vancouver craft beer week’s good vs evil at waazubee last night was fabulous!
i have all sorts of notes, in varying degrees of legibility… here they are, for what they’re worth! photos to follow.
Russell’s Angry Scotch Ale: nice head. dark as treacle, but not hazy or opaque. i can see why it won a bronze medal at the world cup of beer. malty, toasty, with a little coffee. delightfully dark. 4.5%
oh boy, full-sized sleeves are gonna kick our fargin’ arses
[i chatted up the rep and he said that the lemon ale that i sampled the night before at st. augustine’s is cleared of all its yeast and that’s why its so un-hefeweisen-like and refreshing. and probably why i actually liked a wheat beer!]
Howe Sound’s Pothole Filler limited edition oatmeal stout: 9% and 65 IBUs. a meal in a glass – you could fill a pothole with it. brown head. opaque. lots of coffee. good thing we had this early so as to work our way back up to hungry for the appys. went straight to bridget’s head, did not even pass go or collect $200.
[i chatted up the rep and he confirmed that this limited edition of the John Mitchell series is still available at the specialty beer stores in town. they brewed more litres than usual of it (my notes say 100,000 litres, but who knows if that’s what he actually said!). the imperial red three beavers is over now, but so popular that it will be back next year. total eclipse of the hops should be out soon. it’ll be an imperial ipa with 90 IBUs. oh, and apparently nigel at the alibi room really loves the pothole filler]
lord, this is the night of the two-sandwich beers!
Lighthouse Keepers Stout: opaque, lovely brown head, 5.1%. malty coffe nose, not heavy like a stout – called a stout but touted as a black ale – not a sandwich, for a black opaque bevvie its practically a summer brew. refreshing… believe it or not. not unlike the Okanagan Springs black – is this a gateway stout for lager drinkers?
Tree Captivator Doppelbock: lovely amber colour, fucking refreshing. an amber somehow is so good with food, and we drank this one with our appy plate. our food pairing that maybe Tree doesn’t want associated with them: deep fried salmon nuggets with tartar sauce, followed by brownies with tartar sauce is simply beyond words. sublime comes close. we do apologize to Tree – we heart them and we really heart this beer but we are overwhelmed by the food and the drunk night now and can’t give this beer an unbiased review. frankly we just want to roll around in it. be a fountain of it. we are naughty, we will still respect it in the morning.
[good lord, it was 9:00 by this time, 2 hours and 4 beers into the night, that is all i have to say in my defence]
[chatted up our next table neighbours from CAMRA, who told us that Crannog grows their own organic hops, and after the horrible hops decline last year are now supplying many breweries with hops. yay, organic hops for all!]
major thumbs up to Tree who stood in for Cannery who provided their Apricot Ale and Blackberry Porter for tasting, but didn’t show up to pour it for us. apparently Tree has been pouring for them all week. we were told that Cannery only has five employees so that might be why they aren’t showing up, but its still not good form not to hire someone for the event. again, very nice of Michelle from Tree to be doing her job and helping out a fellow brewer.
[now on to my food rant – please bear in mind that the food was beyond yummy and so very necessary after four beers with two more to go, and i was very happy to see there was only one appy i wasn’t able to eat…also very wonderful was the concept of having my own personal plate of appys delivered to me when i decided i wanted them – stroke of genius!] disappointed that when i asked for my appy plate to skip the pork and replace with more veggies or seafood that i got a plate with only nachos, guacamole, brownie, cabbage, cucumber and battered salmon nuggets. no yam fries, no regular fries, no prawns. no idea why they chose these exclusions. upon a petulant whine, my two prawns and regular fries were brought to me.
Lighthouse Fisard 150: bavarian lager out of the bottle. like stella, better than heineken. we like it. refreshing. not overly carbonated. bavarians are a little bland if you ask me… am i an ale snob? probably… but i quite like this lager. could keep drinking it if there weren’t other flavours to try.
Russell Honey Lager: clear, headless, so pale golden. not bad, not standing out – could be we’re not honey drinkers or lager drinkers. we don’t hate it… we just don’t want 8. nuff said… moving on
oh no… we have 2 tickets and only 2 wheat beers left to try. dammit. [neither bridget nor i are fans of the wheat beer]
Howe Sound Whitecap Wheat: coriander and orange. distinctinve. but i may be too drunk to appreciate its subtleties. its just too much. too much coriander makes it bitter in a non-hoppy way. if they tone it down – not get rid of it – i’d like it.
Tree Hefeweisen: number one hefe in canada. so cloudy. did they clear it at all? no? yikes. banana and clove flavours are distinct, but no aroma of same. i taste yeasty wheat and so i tapped out. i just don’t like the hefeweisen.
parting thought: ode to a keg – what do they do with leftovers after an event like this? leave it at the venue, take it with them to the next event, donate it, what?
and those are my notes from last night.
today i feel fabulous, not at all like i had six full sleeves in three hours! thank dog for those appys!
Beck's Beer Blog - test 