March 27, 2012

Spring Beer

Wet grass, new buds on trees, the return of bees and birdlife to the city all signal one thing to me — the return zingy, grassy spring beers.

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A sampler of Olde Stone Brewing Company's four regular brews and their seasonal — a Cascadian IPA, in Peterborough.

This year’s LCBO haul of 15 spring beers is impressive, the buzz among the beer nerds is that it’s the best LCBO release in memory. I have to agree. I wrote about six of my favourites for my Hopped Up column in The Grid last week. In fact, I love Microbrasserie Charlevoix’s Sainte-Reserve Lupulus so much I’m serving it instead of champagne for the toast at my upcoming wedding this May.

Being a beer writer, I’m obviously into serving the stuff at my wedding — we’re pairing an Ontario beer with every course, and I’m thinking of having the cake designed to match a sour beer I like, instead of the other way around. Booze first, food later. I figured I wasn’t the only bride thinking this way, so I dug deeper into the craft beer wedding trend and came up with tons of stories from beer-loving couples — I’ll post a link here when it’s published.

I should also explain my lack of blogging — I’m designing a new website and blog that will be devoted to beer writing and drinking, so my attention’s been diverted over the last few months. Hoping to launch it within a month or so.

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I’ve also made a pilgrimage to Buffalo with my beer club to drink at the Blue Monk, shop for American brews and watch one of our members take on the Buffalo Bandits (Go Colorado Mammoth!)

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And I’ve been eating and drinking my way through nearby Port Credit, Kleinburg and Peterborough (great beer city!) for an upcoming Toronto Life guide called Neighbourhoods.

Barley's Angels Toronto Chapter

A real highlight was meeting a bunch of female beer enthusiasts, experts and bloggers at the Toronto chapter of Barley’s Angels last Sunday — we drank two litres of imported beer from McClelland Premium Imports, paired with traditional fare from the kitchen of The Town Crier.

 

Affligem Dubbel, my favourite beer of the night at the Barleys Angels beer pairing dinner with Guy McClelland

Tonight I’m off to The Mugshot Tavern in the Junction for a talk by a local hops grower and researcher, organized by one of my beer club dudes.  And I’m thinking ahead to Thursday when I’ll hit up Bar Volo’s total tap takeover by Beau’s Brewery and drink some of the beers that brewmaster Matt O’Hara recommends, including the gimmicky Peanut Butter Stout — I’m a sucker for a gimmicky beer that actually tastes delicious — and there’s only one way to find out.

If there are this many spring beer events, I’m a little terrified of summer.

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March 2, 2012

Thirsty & Miserable: Toronto’s newest beer bar

Opening up her own beer bar has been Katie Whittaker’s dream for years — and this week, in Kensington Market, the longtime bartender lit the tealights along the wood bar at Thirsty & Miserable on 197 Baldwin.

But dreams, once realized, aren’t always what they seem — not only does Whittaker, the sole proprietor, and for now at least, the only employee, get to chat to friendly patrons about all things beer — she also has to fend off loud drunks who haven’t quite figured out that this new bar isn’t the same as the old Cuban spot that used to serve up cheap bottles of Bud.

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When I was there, a 6″4 50-something man lumbered over to the bar, towering over tiny Whittaker and demanded a beer.

“OK, what kind would you like?” she asks.

“Beer.”

“OK, but what kind?”

“What’s cheapest?”

“Um.. well tap beers are about $6,” she replies

“OK. That.”

… Anyway you get the picture.

Whittaker handled it well, serving him an IPA in the hopes that it’s bitter punch would turn him off and persuade him to leave. The plan didn’t quite work out. He drank it like water, and then wandered to the back of the bar to socialize with some hipsters.

The whole thing doesn’t sound that scary — it’s regular stuff for bartenders and owners I suppose — but as a mere patron, it freaked me out to think of Whittaker behind the bar on a lonely night with a much more menacing drunk or two on her hands. I told her as much, and she agreed, but then pointed to a baseball bat she keeps beside the well-stocked bottle fridge. It’s hard to imagine her actually wielding the bat — it’s twice as thick as her arm.

But from the looks of a recent post on the bar’s facebook page, the native Cornwallian’s is keeping the  onslaught of rowdy patrons in line, at least somewhat:

Thirsty And Miserable: Sometimes you have to kick people out of your bar for harassing the ladies, and sometimes someone will bust your toilet flusher, and sometimes the blind guy and the weird slut with braces will drum on your bar screaming Deicide songs (even after you politely ask them to shut up) and then practically fuck in front of a full bar of people, and sometimes the kid from Bangladesh will drop his passport and steal her leather jacket, and sometimes the annoying guy will order pint after pint of Mad Tom without tipping but it’s alright when it happens in the company of friends.

But she does plan to hire more staff once things pick up, and the mix of her simple philosophy: serve good beer and her frugal nature means the bar is sure to be a hit with craft beer junkies on a budget. So basically every university student and artsy hipster in town.

The bar is charmingly divey — dark red walls lit by tealights, a few black and white photographs, a simple pared-down bar and lots of good, cheap bar — eight rotating taps and a double-door bottle fridge that Whittaker is adding to so fast she’s already scrawling new beers on the printed menu of over 30 bottles. Just in, eight bottles of Beau’s Coffee Dopplebock, a rarity from its Wild Oats series, which shows Whittaker is winning over beer reps quickly.

The biggest dive component is the aroma of the neatly kept but seriously fishy basement washrooms thanks to the fishmonger’s next door. That part is not so nice.

As for food, Whittaker hates bars that make you do things like eat and pay for it, so she offers four simple dishes, tucked in her freezer, at prices that will ensure patrons never order the stuff:

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Mmm. Yummy, but I think I’ll stick to the Blue Cap Chimay.

Verdict: A tiny Kensington watering hole patronized by a crowd as eclectic as the ‘hood. The iconic Belgian imports and Canadian crafts on tap will satisfy most micro-beer palettes, and Whittaker knows her suds. Plus hot makeouts on the bar are allowed — makes me hanker for the POF-filled single days of old.

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November 29, 2011

A very beery few months

Cask Days 2011, organized by Bar Volo, at Hart House

Last night I dreamt about beer, again. This time I was at a beer club meeting (I’ve recently joined not one, but two beer clubs — WAY better than a book club), and one of our five members was organizing a beer dinner for us and he chose bad pairings, I felt crushed.

Not as exciting as my blood-red adventure dreams the night before, featuring a raven-whale rising out of a blood red lake, which I was canoeing down to get to my grandmother’s cottage (pot-induced dreams are the best), but then beer writing isn’t always exciting — sometimes it’s just plain work.

For me, the toughest thing is all of the beer events that are happening in the city all of the time. I have a low tolerance, and long hangover period (sometimes even a few drinks cause a three-day migraine) so I’m finding it nearly impossible to attend all of these functions.

But they are all so good and most offer one-off beer drinking opportunities, my FOMO (fear-of-missing-out) radar shoots sky-high when I can’t make one of them. For example, here is a list of just a few events that are coming up in the Toronto beer world (all contain potential for greatness):

Tomorrow night, the Burger Bar is hosting one of many beer Movember events — this one will see Canadian beer writer Stephen Beaumont judging which local beer blogger or writer has grown the best “Beaumont” style moustache for Movember. And it’ll feature two cask beers: a special release by Paul Dickey of Cheshire Valley (the brewmaster behind Augusta Ale at the Burger Bar) and Devil’s Pale Ale aged in Jack Daniels Cask from Great Lakes.

On December 5th, Muskoka is having a party to launch their Winter Beard beer at the Drake Hotel.

On December 6th, Greg Clow, author of Canadian Beer News blog, is launching a beer dinner series. The first one is a mega-challenge: vegan/raw food chef Doug McNish is pairing Beau’s beers with a vegan menu at the Windsor Arms, where he is the consulting chef.  It’s time we started getting away from the beer and meat combo as the only go-to, and this dinner promises to be a step in the right direction.

The next night, December 7th, the Bier Markt’s new location at Shops at Don Mills is opening and luring beer writers over with a special sampling of Sam Adam’s Utopias.

And on December 11th, the ladies-only beer appreciation club in Toronto — Barley’s Angels – is hosting a Brewing 101 event at The Rhino featuring beers from Lake of Bays.

And then there are all of the new holiday and winter beers which are being released at breweries and in the LCBO right now. All of which must be sampled… sigh.

Couple that with the fact that I’m walking down the aisle in May (for a girl this is the day where you’re supposed to look your BEST EVER), and the guilt over copious and frequent beer drinking piles on. In fact, I even tried to cut out recreational consumption of beer in November, limiting drinking to work-related events only. But then this created a whole host of questions: like how do you define work-related? Must one be writing about the beer one is consuming? Or can the rules encompass drinking any beer which is new to the writer’s lips — “research.” Let’s just say this little experiment didn’t last longer than five days.

Rather than self-hate, I’m a fan of celebrating one’s guilty pleasures — so I’ll end this post off with  some pictures of beers (and other alcoholic bevvies) I’ve been imbibing and loving this fall:

Denison's Dunkel on tap at Lil' Baci

Sipping Crown Royal at Whiskey Live

Tried the Maker's Mark 46 at Whiskey Live — woody goodness

In Miami, drinking beer & Columbian coke pitchers

Beer & columbian coca-cola might be sacrileg to some — but it was light and fruity when paired with ceviche, yum.

Cigar City's Pumpkin Ale — beer from Florida's best microbrewery at South Beach's best beer, Abraxus Lounge. LOVE THIS BAR.

Drank far too many of these at the noteable.ca awards party - thanks for the invite Danica.

Cameron's Deviator Dopplebock, coming out this week. I had it early, straight out of the fermenter — really interesting beer, worth picking up from the brewery.

Drinking at home: a wheat-beer like brew made by an Italian co-op brewery from what they call "slow foods," tapioca, quinoa, basmati and amaranth rice. Surprisingly zingy with a wheat-beer like cloudiness and mouthfeel, missing the yeasty goodness and natural fruit esthers of a weizen though.

This year's Cask Days was so much fun — great beers from across Canada all at Hart House. Beautiful job by Bar Volo.

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September 6, 2011

Beer and barbecue pairings

Jason Rees, Pork Ninjas

A couple of weeks back, The Grid had to cut my Hopped Up column, well, pretty brutally. I was writing about how to pair beer with barbecue, so I spoke to two men that love both things deeply: Ryan Donovan, the butcher at Marben, and Jason Rees, pitmaster of barbecue team, Pork Ninjas.

Sadly Rees was cut from the story (I’m sorry Jason!), he spends a lot of time smoking meat, and drinking craft beer, and I wanted to share his expertise here. I also gave both Donovan and Rees the challenge of pairing beers you can buy or drink in Toronto with their favourite BBQ — and I asked them to comment on one another’s suggestions — most of these were cut too.

So I’m pasting the entire article here for your barbecue-and-beer-pairing pleasure:

Ryan Donovan has the ultimate man cave: a brand-new walk-in keg fridge, its walls lined with barrels of craft brews like Muskoka, Beau’s and F&M. And in the centre, hanging from the ceiling, there’s usually one huge cut of meat or another—loin, ribs, flank. King West restaurant Marben (488 Wellington Street West) is known for its monthly pig roasts conducted under resident butcher Donovan’s watch, and he says the merger is fitting—any carnivore knows that ale and barbecue is a natural pairing.

Donovan, who ran the Healthy Butcher and worked at Cowbell before moving to Marben, learned what beers to match with barbecue from practice, and by talking to the brewers who supply his restaurant.

Donovan reccomends Muskoka’s Mad Tom IPA to cut through the rich, pink meat of a roasted pig. For lighter fare, like grilled fish or chicken, Donovan likes Muskoka’s Weissbier for its sweet banana character, or Duggan’s zingy, No. 5 Sorachi Lager. “When it’s hot outside it’s tough to drink a lot of beer,” he says, “so a lighter, effervescent lager is best.”

Some beers are better than others to drink with barbecue. And while there are some rules of thumb: go for brews that compliment, contrast or cut your food; a sweet taste should be paired with even sweeter beers, tart with tart — brewers, butchers and beer nerds don’t always play by them.

Jason Rees, for example, never serves lager with barbecue. The pitmaster for Pork Ninjas, a Toronto-based competitive barbecue team, Rees spends upwards of 16 hours over a cooker. And that’s when he relies on lager. “I love my double IPAs and imperial stouts but if I was to drink those for 12 to 16 hours, my palate would be completely polluted, and I wouldn’t be able to tell if my spicing was correct.” His go to? Anything by Muskoka, preferably in a can, or Yuengling Lager, which he picks up at Walmart in the States.

Like Donovan, Rees likes the IPA’s ability to cut through sweet, rich barbecue. But he also likes the complimentary pairing of a sweeter brown ale, like Neustadt 10W40, with spicy ribs smothered in brown sugar. What to serve to your Coors Light loving Dad? Try Black Oak Pale Ale, says Rees, “it doesn’t offend anyone.”

At your next dinner party, Rees advises, choosing six kinds of Ontario beer, giving everyone a small glass, and trying different beers throughout the meal, starting with lightest and moving to the heavier, more alcoholic beers.

“Beer is so much easier to pair with barbecue than wine, because when you serve the real spicy stuff, some wines can taste like vinegar. But even a poor beer pairing is still going to be drinkable,” he says.


Jason Rees’s beer and barbecue pairings, Ryan Donovan weighs in

Denison’s Weissbier with burger with goat cheese
Donovan: “I would pair this as well, but only if I could have two beers.”

Sweet and tangy baby back pork ribs with Muskoka Cream Ale
Donovan: “Mmmmmm tangy”

Smoked sausages with Kozliks German Style mustard with Church Key Holy Smoke Scotch Ale
Donovan: “Church Key is one of my favourite breweries, great choice.”

 Jerk Chicken with Muskoka Mad Tom IPA
Donovan: “British + India + Jamaica = Bracebridge.  A classic pairing.”

Grilled chocolate pound cake with scoop of chocolate ice cream & hot cherry sauce with Black Oak Double Chocolate Cherry Stout
Donovan: “I’ll bring the beer if you take care of cooking this.”

 Rib-eye steak rubbed with coffee, salt and pepper with Muskoka Dark Ale or Wellington County Dark Ale
Donovan: “Wellington County Dark is one the best beers I’ve ever had.”

Orange marmalade glazed duck breast cooked over Basques Charcoal, (made from sugar maple) with Lindemans Cuvee Rene Gueuze
Donovan: “Orange?????Duck Breast???????? can I have a beer now?”

Note: Most of these recipes are Rees’s and are on his website at BBQBlog.ca


Ryan Donovan’s Beer & Barbecue Pairings, Jason Rees weighs in

Muskoka Mad Tom IPA with Patio Pig Roast
Rees: “I absolutely love the Muskoka IPA, but I think it lends itself better to spicy food, and a whole hog has a lot of different delicate flavours. I’d rather see that paired with a pilsner.”

Muskoka Dark with fermented Thuringer
Rees: “The marjoram spice in this sausage would be very tasty with the Muskoka Dark Ale.”

Anchor Steam with BBQ Brisket from West Side Beef
Rees: “I think I would enjoy Anchor Steam with a brisket, but I usually pair it with raw oysters.”

Creemore with anything BBQ’d outside at The New Farm
Rees: “My theory that you need something easy drinking while bbq’ing seems evident from his pick of Creemore. I’ve done the same thing when I can’t find cans of Muskoka, I enjoy Creemore’s Kellerbeir more than their lager.”

Tsing Tao with #76 at Pho Phuong
Rees: “I can barely get my nose into a Tsing Tao beer, so it must stay in the bottle and be served extra, extra cold so I can barely smell it. It’s just another large batch adjunct beer that I wouldn’t normally consume… but I will admit to consuming it as a last resort beer on many occasions in the many amazing Asian restaurants in the city.”

Beau’s Lug Tread Ale with a porchetta roast from The Healthy Butcher
Rees: “I have not tried the Healthy Butcher’s porchetta as I make my own, and mine has lots and lots of fennel seeds in it, is cooked over apple wood, and injected with apple juice brine. It would marry well with the Beau’s Lug Tread, but I have a serious love of pork and apple, so I usually drink my porchetta with Wapoos Cider from the County Cider Company.

Rogue Dead Guy IPA with Pulled Pork
Rees: “The Dead Guy IPA is a very well-balanced beer, and I’ve enjoyed it with pulled pork on several occasions.”

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July 15, 2011

San Francisco Part I: Beer & Bay Boys

I was commenting on the sheer number of gays and lesbians in the fair city of San Fran, and my new (gay) friend Richard agreed, “Here, it’s like throw a rock, hit a homo,” he laughed.

As our car rounded the corner at the bottom of an otherwise deserted strip we saw — you guessed it — another gay man.

I thought Toronto was gay-friendly, but it’s got nothing on this salty city — around 9 p.m. on the Friday we arrived we headed to the Castro. I heard hoots and hollers coming from the balcony of a bar, and looked out on the street to see a slight man, buck naked except for a construction hat and boots, crossing the street. Just another start to a Friday night in the Castro.

Being open about sexuality isn’t the only thing San Fran has the lead on — there’s the beer too.

I love it all. Before heading out I did my research by listening to my favourite beer podcast – by a couple of San Fran beer enthusiasts and sometimes brewers, called Beer School. These guys are unpretentious, full of useful information, and sometimes hilarious. I jotted down notes from their Touring San Francisco Beer cast and I was good to go – despite it being OLD for the interweb (2007) all the recco’s and spots checked out.  (For a more recent take, check out BeersbyBART a website mapping out how to enjoy craft beers at every public transit stop in the city).

The thing about drinking beer as a primary tourist pursuit is that a) it’s very easy to do it alone and meet lots of friendly people.  And b) being tipsy in a new city equals fun.


Upon arrival, I asked my hotel peeps where the Thirsty Beaver was — they Googled, but couldn’t find. That’s cause it’s the Thirsty Bear. Oh, common Canadian faux-pas.

What to drink? Why, the tasting rack of course!

This little brewpub is all organic, and very, very good. While the staple – Brown Bear – was delish. My favourites (and the Texan actuary at the bar stool beside me agreed) were: the seasonal Farmhouse Ale and the Meyers ESB, so goddamn smooth and well balanced. Love you Thirsty Bear!

After that it was off to the SFMOMA, the colours in the pop art room seemed extra bright after a 45-minute chat in a dark bar.

Little did I know that Moe’s friends, Andrew & Richard, were fellow beer nuts and the rest of the weekend would be spent in pursuit of great beer and maximum merriment.  More to come in my next post.

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May 31, 2011

TV, beer and Aldo Lanzini

Three of the things I’ve been up to this month.

TV
My fiance, Conor McCreery, a comic book creator and screenwriter, has been appearing on the Charles Adler show as a commentator on all things pop culture. Last week they wanted a female talking head to comment on Bridesmaids, a movie that I love, so I decided to give it a shot.  The day of I got super nervous, forcing Conor to play Adler and throw out all sorts of possible questions, over and over. I went to the studio armed with facts, and then, when we did the interview the questions were mostly personal opinion. No rehearsal on those, and no chance to show off all of my R&D. Once we got going, the nerves subsided (it’s easy to talk to a camera that doesn’t look back at you) and I was surprised by how much fun it all was. Now all I need is my own beer travel show.

My first two beer columns have been published in the Grid, and I have plans for more.  There is so much happening in craft and commercial brewing, so lots to talk about. The best part of this new gig has been how welcoming the beer community is — experts, writers and brewers all love what they do and don’t mind sharing their intel. In my latest column, on Barley’s Angels, I looked at women in the craft brewing industry and discovered that the act of making beer is totally girly. Unfortunately I couldn’t squeeze this fascinating history into the column, so I’m sharing it here:

Women parted ways with beer around the industrial revolution, when brewing ale, once the sole responsibility of the female, was moved into factories and drinking shifted from the home to the male-dominated pub. It’s a travesty, because beer is utterly feminine. High status females were the brewsters of chica in pre-Inca and Incan cities high up in the Andes, of Hekt in ancient Egypt, and in charge of the prestigious brewing trade in Babylon and Sumeria (modern day Iraq). Beer deities were always goddesses, never gods. Even the hyper-masculine Vikings favoured brewsters — Norse society law dictated that only women could own brewhouse equipment. Today, things are different. A 2004 Health Canada survey found that a quarter of men ages 19 to 50 drink beer, compared to eight percent of women, and men guzzle, consuming about 80 percent of all beer.

Anthropologist Alan Eames uncovered the female-dominated history of brewing — and more evidence is being unearthed every few years, like a recent discovery that high-ranking females were the brewmasters in pre-Incan societies.

Finally, I just finished up a piece for ELLE’s September issue exploring a fashion and pop culture trend — it was fun to research, and I’ll remain mum about what it is until publication, but I had the pleasure of discovering the work of Italian artist Aldo Lanzini.  His crocheted masks are mesmerizing and all about the construction of identity.

Check out this profile by Crane TV: http://static.crane.tv/player/flowplayer.commercial-3.2.5.swf?0.2654293088708073


							

	
			

				
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								April 18, 2011
							


			
Royal Ontario Museum Sleepover — a scary experience


				

				


Taking my 4-year-old nephew to the Royal Ontario Museum’s dinosaur-themed sleepover seemed like the perfect plan to win me the Favourite Auntie Award.  Not so, it turns out, if your nephew has an unnatural fear of just about every animal (dead or alive).




Still, we survived.  You can read the article I wrote about it here. Hot tip: Bring or make a fast friend the same age as your niece/nephew, and suddenly the “I want to go home to Mommy’s” dissapear.  It’s magic.  For more photos from the night, check out my ever evolving flickr page.


  For those of you into such things, this event occurred about a year ago — but I just stumbled upon the article and thought I’d post it.

							

	
			

				
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