First off, if you happen to be in Vancouver on September August 10th, check out Farmhouse Fest! I've been promising myself to go for years but due to time, money and life, I won't be able to go. So go for me! Classic old school Belgian-style Saisons are easily one of my favourite styles of beer but unfortunately it doesn't seem to be that way for most people. Last year I was trying my best to find *any* Saison within a short driving distance. Well, I got an answer near immediately! One of the brewers (Chris) at Winnipeg's Low Life Barrel House told me to look out for their House Saison. Well ..read more

Kilter Brewing Skye Rye IPA. Golden / Crisp / Citrusy. Brewed with malted and flaked rye, dry hopped with Idaho 7 and Amarillo. Appearance: Pours a real nice golden straw with a very clear body, minimal carbonation in the body and a moderate amount of snow white head on top. The head diminishes rather quickly, with not much head on top of the beer and a light lacing on the glass. Aroma: Sweet with notes of caramel, a bit of a nuttiness, a bit of "rye" bite to it.. floral hops and a bit of tropical sweetness as well.. grapefruit, orange zest, lemon, hint of pepper. Taste: The rye malt ..read more

In the past year or so Peroni Nastro Azzuro Italian lager has become one of my go-to lagers. It was only four years ago when I finally reviewed it for the first time and while I didn't mind it, but I didn't know if I would ever buy it again. Fast forward to now: it's a very crisp, floral and grassy lager with a distinctive hop presence that makes it one of my go-tos alongside a very small list of European lagers. Now Peroni has a 0.0% ABV non-alcoholic version of the Nastro Azzurro and my buddy's dad went to a place that was giving away FREE! servings of the beer. He joking asked for fo ..read more

New(ish) sampling from Skout Brewing out of Moosomin, SK! Today I'm checking out Middle Coast Session IPA. At 5.1% ABV... I'd call it more an IPA than Session but a regular ol' IPA is on the verge of going up to 6.5% so yeah.. I guess it could be considered a session.  Tasting notes: tropical aroma with notes of mango and papaya, moderate bitterness. Pairs well with: beach days, spicy food and Muskoka chairs. Appearance: Pretty clear with an amber-honey colour to it. The head is moderate with a light beige hue to it and diminishes a tad on the glass leaving a bit of a lacing. Aroma ..read more

Last week was the 2nd annual Clear Lake Beer Festival hosted by Lakehouse and on the way to the event I stopped by the local Home Hardware - they have the best rural beer selection in Western Manitoba so I was going to for sure find a few new treats while in the area. I certainly did! They had a wide variety of Obsolete Brewing's beers in stock, a lot more than just under an hour away in Brandon, but hey.. the Home Hardware is a whole hour closer to the brewery than Brandon! I don't remember what all I picked out but I picked out one of their Witbiers as well as today's sampling, Ski Bal ..read more

Any time I hear about a new brewery opening up within a short drive of where I live, I get excited. Five years ago when I still had a weekly column in the local newspaper there was only one brewery in the area. Now, there's officially five breweries in my region. Skout Brewing may not be a Manitoban brewery, but it's close enough to be Manitoba-adjacent. I grew up a stone's throw from the town (Moosomin) and have visited the town just because I wanted to pick up some beer and had nothing better to do that day. I first met Aaron of Skout Brewing at JGL Shepherd's hop farm August last year - I ..read more

Montréal! It's been a few minutes! The last time I was in the city was exactly four years ago.. but then a certain pandemic happened. Sure, I could have gone to Quebec in the past two years but life happens and last year I had some health issues.  Almost every year I go to Montreal, it's during the ever famous Mondial de la Bière festival and this year is no exception. This year I spent most of the time people watching, chatting with a few brewers and of course - sample a few beers. After a five year hiatus of going to the event, I noticed something - there weren't as many people this ..read more

It was just last week that I first heard of Happy Dad Hard Seltzer and since then I've been to my local LC and heard people asking for it. I'm not a seltzer fan at all but with a name like Happy Dad.. I'm assuming this is aiming towards oh god.. my generation of beer drinkers. I can't believe I'm that old but here we are. Today's sampling is a Death Row Records Grape hard seltzer brewed with water, vodka, sugar, etc.  Appearance: Carbonated water. Very fizzy. Clear, of course. Aroma: Full on grape soda or grape freezie, nice! No overly booziness to it. Pretty much the smell of childho ..read more

So, there's times in life where good thing I wait a while before I do something, such as a review. I've been aching to review Unibroue's newest beers (to me) since sometime mid to late last year. Unibroue retired their Blonde de Chambly in favour of a new lighter Saison called Saison Libre, and as well brought out a lighter, more sessionable take on North America's first "strong beer" (not malt liquor) Maudite with P'tite Maudite at 4.0% ABV. Wellllll, my pricy memory card I purchased at my previous job pre-COVID conked out. A few days ago it was working fine but erased every photo except fo ..read more

I receive on average of one to twenty emails a day with almost all of them are ads or random press agencies who don't understand what my blog is even about and try to do a "collab" with me. One of the more recent press releases was about a "taste of Madrid" beer called Madrí Excepcional. I wasn't really interested because there's enough import-themed beers beers being produced domestically in Canada that there's a fine line between an import and a premium domestic. Looking back, I was a big fan of the Molson band "A Marca Bavaria" in the mid 2000s.. it was pretty much Molson trying to capita ..read more