st. augustine’s sampling

i rounded out my sampler at st. augustine’s last night with rogue’s yellow snow ipa, cannery’s squire scotch ale and longwood’s russian imperial stout.

i love the rogue, and the yellow snow is no exception.  i add it to my sampler somewhat regularly out of an abundance of caution.  i had a bottle of it once that must have been quite off because it was one of the worst things i’ve ever tasted.  as that was my first yellow snow experience i thought maybe it was just a bad beer.  luckily i trusted in rogue and tried it again on tap.  and loved it.  so i tried it again on tap.  and loved it.  and now i’m caught in the cycle of having to check back in with it from time to time just to make sure that first bottle was off…

the scotch ale had lovely smoky malty notes in it, balancing nicely with hoppity hops.  i quite enjoyed it.  but like several of the more novelty beers, the smoky flavour didn’t particularly make me want to have more than my sampler size of it.

the stout was lovely and dense, with all the right malty coffee notes.

alison rounded out her sampler with salt spring ales golden spike ale, pike brewing’s xxxxx stout and the yellow snow.  she was quite pleased with them all.  of the yellow snow she says:  love this!  nice hop, kind of almost too fruity, but not really”.

bridget also went with pike’s xxxxx stout, st. augustine’s lager and lost coast’s indica ipa.  she liked them all just fine, but particularly the stout and the ipa (which are her two favourite styles… just sayin’).

i had wanted to try the swans arctic ale, but they were out of it.  i’m not sure i’ve ever had a “canadian-style light ale” and really wanted to know what it was going to be like.  next time perhaps.

more about our pint and bottle choices to come.

click here for st. augustine’s current line up of taps.

good vs evil photos

hopping back in time to last thursday….

here are photos from the good vs evil event at waazubee (part of vancouver craft beer week):

bridget shows off our tickets at the beginning of the night:

the fearless russell brewery reps (featuring the honey lager and the angry scotch ale… their version of good vs evil???):

michelle, the tree rep pouring for the absent crannog rep:

and michelle pouring her own tree beverages:

best display definitely goes to tree…

and here’s the lighthouse rep with bottles of the fisgard 150, he also had a keg of the keeper’s stout:

howe sound may have had my favourite beer of the evening, the limited edition pothole filler oatmeal stout, but they didn’t have much going for them in the presentation department.  i don’t have a photo of their table at all… but this might be the pothole filler (or it could be the angry scotch or the keeper’s stout…):

these are our end of the evening beers… when we resorted to lagers like tree’s hefeweisen, howe sound whitecap wheat and russell’s honey:

this was the only evil we found all night – tasters who ordered full beers just for a taste and then left them all behind.  it was a sad time for the rest of us all until the delightful server took the abandoned beers out of our sight:

and this is me clowning around on my wobbly way home:

good food, good beer, good times… and no hangover.  in good vs evil, this time the good prevailed!