beernesday

new and fabulous at legacy liquor store in vancouver: Southern Tier Brewing Live Pale Ale - $18.35 From the beloved Southern Tier Brewing Company in New York comes an exceptional bottle-conditioned pale ale. Deep yellow in colour, with a touch of haze for mystery, this beer is all about citrus on the nose. A hop-forward profile featuring the likes of orange, grapefruit and lemon all work together to rocket you into absolute bliss, while a crisp finish and lighter body make this brew easily quaffable and one worth revisiting again and again. Evan Doan | Beer Team | Legacy Liquor Store Jolly Pumpkin La Roja - $15.05 This American Wild Ale is brought to you by the state of Michigan and the creative minds of Jolly Pumpkin Artisan Ales. This barrel-aged beauty is brewed in the Flanders tradition and pours a murky amber in colour with all sorts of things going on in the aroma including subtle oak, spice, floral and of course sour notes. In addition to notes of red grape, these sour char...

new beers at legacy liquor store in vancouver: Southern Tier Brewing - IPA - $17.55 (6 Pack) In Lakewood, New York, on the shores of Lake Ontario, resides the brew house of Southern Tier Brewing. This beer, simply named ‘IPA,’ pours a beautiful amber colour with a nose of citrus, pine and a touch of caramel from the intense yet balanced hop presence found both in its bouquet and on the palate. An outstanding beer. Joel Wilson | Beer Team | Legacy Liquor Store Shmaltz Brewing - Coney Island Albino Python - $7.45 Another brew from our friends on the far side of the continent, New York to be precise, this White Lager is brewed with ginger, fennel and orange peel (think Belgian Wit, but not at all). Cloudy and straw-coloured, with a one-two punch of ginger and zest, this crisp, light NY brew is a must. Conor Marshall | Beer Team | Legacy Liquor Store Gaffel Kölsch - $4.25 This classic German beer style is making a serious splash this summer. Clear and golden in colour with earthy yeas...

blergh, i've been a bit under the weather not a great start to a long weekend but fortunately the amazing vancouver weather has healing qualities (or maybe it was the beer) and i'm on the mend - with a tan! new beers at legacy liquor store in vancouver: Southern Tier – Imperial Mokah - $13.15 Exclusively at Legacy, this east coast beer packs a serious punch. Jamaican coffee beans and Belgian chocolate are the stars of this dark and powerful brew, with serious malt and a touch of bitterness making it a beer best enjoyed with dessert.   Alameda – Rose City Red - $7.45 Named after the Rose City, this beer pours red amber in colour and has hoppy floral notes on the nose. Malt, brown sugar and caramel balance well with the Nugget hops used in the brewing process. The laidback lifestyle of Portland, Oregon is complimented by this easy drinking red.   Hofbrau – Schwarze Weisse - $5.15 Straight from the heart of Germany, this Schwarze Weisse is chestnut in colour and has a nos...

there's a u.s. national ipa championship? i never knew! read all about it here only one of my favourites is still in it (hopefully in it to win it!) green flash west coast ipa some of my favourites (unbelieveably to me) went out in the first or second round ballast point big eye ipa deschutes inversion ipa stone brewing ipa southern tier ipa unfortunately central city's red racer went down in the first round to fat head's headhunter must try some of these ipas i mean, if people say they're better than my known faves, then maybe they're pretty good!

from last week's beernesday at st. augustine's: i began my night with a sampler dead frog's christmas beeracle!  5%  a festive, rich, warm amber ale with a medley of spices including cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg. cannery's no jail pale ale:  3.05% a lower-alcohol beer with an authentic ale taste!  a clean, crisp ale with a bright hop finish and about 40% less alcohol than conventional beer salt spring's golden spike ale:  5%  voted "best golden ale" at the canadian brewing awards paddock wood's london porter:  5.3%  a dark ale based on a recipe from 1850 which lets chocolate malt take the lead.  smoother than stout, but still holds a deep roast profile i very much liked the christmas beeracle! gingery goodness (reminiscent of the steamworks ginger from last spring) and no vanilla!! i would definitely have this one again and i don't say that about many christmas or winter ales bridget liked it a lot too! the no jail was a little...

last week at beernesday i began my night with a sampler i went with darker beers, it being winter and all rogue's hazelnut brown nectar:  5.6%  a nutty twist to a traditional european brown ale.  dark brown in color with a hazelnut aroma, a rich nutty flavor and a malty finish. longwood's scottish ale:  6.5%  scottish ale, little brother to the "wee heavy", is a soft, full bodied, malty ale, nicely balanced by subtle hopping. storm's scottish highland cream ale:  5%  this creamy, nutty, malty, dark ale is true to its scottish origins and is caramelized as the kettle is being filled. central city's red racer oatmeal stout:  6.5%  this irish-style stout is deep, dark, smooth and creamy.  the use of oatmeal adds a silkiness to the texture and body of this ale. the hazelnut was some nutty goodness maybe a bit too malty on the finish for me, just a sampler did me fine the longwood scottish ale was the big hit of the night bridget...

lord almighty, i pub crawled last night and lived to tell the tale! okay, it was more of a meander, we only made it to four stops but the last one was so comfy and we had our own room, we decided to stop venturing out in the rain and just stay put that i think is the biggest difference between pub crawling in your twenties and doing it when you're a little older knowing that enjoying where you are is more important than checking off 12 pubs on your list! we started at 3 at anna's place for sushi and ipas (southern tier unearthly and howe sound devil's elbow) then hit the charlatan, where joy of joys they now have fat tug on tap! then the libra room, where i enjoyed the anchor steam and finally falconetti's, where we had the whole upstairs room to ourselves, and our own bartender - how could we possibly leave there? okay, well shortly before 2 we kicked ourselves out! good times, good friends, good beers does my heart and soul good!

yet more tasting notes from the last beernesday at st. augustine's... this time its all the bottles that we tried! and between three of us, we tried quite a few: elysian brewing co. avatar jasmine ipa:  6.3%  has a very floral nose while the taste is an elegant balance allowing the subtle flavor of jasmine to prevail through essential hoppiness. southern tier unearthly imperial ipa:  10%  vigorously hopped high abv beer that is still eminently drinkable. kiuchi brewery hitachino nest real ginger ale:  7%  a dose of fresh ginger root added to the brew kettle creates an intriguing mix of ginger, malt-sweetness, and citrus-like aromas. flying dog classic pale ale:  5.5%  brilliant amber in color and dry hopped for an unrivaled hop flavor. jasmine ipa:  good head, clear, floral, light hops, pale, malty yet still crispy and hoppy.  big floral nose.  delicious at first, almost too sweet as i get further down the glass.  pe...

and now for "the antithesis of unearthly " from southern tier , its the imperial iniquity black ale pours up thick and black with a compact creamy head malty, malty, malty definitely some hops definitely different than an ipa a taste bridget is happy to acquire! and i like it too much like (and yet totally not even similar at all to) the snakebite i made with ipa and worried that it would be too clashy, this is a pairing that could be disastrous, but instead ends up complimentary and supportive its like therapy in a glass! hops and de-bittered chocolatey malts are a match made in heaven! 9% 21 degrees plato 2 row pale malt, debittered black malt kettle hops:  chinook, cascade hop back:  willamette dry hops:  cascade, centennial serve chilled in a southern tier tulip glass from the bottle:  "The hexagram talisman has been used around the world for centuries to invoke magic and good luck.  The six-point star is also the customary symbol of b...

ah the Southern Tier Unearthly 'tis one of my favourites - and offers "an uninhibited infusion of hops" which is good - i like hops! i'm not sure if its the 11%, the 23 degrees plato, the red wheat or the triple hopping with chinook & cascade hops in the kettle, styrian golding hops back, topped with cascade, centenial and chinook dry hops that makes it so darned tasty, but whatever it is, i'm quite the big fan!  (and don't tell anyone, but i like to put on my best jersey accent when i say that its from new york, not that i know whether lakewood is anywhere near jersey or not - why let trifles like that stand in the way of an accent opportunity?) this is a beer that i can have just one 650 mL bottle of over the course of an evening and feel perfectly satisfied on any old night, or require several rounds of to quench my hops hunger some other random night, but guaranteed i'll be a hoppy camper either way it turns out!  one night it will just be ea...

for my drinking pleasure this evening i'm going with an imperial pale ale rather than an ipa.  no good reason why, just happened to love Southern Tier's unearthly ipa and thought i'd give their Hoppe a try. Southern Tier reports:  "2XIPA in the Bottle - April 15, 2010 is the first day for bottling our newest beer, 2XIPA. Phin DeMink has declared it the best beer we've ever brewed! 2XIPA also has the distinction of being the first beer to be distributed in our newly designed packaging. Cheers!" if only my local purveyor of beer had had some in stock, that's what i would have chosen to imbibe this evening.  but no use crying over unavailable beer - let me turn my attention to the clear, honey coloured beauty in front of me! speaking of beauty, let me extol the virtues of the cascading beer bubbles at the pour!  what a head!  i wanna pour some more just to see the wonder of it again.  and i did!  and it was a thing of beauty and a joy to behold....

it may be easter, but the hops i'm most interested in are not those being performed by bunnies. i am currently obsessed by the myriad of hops options in beer. beer, nectar of the gods. proof that god loves us. improver of all social situations. now, don't get me wrong, i love beer, pretty much all beers. but currently i have an overwhelming desire to consume hops by the kettle-full. i just can't get enough of the bitter little buggers. more detail to follow, but my current favourite examples of hoppy goodness are the following: Phillips Brewing Company's Amnesiac Double IPA Southern Tier Brewing Company's Unearthly Imperial IPA Granville Island Brewery's Brockton Oval IPA Howe Sound Brewery's Bailout Bitter