Ontario – Page 16 – A Good Beer Blog

A Good Beer News Roundup For An October Tuesday

“Ah!” That’s what I hear you all say… “aaaaaahhhh!” Feet go up. Glasses get adjusted and you tuck yourself in for another fabulous edition of the unscheduled beer news roundup. See, Stan may post a round up every Monday while Boak and Bailey do the same most Saturdays. But it’s that unscheduled aspect that brings that extra zest to these particular news items.

=> I am really bored with the anti-shaker glass stuff that is still going around. Strikes me as the next phase of some concerted effort towards the snobbification of beer rolled out to justify supplemental price hikes above inflation. In 2008, a strong argument was made for just sticking one’s nose in the glass rather than letting the glass do the work. I described the same thing over at Stan’s in 2012. Can’t handle a simple beer glass? Already pint-sized Nonic letting you down somehow? Boo hoo. What next? What’s it mean? First craft v crafty. Next, local is unreliable. Now, large measures for low prices are bad. Sooner or later beer drinkers are going to realize they can’t afford all these big craft demands.

=> The New York Times has jumped into the discussion with an editorial today which includes the assertion “the big brewers have used their clout to try to slow the growth of craft beer companies by offering distributors and retailers incentives not to carry smaller labels.” This is really interesting as last night in Massachusetts on Twitter… or is that Twitter broadcast from Massachusetts… Dan Paquette, the co-founder of Boston’s Pretty Things Beer & Ale Project, a craft brewery, called out not only bars but other craft brewers who appeared to be offering retailers incentives to get placed ahead of craft brewers who didn’t pay to play: “The Mass Brewers Guild has no opinion on buying lines since they have many members who do it as a policy.” Jeese, I thought they were steamed over the whole “sandwich tongs” thing. So… if a lot of craft brewers are doing this… what was the NYT’s point saying it was a big beer thing? More here on Boston.

=> In case you were wondering, here in Ontario such things are also specifically against the provincial liquor law known as the Liquor License Act. See, section 21 of Regulation 719 states: “The holder of a licence shall not directly or indirectly request, demand or receive any financial or material benefit from a manufacturer of liquor or a representative or an employee of the manufacturer.” And section 2(1) of Regulation 720 states: “A manufacturer of liquor or an agent or employee of a manufacturer shall not directly or indirectly offer or give a financial or material inducement to a person who holds a licence or permit under the Act or to an agent or employee of the person for the purpose of increasing the sale or distribution of a brand of liquor.” Those two laws ban both sides of the “pay to play” cash for draught lines diddle that was complained about by Pretty Things last night. Ben’s already established it goes on in Toronto’s craft scene.

=> I never thought I would say it but I am with Paul Mangledorf. Who? The guy quoted at the outset of this piece by anthropologist John W. Arthur thinking out loud about the origins of grain growing being cause by brewing or baking. Why one or the other, says I! Why can’t it be both beer and bread concurrently? One interesting nugget noted by Ian S. Hornsey in Chapter 4 of Alcohol and its Role in the Evolution of Human Society, published by The Royal Society of Chemistry in 2012, is how wheat had long been considered the finest grain for the brewing of beer. Evidence of wheat brewing in the Celtic culture of Bavaria dates to 800 BC. It is described as being the basis for the finest beers well into the relatively recent Baroque era in Europe. In North America, wheat held sway until the early 1800s. Barley has been with us for as long as wheat has but, as the poorer foundation for bread, inherently poses a question about the reason for its co-existence. Maybe… just maybe… the two worked to create a range of options. Why wouldn’t they?

There. That’s likely more than you can handle on a Tuesday. Take it in small bites… or sips I suppose. Stick your nose in deep if you take my advice.

A Summer Sunday Beer News Roundup

News round ups are sort of the sweat pants of blogging. A pal calls sweat pants “give ups” and I suppose that might apply to my links posts. Yet, sometimes there are actually a number of things worth noting but not really worth going into in any depth around here. And, yes, I wait with rapt attention every Saturday for the BB version and Monday for Stan’s. So, you decide. Am I watching a baseball game and doing laundry as I write this post half heartedly or am I really paying attention to the top news in the brewing world and sharing them with you… [ooh, Giants on first and second… game might get away from the Dodgers…]

=> I suppose we need to acknowledge the big craft botch of the week. Jordan and Maxand Craig all posted about it, the co-author triumvirate. Me, I think of two things. First, I have not bought a Rogue beer since I read about their employment practices. Second, I stood in a Price Chopper in NNY last Wednesday trying to understand why a Stone mix 12 pack was $24 when all the other excellent craft mix 12 packs were 15-19. Needless to say, I passed. I may not be worthy (like anyone should give a crap) but that was simply not worth it – especially as, when you strip away all the noise, it is for the most part just very decent gas station and grocery beer with hundreds of siblings. I am sure they did not want to come away looking greedy and insulting but they sure have found a way.

=> Not a lot of people who have not earned the right have drained beer from the Stanley Cup. Note the Habs player respected the voodoo by using a straw.

=> By my count, ATJ has been writing an increased number of his wonderful vignettes on the experience of beer and pub lately. His finest so far is last week’s “Brewery fresh” in which a cask arrives and then another.

=> Best news related to opening of Stone City Ales in my own hometown this past Friday goes to Jordan’s tweet: “Mom is already dropping off beer to Stone City Ales in Kingston to get them to brew things she wants to drink. I’ve created a monster.” I had a half-growler of their 12 Star session ale. Delish.

=> If you are going to compare beer and wine, you had best understand the wine side of the equation but seldom seen amongst the chatting beery consultant class. One example of many. The fact is that fleets of bulk cargo carriers’ worth of sauvignon blanc have been delightfully downed with forest of asparagus since, well, since the Romans rules the known world. Wagner points us to the better approach.

There you have it. The weekend is winding up and I thank my lucky stars that I once again missed the TFOB. I love Mr. B’s succinct comparison with the new fest in nearby Buffalo, NY. It’s good getting past such things, now thinking myself too old to, say, hang food about one’s neck… well, at least in public. Not that it’s the worst thing in beer this week. No, this might be that. Or the botch. There. List’s done. Stan’s up tomorrow morning. When there isn’t a distracting ballgame on.

Ontario: Uber, Nickel Brook Brewing, Burlington

What a minefield this beer presents me. Not only do I know and like the brewer but his mother lives nearby and his auntie works where I do. How could I possible give an opinion unbouyed by positive thoughts? Then again, it’s not like I am all Jim–junkety or anything. No need to stop using the bathroom mirror. Then, besides that, there is the question of what others might think of me – which can be odd and disconcerting – not to mention likely wrong. How dare I try something not conservative? But more importantly, what does it mean about this style? What does this beer in this place and time mean?

You will recall the the best expression of what style is was Jackson’s first go at it, before he went bad Aristotelian creating the mess we live with today. Originally, a style of beer was stylized after an example, a great beer. I think it is fair to say that practically speaking that example is the Weihenstephen Berliner Weiss I wrote about for Session 19 – if for no other reason that for a long while this was the only example you were going to lay your hands on in North America. That is until micro went craft. So, is this homage or dommage to the style? Should I care?

The beer pours an effervescent clear light gold. No head at all. On the snort, you get apple cider and cow poo of the nicest kind. In the mouth, a light and lightly astringent texture holds flavours of apple, meadow grass, minerals like a good Mosel, fresh lemon juice, a little cream of wheat like a good gueuze and a little little something vegetative like fresh cabbage or cauliflower. A really lovely sipper and at 3.8% a beer you can sip for a good long time.

What a relief! No ethical qualms!! Priced at $7.95 for 750ml, this is about twice as much as the brewers hefty IPA Headstock, one of the best values in beer in Canada. The BAers give it lots of positivitay… which is good.

Ontario: Conductor’s, Junction Craft Brewing, Toronto

This was the beer that caused a slight rift in the fabric of that great evening three weeks ago with Ron, Jordan and Peter. We were at the end of the middle act of the night at 3030 when we all had this same one last beer, brewed within walking distance of the bar. “Mmm… sweet malty goodness,” says I. “Yik, crystal malt,” said another. And we were off. The brewery says of this beer: “Our signature brew is Conductor’s Craft Ale, a ‘hopbacked’ hybrid ale utilizing British, German and American brewing techniques.” I can see your furrowed brow. Me, too.

The beer pours a pleasant clear filbert paper brown under a rocky egg white head. Plenty of nut aromas. In the mouth, this is quite interesting. More nut than dried fig along with a crusty brown breadiness and a touch of dry cocoa. The whole thing is framed by a really clever hop choices: black tea and twiggy, then a bit of steel and then spicy pine resin at the end. There is a lot going on. When I described some of these flavours, Ron suggested disapprovingly it sounded like Wells Bombardier, a beer I wrote positively of a a decade ago. This one has more acidity and complexity than likely you would find in Bombardier now.

The main thing I thought the beer illustrated were the off pale malts, maybe the lightest of the crystals. In certain circles, these are unfashionable flavours in beer right now. Beery flavours. Boethius would understand. Perfect match for a plain Snappy Griller with its white pepper jag on a billowy bun. I look down at the average BAer’s view.

Last Night I Heard The Jet Planes Land

Somehow, Toronto achieved a late spring evening without humidity or auto exhaust or heat or crowds or any of the other things that make me not love going to Toronto in the warm months. Maybe they were all at other events or at the cottage. Whatever it was, it was a great night for walking from bar to bar with good company. A good night for taxis, too, as the only hotel room I could get was out by the airport. The planes land every 45 seconds through the night. In case you were wondering.

We met in the mid-afternoon at Stout, a pub off Parliament on Carleton. Ron was drinking Nickle Brook’s imperial stout. He must have liked it because he had another. Jordan was drinking a sensible Muskoka Detour. We were joined by home brewer Peter Friesen who had arranged Ron’s presentation the next day at Toronto Brewing Co. Ron is on the Great Lakes portion of his global tour. We then drove about 25 miles to drop off my car and then taxi back into the Junction district via highways showing their age, past 1970s concrete office towers with neon signs proclaiming things like “Canada Bread” where, according to Jordan, Carol works in accounting. We stopped at Indie Ale House and 3030 in the Junction before finishing at Bellwoods.

I won’t play by play the consumption but a couple of things stuck with me. One thing was a lot of of the people out and about were loud mixed groups of friends with, especially at Bellwoods, almost half being young women. Sure people were on dates, too, but there was solid representation of the genderless interest in good beer and good food that gave me hope for my school-aged daughters’s future. Also, a difference between Indie Ale House and Bellwoods was primarily in their brewing choices. In many other ways, they were very similar. The food at both places was excellent and reasonably price… and both served their meals on those individual slabs of lumber which will one day keep cottagers toasty as these burn in their fireplaces after this trend passes.

What set them apart was how at the Indie the beers were decidedly leaning towards the added flavours school of craft brewing while at Bellwoods there was a bit more of a traditional approach. Both were largely excellent. The IPA at Indie was extremely fruity, even more fruit cocktail than, say, Kipling. But it was cut neatly by the arugula side salad next to my smokehouse burger. At Bellwoods, an undoctored guest cider from West Avenue went down exceptionally well with a rabbit on toast thingie. OK, it was rillettes de lapin which I have only bought in Quebec so I translate it as thingie so you will understand. The unadorned brown beer there was also really good. Jordan convinced me to eat a duck heart. You should eat a duck heart.

A good evening out. But for the lack of hearty north woods plaid chic, you might have even thought you were on Duluth in Montreal. Which is a very good thing.

May Two-Four And Our Well-Wishing To The Crown

Even though it is just the 17th of May, this weekend is nicknamed May Two-Four. It is Canada’s non-much-observed celebration of the lass who was Queen Victoria. Monday is still called Victoria Day. It also has a quiet subtext of somehow being the celebration of the present Queen’s birthday. If those are the dimming antecedents, the once glowing purposes of the day – they are doubly wrong. Our current absentee monarch was born on an April 21st. Vicky was born in May 24th but, as you may note, that is not today’s date.

And yet this is the weekend of May Two-Four. Not next weekend which contains the twenty-fourth day of May. This one. Why? Because a two-four is the name of a cardboard case of 24 bottles of beer. Twenty-four 12 ounce bottles is that unit that is beyond personal consumption. It implies either sharing or duration. A long warm weekend is apt for both. And gardening and fireworks. Because we have no real remaining cultural focus on this long weekend, unlike any other long Canadian weekend, we are now free to create our own. So we think about drink in itself. We just enjoy ourselves.

It was not always so. In the course of co-writing one book on the history of beer in Ontario and another on Albany, I have written about three drink laced celebrations of the Monarch’s birthday in 1755, 1776 and 1828. As I mentioned the other week, Sir William Johnson supplied the Royal loyal allies of the monarchy, the Mohawk nation of central New York, with beer during the Seven Years War – aka the French and Indian War. One of those deliveries, as noted at page 572, was on June 4, 1755 when he obtained two barrels of beer from Hendrik Fry for the Mohawk at Conajoharee to drink to toast the birthday of George III. As I wrote a year ago, Craig and I located the scene of the drunken tavern brawl 21 years later in Albany which finally ripped that city’s Tories and Patriots apart triggered by overly vigorous toasting to the King. Perhaps my favorite Royal birthday celebration in British North American happened about half a century later. As you will see in Ontario Beer, at a celebration of the King George IV’s birthday hosted by the Canada Company on 12 August 1828, 200 settlers gathered at what is now Guelph when it was at the point where the forest met the clearing of fields. A whole ox was roasted held over the fire with logging chains. As there were few utensils, most of it was eat off of wooden shingle plates with a stick for a fork. After the eating was done:

…toasts were drunk to everybody and every conceivable thing, the liquors of all imaginable descriptions being passed round in buckets from which each man helped himself by means of tin cups…

It is recorded that many were found the next morning reposing on the ground in the marketplace “in loving proximity to the liquor pails.”

Now, I am not suggesting we take our Canadian admiration of the Crown to that point. But… it is a proud tradition. It brought together peoples as loyal allies, insulted our treacherous enemies and celebrated the new frontier in our new homeland. If I had my druthers, that would be what we celebrate today. Not so much the Crown or a particular monarch but the loyal pioneers who defended the cause and created the nation. And drank like idiots as they did and because they did. Because we are like that.

Ontario: All Quiet About Beer On The Election Front

OK, so far the Ontario provincial election appears to be playing out as an effort to ensure the same outcome as last time. As a result, even though it is an excellent time to discuss beer buying policy in the province, no one is doing so… yet. Fervent please by bloggers, newspaper columnists, commercial interests which were winding the story up just a few weeks ago have also gone quite quiet. Odd. Can’t be the interim blackout on political advertising. It was not always so. If we consult the book we see that in 1924, when Ontario was fed up with the strictest form of dry law under provincial law beer sales became a widely fought public issue:

Support for temperance was weakening based on the public awareness of the failure of the law and corruption it brought. In October of 1924, when another plebiscite on temperance was held, the vote against repeal had fallen to only 51.5%. Major population centres like Toronto, Ottawa, Hamilton and Windsor all voted against keeping the law. In response, Premier Ferguson raised the strength of permitted light beer to 4.4 proof from 2.5 and also redistributed the seats in the legislature to remove wet seats and add dry ones. Reaction to the new beer was not rabid as one newspaper noted:

To the imbibers who thought that they were going to get some kick out of the potation, the ordination was as disappointing as a cancelled marriage license to an old maid. Many of them claimed, in fact, that the new beverage bore such a family likeness to the old 2 percent that it might be its twin brother. Unlike the stuff that made Milwaukee famous, there was no blinds staggers accumulated from the new suds. Temperance people who thought the wolf was here in sheep’s clothing will have to wait a while.

Not surprisingly, Ferguson won re-election in December, 1926 on the platform of repeal of the temperance law and replacement with a system of government controlled liquor sales.

So, beer retailing can become a winning story even if it does not seem to be doing so now. Either one of two things is happening. Folk are not as motivated in 2014 to pursue the political route to effect beer retailing change as they were ninety years ago in 1924… or politicians have not had the interests of the public effectively brought to their attention as a vote getter. I suspect it is the first possibility as there has been plenty in the news. It’s just that the story has not been made compelling enough yet to actual inspire real action, to move people to switch habits at the ballot box.

The strangest thing, however, is how like Premier Ferguson in the early 1920’s any of the three main political parties could themselves use it to justify getting votes if they just framed it as an illustration of their core values. Sure, the Tories under Tim Hudak have supported corner store sales but only tepidly so despite it being a tale of small business and personal freedoms. Beer as the drink of the working class sure could be again framed as a boon to the left, the union made drink of the little guy and the NDP – but so far the party is only “open to new ideas.” The Grits under Premier Wynne have sided with the no vote so deeply that it might be tough to now shift, preferring to take the “we control stuff so you don’t have to” route. Gridlock.

What is needed is a compelling new angle for one of these parties to latch on to as a way to present itself as mirroring a compelling positive public need back to the public. What is it and who gets to it first?

Albany Ale: Beer Rewarded Loyalty Against New France

A month or less to go for the delivery of the Albany and Upper Hudson Valley beer history and Craig and I are putting on the almost finishing touches. One difficult stretch was the first two-thirds of the 1700s as, basically, the same families kept brewing and – surprise – got richer generation by generation. Fortunately, a war broke out in the middle of the century to spice things up. I had presumed that the only news would be about the suspension of brewing as that is what war does… among other things. But then I came across this in his papers:

These are accounts from William Johnson, the 1st Baronet of New York and a personal favorite of mine. Near my work there are two streets, “William” and “Johnson” which commemorate the guy whose son helped settle our fair city. But that was after the war after the one just begun when these accounts were noted in 1755. In 1755, the Mohawk, the British and the Dutch were all united against New France and its plans for invasion from the north. In the defense of the empire, Billy Johnson did everything he could think of including, apparently, shelling out beer.

I had known he was a beer buyer but not like this. Names like Hendrick Fry appear in these accounts, some the same as names that appear over a decade later in the lists of members in the Masonic Lodge at Albany. The accounts show how barrels of beer were used to retain and reward loyalty with the Mohawk allies in the summer leading up to a campaign at the south end of the Champlain valley when Johnson took on the French and kept them from marching farther on to Albany.

The last image on the right is interesting. It makes passing reference to one Barent Vrooman. Vroomans were a Dutch brewing dynasty who, like their fellows, expanded from the Hudson valley into Schenectady in the late 1600s and then into the western stretches of what was then called Albany County in the first half of the 1700s. Barent the brewer died in 1746 so this must be a nephew or a cousin. In any event, Johnson seems to have sent him something more useful than beer. He sent a Mohawk warrior to guard him.

Ontario: It’s Beer Book Page Proof Reading Time

obbpage21 Even though I have been writing about beer for over a decade, I have not had the pleasure of the page proof experience before. It balances between sheer terror and giddy delight as I see that so much of what I hoped for the book Jordan and I have been working on since last summer has come into being – while at the same time I am still correcting myself on a few last tiny things. Oh. Me. Nerves.

The best stuff frankly relates to things beyond my doing. That is the top of page 21 over there. Jordan selected the photo and wrote the caption. The good folk at History Press chose the font and prepared the layout. And, as noted, even a major concept at that point of the story was provided by sometimes comment maker around here Steve Gates. The bibliography sets out a selection of the sources relied upon but it still runs for three and a half pages. I just wrote the text at that bit. I wrote it before Christmas. Rereading your own work at page proof time confirms the adage that the past is a foreign land.

I like the co ver, too. Didn’t know I would. Someone else took care of it. It’s odd. There are so many people involved. I had no idea. Blog writing is so private by comparison.

Why Does The NYT Perpetuate A US Craft Fiction?

Stan linked to a NYT opinion piece by Steve Hindy who is correctly identified as “a founder and the president of Brooklyn Brewery and a member of the Brewers Association board of directors.” I think it struck me a little differently from Stan. Consider this:

…state laws continue to empower distributors to select brands and manage them however they want — selling those they choose to sell, while letting other brands sit in their warehouses. The only recourse is to sue, and many small breweries lack even a fraction of the resources needed to take on a big distributor in court. As a result, they’re stuck with the bad distributor, which severely hampers their ability to perform and grow as a business. Buy a small brewer a beer, and pretty soon he or she will be regaling you with war stories about fights with distributors…

See what’s going on? Small brewers. No discussion about the different effect regulations have on actual small brewers compared to big national craft brewers like Brooklyn and the other oft cited Dogfish Head. As the owner of Notch Brewing, Chris Loring, recently shared with Max, the interests of big national craft are very much at odds with the interests of actual small and local breweries. The opinion piece, as would be expected from its source, references nothing of that. Gripes about regulations from state to state are only a burden to those business folk whose aims include 18 wheel transportation and national advertising campaigns.

So, while the title of the bit is “Free Craft Beer!” it really could better be “Unleash The Opportunity For Brewers With Scale!” We know what would happen were this sort of shift to occur. We’ve seen it before. It happened in North America in the 1860s to 1890s. It wasn’t that laws were change so much as the railway established itself. All over Ontario many many small brewers making good beer were crushed when previously local brewers like Labatt and Carling out of the southwestern town of London got their casks out of their towns and into the province, the nation and then the world. Yes, that Labatt and that Carling. Prohibition did not close the breweries. Advantages of scale did. The wiping away of borders and other obstacles did. As you can read in the article “The Canadian Brewing Industry’s Reponse to Prohibition 1874-1916” by Matthew J Bellemy in Brewing History, there were 61 breweries in Ontario at the turn of the twentieth century. There were 49 in 1915 and 23 two years later. The strictest form of temperance law imposed locally came into force in 1916. Historically, it is clear that beer and brewing likes a few things like peace and a good growing season. It also likes oligopoly. Beer responds well to aggregation. We know that because all big beer was once small.

Actual small, local and well made beer is antagonistic to oligopolistic economic forces. Actual small batch beer made by actual small brewers is easily crushed. By perpetuating the idea that there is that one homogenous thing called “craft beer” and “small brewers” we ignore that big commercial brewing enterprises are different. We cover over the fact that intra-national importing brewers moving beer coast to coast in the US like Brooklyn, Dogfish Head, Stone or Sierra Nevada pose as much or a greater danger to actual small brewers than Bud or – what ever is like Bud but not Bud – does. It is not wicked that this is the case… but it is a natural economic force. If you want to live in a world with brewers making good beer in every second town you may want to take what national and now exporting international craft argues with a healthy dose of skepticism. A healthy dose of skepticism actually pairs extremely well with actual small scale, local and good brewing.