Black Stone Porter

A London-style porter from Victoria, British Columbia, Black Stone Porter is a 6% alcohol ale from Driftwood Brewery. Sold in great looking 650mL bombers, the beer is very dark, with some amber highlights and a bountiful fog of tan head.

Black Stone has an engrossing nose that mixes chocolate, leather, and dried fruit. Dark chocolate is the most prominent flavour note, but there is a subtle taste of pipe tobacco in there, too. The finish is quick and fairly bitter.

With a nice aroma/flavour, decent potency, large format, and beautiful label, there wasn’t much to complain about when I drank Black Stone. True, the flavour isn’t especially memorable, but it is clearly a well-constructed beer with little downside. I definitely recommend giving this offering from Canada’s west coast a go if you spot it at your preferred beer seller.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10.

Mascot Pilsner

Downtown Toronto’s Mascot Brewery is the source of Mascot Pilsner. Sold in 473mL cans, this unfiltered bräu chimes in at the standard 5%. It’s a clear, effervescent beer with a sunny golden colour and a fluffy cloud of white head.

MP has an intriguing nose—there are grainy elements, but also a damper, stickier, and more floral hops scent than many pilsners. While the smell might be a bit “damp”, the mouthfeel of this lager is quite dry, but also thin. Its flavour dances from sweet cereals initially to a short, but insistently bitter finish.

 

I’d have liked this beer’s flavour to have a deeper front end. That said, the finish is pretty much exactly what I want from a Czech-style lager: hoppy and dry. According to the copy on the can, this pilsner eschews “Old World” hops for citrusy “New World” hops. While citrus wasn’t particularly prominent to my palate, I did find the switch from traditional noble hops to something a bit more “North American” lended the beer a bit of swagger. That, coupled with hearty crispness make for a beer I’d revisit—though likely not until the snow is gone.

Rating: 8.0 out of 10.

Shakedown Street

From Savannah, Georgia’s Southbound Brewing Co., Shakedown Street is a “dry hopped tart saison”. It comes in loud 12oz cans, contains 5.2% alcohol, and has a cloudy, yellow gold colour with a thick white head.

Shakedown Street has a peppery, yeasty, and slightly perfumed nose. For a saison, the beer is quite mild-tasting, but it has some depth of flavour. It tastes yeasty and dry, with a floral  quality. As a dry hopped ale, I expected a bit more bitterness. There is a decent hops profile, but not an assertive one. 

A fun and playful saison with a bit of subtle flair, Shakedown Street is a pretty decent little beer. It could be hoppier and more aggressive, but I liked the end result pretty well.

Rating: 8.0 out of 10.

Collective Arts IPA No. 5

It seems to me that the fifth entry in Collective Arts Brewing’s India Pale Ale series, IPA No. 5, is the Hamilton, Ontario brewery’s most ambitious entry to date: an 8.2% alcohol bruiser billed as a “New England Style Double IPA with Citra & Simcoe Hops”. No. 5 comes in CA’s usual, stylish 473mL cans. The beer within is a predictably cloudy, milky orange potion, under a decent layer of off-white suds.

No. 5 smells damned juicy—it has ample notes of grapefruit and tropical fruit on display, along with a waft of hoppiness. As juicy as the aroma might be, though, the flavour outdoes it, with fresh-squeezed OJ notes, along with peach and other, more tropical leanings. The downside of all of that fruit focus is that, when combined with the elevated booze content, this beer is mighty sweet—very nearly too sweet. There is a welcome uptick of bitterness at the finish, but it isn’t quite enough to provide the balance and grittiness I wanted.

As I said, IPA No. 5 is an ambitious addition to the series. To use a baseball metaphor in February seems sacrilege, but here goes: this beer took a mighty cut, aiming at the fences, but ended up with a long single. In short, it could have been better, but it a world where professional ball players fail to reach base more that 70% of the time, a single is a pretty solid result.

 

Rating: 7.0 out of 10.

Cheeky Bastard Stout

With a twirled mustachio, square jaw, dapper dress, and smug grin, the lad on the 473mL cans of Nickel Brook Brewing Co.’s Cheeky Bastard Stout is definitely an appropriate choice. The Burlington, Ontario beer contains a light and approachable 4.5% alcohol, but a pretty decent 35 IBUs.

A darkest brown ale, Cheeky Bastard pours with a thick blanket of tan head that fades pretty quickly. It has a fairly sweet nose, with malt and mocha notes leading the way. With a flavour that tends toward chocolate and latte, CB displays a smooth and soft mouthfeel.

I’m interested in session-friendly stouts, and that’s an area I’ve found wanting in the Ontario craft brewing scene. Nickel Brook’s Cheeky Bastard is a pretty good addition to an underpopulated category. However, it should be said that the beer is a bit too sweet to invite multiple cans in a single evening.

Rating: 7.5 out of 10.

Starry Night Chocolate Porter

From beautiful, peaceful Bobcaygeon, Ontario, comes Starry Night Chocolate Porter. Lovingly brewed with lactose and cacao nibs by the folks at the Bobcaygeon Brewing Company, this potent ale packs 6.3% into each 473mL can.

This dark ale has a lovely deep brown hue and pours with a lush, but short-lived tan head. It has a malt-heavy, bitter chocolate aroma. The flavour is, at least initially, less robust. There is a silky mouthfeel that exudes sweet, chocolatey warmth. This gives way to a bitter, almost slightly sour finish. 

 

A pleasant dessert beer with good, but not impressive, strength, Starry Night is a pretty good chocolate stout. It’s not as deep or impressive of some of the genre’s finest offerings, but it’s a pretty solid little offering out of small town Ontario. A fun beer!

Rating: 7.0 out of 10.

Brews From the Six: Belgian Wit

I don’t often find cause to use my witbier glasses during the winter months, but I made an exception for The Six Brewing Co.’s Belgian Wit, so that I could complete my quartet of reviews. Clocking in at 5% alcohol, 6BW is a nicely carbonated golden grog—less cloudy than many beers in the style—under a fluffy white head.

6BW has a cheery banana and yeast scent. It tastes somewhat similar, with a lot of banana esters. Like a classic witbier, this Belgian-style ale has some spicy notes, in the form of clove. However, these aren’t as robust as in some of my fave wits.

I suspect that 6BW will be a big hit in the steamy summer months. On a seasonably chilly March afternoon, it was a bit out of place, though I liked it well enough. If I were pulling the levers, I’d have upped the spice quotient, though that would have sacrificed some of the beer’s quaffability.

Rating: 7.5 out of 10.

Brews From the Six: IPA

At just 6%, the as-yet-unnamed IPA from The Six Brewery is understrength for the style, but it has a lovely copper colour and a lustrous off-white head. The unadorned 500mL bottle poured nicely, and its contents gave off an agreeably juicy, fruit-focused scent.

Tropical fruit was the most prominent flavour note—sweet, but not too much, with subtle piña notes and a solidly dank and dry bitter vibe.

 

This was an agreeable, easy-drinking IPA with a lot of charm, but an unfortunately low-test percentage. If this stuff was 7+, it’d have been a big winner. As a 6% jobby, it is nice, but a bit light.

 

Rating: 7.5 out of 10.

Brews From the Six: Lager

My second venture into The Six Brewing Co. was their lager, a 4.8% sold in 500mL bottles. A pale lager, this one was sunny gold, faintly hazy, modestly carbonated, and topped with a cloud of white fuzz.

Grainy and malt-driven to the nose, The Six’s Lager was more flavourful than some, though not particularly remarkable. It had a classic malt to hops progression, with cereal notes up front and noble hops in the rear. Fairly crisp, despite the fact that the beer wasn’t overly carbonated, the flavour really started to deliver at the finish, which was quite dry and acerbic.

As with most Ontario craft lagers, this was a wildly drinkable, though hardly memorable little brew. The IBU count was slightly higher than I expected, lending it a drier, more pilsner-like finish, which was a plus. The low alcohol percentage was a get for crushability, but didn’t help my overall enjoyment, particularly as I was downing this beer on the past day of February, instead of on a hot summer’s eve, as, in my opinion, a pale lager is meant to be enjoyed.

Rating: 7.0 out of 10.

Brews From the Six: Pale Ale

During my first visit to The Six Brewing Co., the beer that was recommended the most effusively was their pale ale, so that’s where I decided to start my reviews. So new it lacked a name and a label, the pale ale came in an unadorned 500mL (?) bottle with a tag that indicated an alcohol percentage of just 4.7, putting it in the session category for me. Given the light percentage, the beer was darker than I’d have expected, with a slightly hazy amber-gold hue and a standard off-white head.

To my sniffer, this li’l pale ale had a light, tropical fruit nose, backed with some slightly resinous hops. The flavour echoed those elements, though the murky, resinous quality was amplified and the tropical notes took more of a back seat. The mouthfeel was agreeably crisp, but it should be noted that it was a bit brittle—I was hoping for a fuller texture, particularly in the front end, which I found to be thin.

Folks, my first brush with a brew from The Six was a big net win. Given their somewhat unambitious early roster of standard brews, I was worried that the beer would be equally plain, but I must say, I found their pale ale to be a fairly assertive and enjoyable number. Given the proximity of this brewery to my home, I imagine that I’ll be downing a lot of this as-yet-unnamed pale ale in the months/years to come.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10.

Brews from the Six

It’s not often that I am right on top of a new brewery when it opens, but The Six Brewing Co. is four blocks from my front door, so I’d have felt remiss if I didn’t get there in the first week. As it happened, I stopped by the brewery/bottle shop on their second day. Had a nice chat with one of the owners/managers(?) and left with a four-pack of the beers he recommended. A pale ale, a Belgian Wit, an IPA, and a lager. In fact, the brewery was so fresh that the beers hadn’t even been named yet—they were having a contest to name them when I came it (we’ll see if I win).

So stay tuned this week for my thoughts on four of the debut brews from The Six.

Rabble Rouser

Walking around aimlessly on a Saturday afternoon in downtown Toronto, I often find myself drawn, like a moth to a flame, to Bar Hop. On my most recent visit, I opted to sample a 15oz pour of Rabble Rouser, a 6.8% IPA from Ottawa’s Tooth and Nail Brewing Company.

My glass of draught showed up clear, brassy, and covered with a loose cream head. The beer had a fruity scent, with just a scintilla something metallic. The flavour tends toward juicy fruit notes, particularly peach. In the shadows around the back end, sticky hops lurk.

While Rabble Rouser wasn’t quite as bitterly bombastic as I wanted it to be, it did have a charming flavour and very close to the perfect strength for an IPA. Based on the strength of this brew, the next time I’m in Ottawa, I’ll definitely be checking out Tooth and Nail.

Rating: 8.0 out of 10.

Southern Hops’Pitality IPA

Southern Hops’Pitality IPA is brewed and bottled in Kiln, Mississippi. It comes from Lazy Magnolia Brewing Co. and contains a lethargic 5.5% alcohol, but a lively 60 IBUs. Sold in 12oz bottles, the beer has a hazy golden-orange look, and pours with a loose and thin off-white head that was unexpectedly durable.

Southern Hops’Pitality has a commanding tropical fruit aroma that is packed with mango notes—possibly more mango than any beer I’ve ever sniffed that didn’t use mango purée. The mango scent translates into the flavour, though with a bit less vigour. However, that’s where the the bitterness picks up, making this beer a convincing tasting IPA.

Despite its relatively low percentage (give me 7 or give me death!), this stuff is very flavourful and really quite impressive. The low % costs it a half point (just call it an American Pale Ale!), but the taste is verging on exquisite, and it doesn’t sacrifice bitterness.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10.

Ellida IPA

Ellida IPA takes its name, apparently, from a Viking vessel known as “the magic dragon ship of the Baltic Sea”. I couldn’t find a Wikipedia entry, which is weird, but I’ll take the word of Greenville, South Carolina’s Quest Brewing Co. The percentage isn’t listed on the 355mL can, and the mobile website was unhelpful,  but the non-affiliated ratebeer.com lists it at 6.9%.

The South Carolinian suds have a hazy brown-orange hue under an off-white head. The nose is potent and murky, with dank, resinous notes. The flavour has more emphasis on a stable malt body than many American IPAs, giving Ellida some nice balance. However, the back end is a bit more muddy than I’d like it to be—it’s compellingly bitter and heartily boozy, but it lacks the shiny crispness that characterizes a top IPA.

Ellida is bold and big, but it isn’t very nimble or subtle. The flavour is closer to that of a conventional double IPA than the slighter cousin, but the booze is more like a single. Flavourful is grand, but nuance is worth something and that hurts Ellida a wee bit.

Rating: 7.0 out of 10.

Garún Icelandic Stout

2017 seemed to be the year that every human I know visited Iceland. Fortunately for me, many of them brought me beer. The ever-generous AM and MM hooked me up with a bottle of Garún Icelandic Stout as a souvenir of their European travels. Thanks gals!

Garún comes from Reykjavik, where it is brewed dark and strong by Borg Brugghús. The beer comes in 330mL bottles. It’s a real doozy at 11.5% alcohol. Black with amber highlights, Garún pours with a thin cover of tan head. It has a rich and slightly bitter aroma with notes of mocha. The flavour is richer still, with big malt presence, a sweet streak with raisin and leather notes, and a bitter java and molasses finish.

This Icelandic offering is a formidable affair. It is strong as hell, with a powerful flavour to match. My girl MM often finds me challenging beers to review, and this one was challenging in the finest sense of the word. I was definitely glad that this bombastic stout came in a standard format bottle, because at 11.5%, a larger bottle would have been staggering. That’s not to say that I would have complained if I had a second bottle—just that it was probably a good thing physiologically that I didn’t. The only real complaint with this brew is its too sweet finish. The bitterness is great, but something to cut the syrupy mouthfeel would go a long way.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10.

Prodromus

Prodromus is an ambitious entry from Omnipollo. Brewed by Omnipollo in Stockholm and Toronto, this high booze offering is billed as a “graham cracker chocolate chunk caramel bar stout”. So that’s a thing. At 10.5%, a 473mL can of this stuff is dangerous.

Prodromus is a tarry stout with a creamy tan head. It has a ridiculously sweet aroma with caramel and cocoa notes through the roof. It has a smooth, but very thick mouthfeel, and a flavour that rivals the nose in terms of ridiculous sweetness. The beer tastes almost exactly as advertised, with chocolate and caramel leading the way, and a sweet breadiness that lends the beer a convincing graham cracker base. The finish does have some dark chocolate bitterness, but nowhere near enough to cut through the syrupy sweetness.

This beer is basically obscene. It’s so sweet and so strong that it is really quite cloying. The flavours are deep and accurately described, and the beer is clearly well made, but it’s just too damn much. A digestif ale if ever there was one, this beer should be served with a rich chocolate dessert. I’ve no doubt that many people would enjoy this stuff—perhaps a single 473mL can shared among four people is the right approach—but as a solo drinker, I was left with a real risk of diabetic coma. This was a hard beer to review, because it did exactly what it set out to do, but the result verged on unfinishable.

Rating: 7.0 out of 10.