada - Ontario - Campbellford) 6.2%

Dark brown in a glass, like a chestnut. Very smoky, peaty and slightly salty aroma. Based solely on the aroma I am sure this beer would appeal to Scotch drinkers that like a smoky, peaty Scotch. There are also some dark malt tones, like dark dried fruits such as fig or prunes, in the aroma.

The flavour is quite sweet and dark malt flavours now take the lead ahead of the smoke and peat flavour though the latter does continue to feature. A watery mouthfeel and some alcohol does come through but it would be highly suitable for a drink in a pub.

Regular readers of the blog will know that I tend to prefer my beers on the warm side. Particularly very malty and high alcohol beers. This beer also benefits from being served a bit warmer as the smoke and the malt flavours come out. Overall, Holy Smoke is very drinkable, the smoke and peat flavours are well done and tasty but its malty body is a wee bit thin, still a fine beer when it is all said and done.

Innis and Gunn Canada Day 2012 (Scotland) 7.7%

Innis and Gunn Canada Day 2012 (Scotland) 7.7%

Oaky and very sweet aroma but with some dry European hops hanging around too. A dark amber in a glass with a off-white head. The taste is strong in oak barrel tones (as are all of Innis and Gunn oak aged beers) but less sweet and more bitter than many of their other brews and there is a fairly prominent dry hops character to the taste as well. The malt is flavour is caramelized and sweet.

The suggested serving temperature is 4-6 degrees Celcius (39 to 43 degrees Fahrenheit) which seems more than a touch too cold in my judgement. At that temperature the alcohol taste is a bit strong. As Innis and Gunn Canada Day 2012 warms, the malt tones develop some more sugary caramel characteristics and the dry hops continue to figure prominently but the alcohol doesn't come out in the taste as much anymore. At any temperature you'll feel some alcohol warming and a tingling sensation on your tongue from the walloping 7.7% alcohol by volume.

Innis and Gunn Canada Day 2012 is an interesting beer and distinct from the rest Innis and Gunn's other offerings, although it certainly hails from the same region on the taste spectrum: the detectable use of hops is unique, as far as I have experienced, but the barrel notes and the high level of sweetness is typical of Innis and Gunn ales. It drinks a lot like a Scottish Wee Heavy actually although it is probably too light on the malt characteristics to fit that mould perfectly. Nice to see (taste?) that this special beer is indeed special and not just any other Innis and Gunn is a pretty box.

Fredericton Craft Beer Festival 2013

Fredericton Craft Beer Festival 2013

The inaugural Fredericton Craft Beer Festival took place this past weekend (March 9th, 2013) at the Delta Fredericton. The event was well attended and thoroughly enjoyable with an impressive selection of great beers. Where some beer festivals have a number of international lagers that we've all had before, Fredericton Craft Beer Festival was a tribute to craft beers and had none of these "filler beers".

I was very pleased to be able to try beers by Bushwakker, based in Regina, Saskatchewan and by Shiretown out of Dalhousie New Brunswick. I'm not normally able to get my hands on these brews so that was interesting.

Also Picaroons had a cask version of their Yippee IPA that was just amazing. The most surprising beer of the festival had to be Moosehead Cask, it was flavourful and really interesting - not what I expected from Moosehead to be honest.

As fun as the festival was I feel like I could have had a better time if the event had done a better job of getting information to us. When I arrived I was handed a roll of tickets without explanation. None of the volunteers inside the venue that I asked knew what the tickets were for. I eventually went back out to the gate, asked the staff there and found out that the tickets were for the "Garrison Beer Education Room" but with no indication as to what the "Garrison Beer Education Room" was.

I eventually made my way to the Beer Education Room and, to my utter astonishment, found what seemed like more than a dozen more ales, barley wines and bock beers to sample by Unibroue, Brooklyn brewery and plenty of other breweries that had not been advertised in the lead up to the event and were not even included in the beer checklist pamphlet I received when I arrived!

Jackpot.

... Except, the Garrison [District Ale House] Beer Education Room closed an hour before the end of the main event and precisely ten minutes after I discovered it, bummer. However, I still got to try Brooklyn Brewing's Monster Barley Wine and their Local 2, so I'm grateful for that.

Edit: The organizers of the Fredericton Craft Beer Festival contacted me after this post went up to explain why the Garrison Beer Education Room worked the way it did. According to them the Beer Education Room had to be treated as a separate event due for licensing reasons as a result they weren't able to promote in the same way as the main event. This explains a lot and I am grateful to the organizers for reaching out to me to explain this.

All in all, I am very glad I went. The venue was very nice, it was a great opportunity to meet some brewers and fellow beer geeks and to try a wide variety of really excellent beers. The VIP ticket was definitely worth it as the pass got me admitted to the event a half hour early and gave me access to the Bushwakker beers for only $10 more. Also the free chips and popcorn was a nice touch and the water jugs at glass rinsing station were always kept full. Next time (and I'll happily go again) I won't leave the Beer Education to the last few minutes. Also, it would be nice to be able to buy a few bottles to take home though I'm sure that would be another regulatory nightmare for the organizers.

Scottish Style Heavy Ale - Big Rock (Canada - Alberta - Calgary) 7.0%

Scottish Style Heavy Ale - Big Rock (Canada - Alberta - Calgary) 7.0%

Brown hued amber in a glass. Sweet, caramel, slightly oaky aroma with hints of vanilla and roast with just a bit of hops. A complicated flavour with heady fruit esters and roasty sweetness, some caramel, some wood tones and bread flavours. Some hops flavour here and there lending some balance. Not much taste of the 7% alcohol except mixed with the fruit esters and hops to generate a port-like flavour and the wood tones respectively. I'd recommend serving it warmish to get the full flavour. A bit of a different take on a Scottish Wee Heavy: Big Rick's Scottish Style Heavy Ale is on the sweeter side but without those heavy, almost chewy, malt flavours.

St-Ambroise Scotch Ale - McAuslan Brewing (Canada - Montreal)

St-Ambroise Scotch Ale - McAuslan Brewing (Canada - Montreal) 7.5%

A brown amber in a glass. Initially a dry, lightly hoppy aroma that reminds me of euro lagers (which was unexpected) but after the head faded (which happened rather quickly, actually) dark malt aromas of grain, peat (that's probably because I'm looking at the word scotch too much but it is a touch smoky), roasty glaze and not quite coffee tones continuing on into a quite sweet aroma with molasses, light wood tones and vanilla is a late arriving scent. The vanilla is very pleasant and very noticeable once some of the other aromas fade. Really, the vanilla comes to dominate with dark malt sweetness and the hops sticking around and keeping the balance nicely. No alcohol really detectable in the aroma but that may change as it warms up.

Bundles of flavours to taste here. Clearly high in alcohol that you can taste in the roof of your mouth but carried so nicely by chewy malt flavours of molasses, dark bread and some dark fruit touches like prunes or dark candied cherries. The aftertaste is long lingering, less sweet and hoppier with grain flavours as well as the shadow of dark malt flavours. As St-Ambroise Scotch Ale warms, caramel flavours reveal themselves from the mix and assert themselves quite strongly and round out this Wee-Heavy inspired winter seasonal. The mix of flavours is just perfect for a cold winter's night (or day).

Wee Heavy Bourbon - Le Castor (Canada - Quebec - Rigaud) 11.0%

Wee Heavy Bourbon - Le Castor (Canada - Quebec - Rigaud) 11.0%

A very dark chestnut colour in a glass. Lots of bourbon-esque wood character and barrel notes of spice and vanilla in the aroma. Something vaguely nutty as well dark fruit notes: cherry and cranberries. Slightly reminiscent of not quite chocolate but a bit of some flavours of chocolate and the kind of dark syrup you find in a dark fruit filled chocolate.

Plenty of barrel notes, wood, oak presumably, spice and vanilla and bourbon in the flavour. Sticky sweet syrupy taste with an alcohol burn, some blonde molasses flavours, sugary glaze and an often hidden nutty characteristic. Very sweet but doesn't taste sweet like refined sugar because there are so many strong malt flavours. The nice barrel flavours make this a delightful bourbon barrel aged ale. Oh and it's certified organic too!