Garden – A Good Beer Blog

Your Beery News Notes For The Start Of The Last Month Of Spring

Here we are. Growing season. Well, it’s been hovering between 11C and 14C in these parts mid-day so perhaps not very much growing but at least there is no frost. That’s my Pinot Noir there. I hacked out most of the Concord this year to let the swankier sibling get more sunlight. That pink edging fades soon enough but it’s a great guide to assist with what lives and dies. Is that why I garden? To judge? To dispense edict? That and salads, sure why not?

First, and sticking with the theme vinous, Katie Mather has been reporting from the front lines of the wine trade and has a discovery to share – well, two after her thoughts on what was once all in black is now very much back:

Ice in wine is becoming a *thing*. Don’t believe me? Do a couple of shifts in your local pub. Over the past year I’ve noticed more and more women (it has been primarily women) ordering white or rose wine and insisting on having ice in their glass. Perhaps it’s because they don’t really like the flavour, and the ice dulls it down. Perhaps pub fridges aren’t cold enough. Perhaps — and this is what I think — it reminds us of being on holiday. Oh god, I am doing everything I can at the moment to pretend I’m not really here. Aren’t you? The world is a nightmare, a giant morality eclipse, and if a little clinky-clinky in my glass helps lift me out of it even for a second, I am going to do it. Black Tower is an ideal icy wine, because it’s heavy in syrupy flavours. And also because you don’t really want to taste it.

Viva cheap sweet wine on ice! Our government is also all about the viva! This week as there was good news for good beer this week was in Ontario’s provincial budget:

The beer, cider, and premixed cocktails you buy at the LCBO could be a lot cheaper as of August 1, with the government cutting the markup rates the LCBO charges for those products. So long as manufacturers don’t increase their prices, the cost of beer, cider and ready-to-drink beverages could drop between 21 per cent to 50 per cent. For example, the government is slashing the markup on Ontario craft beer by 50 per cent. It’s a move that is going to further impact already falling revenues. LCBO revenues are down sharply since the Ford government started allowing the sale of alcohol in convenience stores.

Really? Booze prices could drop 50%? Really?? Jordan ran the numbers and noticed that is not quite correct:

…for every six pack sold, the LCBO gets $1.836… That’s not really helpful math since most breweries sell 473 ml cans. Translated, that’s $0.0939 cents per can. Going by the earlier example of 2,000 hL of cans sold, you’re actually doing better by about $39,700. If you were a larger regional like a GLB or Nickel Brook doing 10,000 hL in cans, you’re looking at a couple hundred grand. The government gets a nice win, because they can say they cut a tax by 50%. No one really wants to understand what I just explained, so there won’t be any probing questions about tax vs. retail markup.

Interestingly, the budget also weakened the regulations around what arrangements qualify as craft beer, as changes “would permit microbrewers to enter into a contract with another brewer that is not a microbrewer” while retaining its status. Don’t know who in particular will benefit from that change…

There was also not so great beer related news from Ontario. Unlike those high hopes I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, on Monday morning I found my Leafs jersey on the basement floor. Inside out. In a bundle. In the corner. You know, it’s reasonable – mathematically speaking – to say that the only team that loses in the seventh game of the quarter finals is the fifth best team in the playoffs. Didn’t feel that way. They certainly did better than I’ve done in the Pellicle FPL pool where me, I sit by myself at 36th out of 55 in the table – but at least I didn’t do what people at the game did:

On Sunday, the Florida Panthers ran the Maple Leafs out of their own building to the tune of a 6-1 blowout. It’s the second 6-1 loss in a row the Maple Leafs have sustained on home ice in this series and Toronto’s 2025 Stanley Cup hopes have officially ended thanks to this defeat… It’s safe to say that Maple Leafs fans have had enough of the disappointment. In the middle of Sunday night’s Game 7, multiple jerseys were thrown onto the ice and beer was reportedly thrown at Toronto’s bench as well.

I’ve seen baseball fans throw beer onto the field in Toronto but never hockey fans. At the prices they charge, it means they have to have been seriously pissed off.*

Could be worse, of course. You could be a US craft beer exporter who had to listen to this sort of weirdly denialist argument from a rep of the US Brewer’s Association as reported in VinePair:

…the in-person attendance of Chinese and Canadian buyers in last month’s 2025 Craft Brewers Conference as proof of the “lasting reputation of U.S. craft beer for quality and innovation — even amid ongoing trade uncertainty for markets,” while conceding that importers from those two countries in particular have scaled back or stopped down on ordering in the opening months of Trump’s trade war. This, after craft exports saw a 15 percent decline in 2024, outpacing the category. Still, Parr argues, “for breweries with a long-term, quality-driven approach, global markets continue to offer meaningful opportunities.”

That’s a funny thing to say. Seeing as the largest importer in the world is our very own LCBO and (i) that 15% drop was pre-Trump and (ii) for the last ten weeks with no sign of a pending policy reversal, the LCBO has entirely cut off your all your exports (in coordination with other Canadian booze commissions), well, I am not quite sure where the “meaningful opportunity” is to be found in Canada. But, you know, it’s the BA! Beer Market’s Insights continues to tell a different story for US trade:

For 4 weeks, beer biz looks a little better. Down 2.9% for 4 weeks thru 5/4, -4.6% for 12 weeks. Wine down just 2% for 4 weeks (including Easter this yr), spirits up 5.6%.

By “a little better” read “not as bad” perhaps. Note the reverse is happening in the UK with the news this week of a UK-EU trade deal as noted in TDB:

Miles Beale, chief executive of the Wine and Spirit Trade Association welcomed the reset, noted that anything that improves the relationships and practical arrangements with the EU is “great news”. However he warned that “as ever the devil is in the detail” and he looked forward to seeing the legal texts over the coming weeks. “For the UK wine sector, where imports account for 99% the wine enjoyed by UK consumers, we want to ensure that any new rules and obligations work for the UK market,” he said.

Well, that’s looking like actual opportunity. Viva! Speaking of which in only the most oblique sense which I will let you figure out on your own, this week’s feature in Pellicle is a postcard from local author, Ewen Friers, who introduces us at a pace to the pubs about the town, as illustrated by some lovely photos from MC Himself:

Quite rightly, Kelly’s and The Crown have changed little over the years, but that’s not to say Belfast and its beer is an entirely fixed concept. The place brims with lively modern bars like any small touristic city in Europe, and new takes on age-old traditions have been popping up more and more. This is true for smaller breweries too. The now sadly defunct ABV Festival and the aforementioned more recent Belfast Beer Festival have been crucial in pulling the beer environment forward. Whilst some small breweries have come and gone in recent years, like the much missed Farmageddon, the scene has continued to grow.

Entirely contrary to that sort of familiar stability and reassuring comfort, Evan Rail followed up on that weird SNPA as ESB story for VinePair this week, sensibly seeking some common sense:

For Chris Williams, competition director at World Beer Cup, SNPA’s win as an ESB shows how well Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. understood the character of its beer, as well as the changes in the pale ale category over the years. For about a decade, the competition’s otherwise English-focused ESB category has included an additional set of style guidelines for an “American-style ESB” subcategory, into which Sierra Nevada Pale Ale fits perfectly. “They looked at the specs, they looked at how their beer stacks up, and they were like, ‘That American-style ESB category is a match for our beer…

I’ll ruin Evan’s punch line: “…fans didn’t seem to notice.” Which is definately fair comment… even maybe when taken out of context. For me the whole thing is a bit of a mini-mummer of a muddle that mainly points out that it’s hard to have 1257 styles (or so) and sub-styles (or whatever) then have them shift around over time and space, then expect a clear outcome… or even a useful one! Once again, it’s good to remember this sort of judging is a nice hobby interest for all the participants. Jeff added his thoughts but, I have to say and with respect, the entire discussion has only convinced me again that the main goal of this sort of approach to style is the perpetuation of this approach to style. Does that qualify as what the kids these days are calling propaganda? Me, if I have a SNPA in front of me, I am really only concerned with the taste of the thing in front of me, not whether it has hit the bullseye on the shifting dart board of style. Still, it’s quite a nice hobby for all involved. Nothing wrong with that.

Speaking of what is in the glass itself, still on the run… err… on vacation, Boak and Bailey have been drinking a lot of lager and have come to some conclusions as discussed at and within their monthly newsletter:

When we’re drinking these half-arsed efforts we find ourselves thinking: “Why didn’t they just give that tap over to a lager from another craft brewery that knows what it’s doing? Or to the best of the local mainstream products?” This would, at least, demonstrate good taste. It’s an opportunity to ‘curate’ and to guide. And, yes, some of the national brands in Romania and Bulgaria struck us as pretty decent beers – as if they’ve been overlooked for so long that someone forgot to make them bad. We’d be happy to see them in offer in craft beer bars. If your £6-a-pint in-house lager isn’t better than something we can buy at a normal pub for half the price, or pick up from a cornershop in a scuffed brown bottle for a quid or two, what’s the point?

And The Beer Nut has been considering what to have in his glass (though not yet pouring a cheap sweet wine on ice) as he finds himself right here at the very toe tippy verge of another hot summer, and also drew conclusions:

Probably to be expected given the lactose, it tastes mostly like lemon curd, and can only make the woolliest of claims to being sour. It’s barely even bitter. Half way down I decided to add ice, and honestly I think it improved it. The flavour became less blurry, more spritzy, although less beery as well. I suppose that with “limoncello sour” it’s unsurprising that it would taste quite like an alcopop. As such, it’s a nice and undemanding summer drink, but it doesn’t press the beer buttons. And doesn’t even know where the sour buttons are. I’m unimpressed but I see what they were trying to do.

Is that so very far from Black Tower on ice? Hmm? Well, except for the price I suppose.

Finally, a fond farewell to actor George Wendt who played TV’s favourite guy at the end of the bar, Norm. His obit in The Hollywood Reporter including this explanation of how he managed the role:

The portly, curly-haired Wendt was self-deprecating about his well-honed delivery, contending that the toughest part of his job was drinking the “beer,” a warm, flat, non-alcoholic concoction that was layered with a pinch of salt in every mug to create a TV head. “There I was slamming those down for a whole day. It not only tastes disgusting, I was afraid of keeling over from high blood pressure,” he told The Washington Post in 1985. “Then I got the knack. I didn’t have to put all those brews away. It only mattered when the camera was pointing my way. It took a couple of years, but now I watch the camera. That’s how I make my money. That’s acting.”

Well, there you go. See you, Norm! And until we (not George and me… you and me!) meet again, please check out Boak and Bailey every Saturday (…as long as all their holiday fun doesn’t get in the way…) and Stan (….not quite every week but yes, he was there this time…) each and every Monday. Then listen to a few of the now rarely refreshed Lew’s podcasts and get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by David Jesudason on the (sometimes even but never) odd Fridays. And maybe The British Food History Podcast. Maybe? And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is out there with the all the sweary Mary! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass which is going back to being a blog. Any more? We have Ontario’s own A Quick Beer featuring visits to places like… Michigan! All About Beer has given space to some trade possy podcasts and there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast with an episode just last month!. And there’s the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube. Check out the archives of the Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good but, hmm, they’ve also gone quiet this year. The rest of these are largely dead. And the long standing Beervana podcast …except they have now stood down. As has We Are Beer People. The Share looked to be back with a revival but now its gone quiet. And the Boys Are From Märzen podcast appears suspended as does BeerEdge, too. VinePair packed in Taplines as well. All dead and gone. There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. Nope – that ended a year ago. The Moon Under Water is gone – which is not surprising as the ask was $10 a month. Pete Brown’s one cost a fifth of that – but only had the one post. Such is life. Such is beer podcasting and newlettering!

*Superior reportage from The New York Post: “The Maple Leafs’ alternate captain, Marner, is set to hit free agency this offseason and is expected to depart. After the Maple Leafs allowed three unanswered goals in Game 7, completely taking the air out of their raucous building, Marner yelled at his team on the bench, screaming “wake the f–k up.””

That Musty Box Of Fuller’s Vintage Ales

First conclusion of the experiment: the boxes are far less mould caked
when not left in a corner of a cold room for a decade.

OK, it wasn’t so bad. I was worried there for a bit but its gonna be OK. Turns out I have doubles. I have leeway. But, come to think of it, this box holds ten years of Fuller’s Vintage Ales, 2007 to 2016 and it’s high time I tucked into them. First, I bought them and tucked in right away. Later, I would do some comparing and contrasting, like the .05 v .10 and the ’06 v ’11 but I didn’t keep it up. I just stock piled.

I used to stockpile. Like those Stone Vertical Epic Ale annual releases. Like the Thomas Hardy ales. I ended up giving away Stone’s 05-05-05 to 12-12-12 more out of a sense of boredom than anything. By the end of the project it was a parody of itself. Reports were that a third were great, a third were fine and a few plain sucked. Such is the path of big US craft. Yet, they gave more joy to those gifted than my THA’s are given me now. Yik. Malt reduced to soy sauce. Hops now only offering the residue left after I boiled down my childhood ’45s. So glad I saved them. So, tonight I begin my attack the box at the back of the cellar.

First up and this Fuller’s Vintage Ale 2015 is not giving me the joy. There’s an astringent green vegetable taste in the middle of my pint where, you know, rosy cheeked English youth gathering in autumn’s harvest should be gamboling… cavorting even. But it’s clear and the colour of a love match between a lump of amber and a chestnut – which I will grant you is a bit of a range. And it raises a good head. As ale it is not fouled. BAer review speak of a wooden bitterness. I get that. Don’t want it. But I get it. Yet… as it sits it moves from astringent green vegetable to astringent exotic orange-like citrus fruit you couldn’t pronounce but thought you would buy anyway because “hey, it’s Christmas!” and then you find it dried out a bit at the back of the shelf weeks later, closer to February than December. Which is better. I now get some husky grain. I can even see Seville marmalade from here. Even if made by my cray cray great-aunt well past her marmalade glory days. Household helpful hint: open this and let it breath for an hour.

I had to wash both bottles of the 2014. The first one I pulled out was stored upside down and it’s showing a need to sit for a bit. Cloudy. And both have stage one designate substance issues on the box and label. In the mouth, again with the musty staleness. Gonna let it sit a bit but at least its not paying homage to a green pepper. Later. Better. Still maybe infanticide as the flavours have not resolved. There is a hay loft grainy dry as well as a a rich earthiness. If my garden compost tasted like this I’d be ecstatic. Thinking about it, Gouda and mushrooms on toast. That would work well with this. Later still, the narrative is adds a dry stone aspect. I am now walking on a path on a hot day through rocky fields like those in our nearby fine wine region. The hops after an hour have a rich sweet field herb and mint aspect. I once owned a scythe and an acre garden needing tending. This is taking me back there.

[More later. An on-going project… until it’s all gone.]

A few days later, the 2013. Bottle washed and cap popped. Cold. Canadian cellar in February cold. Gotta let it sit but the first sniff and sip are promising. Cream, grain and rich sweetness. Unlike its two juniors, nothing off yet. Receding beef brothiness shifting towards sweet stewed apple. But mainly a mouthful of husky graininess. And cream. Brie cream, though. The cream made by the Brie cows. There’s something going on there. A Brie thing. Brie-like. Maybe. Thick viscous stuff. But no earthy brooding and nothing like Seville marmalade. Fresh and open an hour later. A lovely beer.

One more week has passed. The 2012 just opened had a far less challenging bottle. Cold from the final few boxes in the beer cellar it is stunning, exemplifying what I absolutely love about great beers. Masses of cream cut orange marmalade. I curse 49 year old me for not buying cases and cases of this. Kumquat even. I say that as a man who just this very afternoon roasted two chickens stuffed with kumquats. Just saying. Go eat kumquats if you don’t understand. Tangy, fresh, intense, bright citrus. I am pouring half an inch at a time into a dimpled pint mug and ramming my nose in, sucking the aroma in deeply. [That, by the way, is how to drink fine beer according to me.] As it warms, the graininess starts to assert itself. So now it is like wholewheat bread with a double cream and marmalade spread. I should be graphing this, with different brightly colour lines tracing the taste every fifteen minutes. I am going to leave it there. I am having a moment. OK… ten minutes later weedy herbal notes as well as a nod to beef broth come out. Stunning.

Not Beer: Welcome To Seed Catalogue Reading Time

I know I mentioned I am sick of winter but did I mention I am sick of winter? I did? OK. Did I mention that I am already gearing up for spring planting. With any luck, three or four weeks from now I will take out the bag of soil I keep in the basement all winter, dump it on the ground and ram in a bunch of pea seeds. It’s my way of shaking a fist at the lingering frost. Peas like a few other common vegetables survive early frosts quite well. Not hard in these parts to get a few crops in that might start providing some salady bits before mid-May. The first peas are as good as the first tomatoes – except they come two months earlier.

It’s not the only bet I will have at play in the garden. I’ve left parsnips and leeks to overwinter. More than one pot of soup to be made of the sweetened roots. Saison Dupont’s true partner is fresh spring harvested parsnip. I pulled that batch up there out of our suburban front lawn a couple of years ago. Need fresh seed for the 2016 crop. There’s parsley and chives and maybe a few other herbs under the drifts waiting to send out fresh shoots, too. The other great spring crop is bok choi. I only learned this two growing seasons ago when I bought a pack on a whim. It grows like mad in the cool spring air and again in a second season in autumn. Ten bucks gets you 1,000 seeds if you buy the commercial grower size packs. That’s a lot of small shoots, a lot of dinners.

I am convinced one of the best ways to understand beer is to understand all the things you can eat and drink. Better than buying hydroponically fed, commercially produced veg growing food will give you an earthier experience as well as a small but direct appreciation of agriculture and some of the tensions plants face. Beer, after all, is a result of our relationship with edible plants.

Beets, Beet Greens, Fence Posts And Poppies

A busy Remembrance Day. Elementary school assembly hall at 9:15 am then right over to the main City of Kingston gathering. I say the main one as there is another which starts about 15 minutes earlier for the Royal Canadian Horse Artillery about 200 yards away, then one for the Burma Star after the main one, then one after that at the naval memorial. All are well attended. And well protected. A large police presence with other sorts of security moving around us. All well received. Except by that guy with the black back pack on the bike. Seriously. He went on his way after a good searching.

Lunched. Being off work while the kids are at school does wonders for the luncheon scene. Luncheon dates need a revival. Our first time at Carmelinda’s. No avacado to be seen but a solid and surprisingly good chicken sandwich. Thence to Home Depot for stuff to further fix the fence. 12 gauge metal plate to screw in across a week spot. $3.39. It must be 45 weeks since the ice storm of last December. I have the fence 78% fixed and will have to get through another winter in that admittedly enhanced state even if the rot is in. It actually feels fairly solid even if it’s all jury rigged. Cheap and jury rigged. Needs to be cheap seeing that the new in-the-wall oven is coming in two weeks. Why?

Oh me nerves. Convection oven fan motor fried right at the end of roasting the chicken for dinner. It made a funny noise and, when I looked in the oven, the fan at the back was glowing bright orange like the coals at the foot of the gates of hell. Race downstairs. Shout to the kids to get upstairs. Thinking of how to call the fire dept. Pull fuse for oven. No flames when I get back upstairs. Leave oven door open to let everything cool. Then find a really good bottle of port. Because the chicken was, in fact, done. Like the oven. And roasted chicken and roasted convection oven fan both good with good port.

That was Saturday night. Me on Facebook, Oh. Me. Nerves. So, a new oven is coming.

And then the beets. Maybe 15 pounds of them? A third of a bucket with a full bucket of greens. Chopped the greens, sauteed them in olive oil and garlic, added a little ham, a little mustard. Kids ate it with a 60% rate of enthusiasm. I’ve seen worse.

Garden 2013: A Week Into July And Where Are We?

So, there are beans. A patch of soldier beans from Johnny’s seeds that should flower and pod, then fade and die before any are picked. Dried beans for winter to be slow baked with molasses and bacon. Bombastic bowel-tastic beans waiting for an evening with Hockey Night in Canada as a blizzard howls outside. The bok choi and mustards have flowered with the advent of heat. The lettuces are still coming on with new sowings. Grapes are looking very good as is the tower of potatoes. There are hundreds of sugar snap pea pods waiting to be picked now. The lad ate a raspberry from his own property today.

More seeds will be planted before work this week. Tender carrots for September and October need to get in the ground now. You mail order seeds in February to plan for spring. You sow seeds in July planning for autumn. It’s never about now.

Garden 2013: Lots To Eat… Including By Rabbits

Rabbits. I have seen them around the raised beds out front in the mornings when I head to work. But I had no idea that it had come to this. Beet eating. Frigging cheater pants rabbits are eating my beets and swiss card even if they are leaving the mustard greens, spinach and basil. Thing is… I like beets. Which is, of course why I planted them in the first place. For my eating, not theirs.

Out back there are parsnips, carrots, bok choi, onions, leeks, grapes, radishes, lettuce, peas and the amazing tower of potatoes. A chipmunk is eating the sunflowers but I feel less offended by that. I don’t eat sunflowers or chipmunks. And I am not allowed to trap the rabbits to eat them. It is an unfair deal. The tower of spuds is the year’s biggest innovation. Multilayer rings of seed potatoes on the outside of the tower, compost rich soil in the core and layered between the rings. They grow out the top and through the sides of the mesh. We’ll see what happens.

Garden 2013: The Last Of The Parsnip Crop

One of my favorite things to do is to not do something. Last year, I planted parsnips, onions and carrots in the square of soil by the front door. The carrots got dug up in early October and the onions were lifted a month earlier. But five parsnips were left in the ground all winter. Where they apparently grew. I had to dig around each root down around a foot and pull on the damn things. I left at least a quarter inch width of each in the ground. They came out with a snap.

Garden 2013: It’s Still March But Planting’s Begun

It has begun. A sunny Saturday reaching up towards maybe 7F today. I took down the cold frame that sat out back all winter and found one lone red lettuce plant growing along with a fair number of carrots. Leeks survived, hilled, out back and out front. Parsnips are starting to poke up enough green to betray their hiding spots.

Soups of ginger and parsnip are a-comin’. Peas have already been planted twice and some of the onion seedlings in the basement might actually survive. Rhubarb is a red ball pushing up through the leaves. But, best of all, that is the plot of garlic planted last fall showing itself.

Garden 2012: Root Vegetables For Thanksgiving Dinner

Three types of carrots. The smaller ones to be roasted with olive oil. The bigger ones will be shredded and mixed with parsley, garlic and rice wine vinegar in a salad. Add to that swiss chard with tarragon and orange zest as well as box choi with fish sauce and lime juice. Not to mention small onions roasting under the dripping beef. Lawn food is good.

Garden 2012: Making Meals From The Harvest

Yellow carrots. Small onions. Mine. Bought the seeds for the carrots in early March from Stokes. The variety is Yellowbunch and the seeds cost $2.25 a packet. Been eating them for likely 2 months now. Next year I am buying ten times as much. I believe I planted the carrots from May 5 until mid-July. Some are over a foot long now. Others are tiny like those above. The green bits taste like parsley when lightly roasted. Next year the spuds will be mine as well. I am building a tower, a crib, a box. Fill with soil. Ram spuds in through the sides. Potato high rise. A spuddy ziggurat.