Diamond Park English Mild Ale

Named in homage to the former home of the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball squad, Diamond Park English Mild Ale is a 3% mild ale from the talented squad at People’s Pint Brewing Co. The Torontonian beer comes in cute 500mL bottles. The beer is an elegant amber ale, almost exactly the same colour and clarity as the bottle it came out of. It pours with a healthy measure of tan suds.

 

Diamond Park has a malty, toasty nose that has a brown sugar subtext. The flavour packs loads of caramel and robust malt notes into its low-alcohol frame, along with a respectably bitter finish.

While mild ales seem to be de rigeur among beer nerds at the moment, I haven’t had many that really caught my interest. But DAMN! This one is a brilliant beer. This is likely the most flavourful session ale I have ever had, and it has a nicely rounded mouthfeel, too. A fantastic ale!

Rating: 9.5 out of 10.

Quantum Leap Double Dry Hopped IPA

 The gang at Toronto’s Rorschach Brewing Co. Are responsible for Quantum Leap Double Dry Hopped IPA, a 5.5% alcohol ale is brewed with Galaxy and Vic Secret hops, as well as oats and wheat. The beer comes in 355mL cans. When de-canned, it’s a hazy orange-gold colour topped with a fluffy white head.

QL has a sweet nectarine and mango aroma. It has a juicy, fruity aroma with a hint of sticky resin at the back end. The beer has a velvety smooth texture, though it also came off as a bit thin.

The copy on the sign of the can promised “notes of fuzzy peach candy”, which caught my eye and imagination, and I’d say that Quantum Leap delivered. I’d have liked more body, and a bit more booze, but it was still a pretty playful little ale and I’m pleased to know that I have another three in the fridge to which I can look forward.

Rating: 8.0 out of 10.

 

Gosé Cuervo Tequila Lime Sour with Salt

Brewed up in Toronto’s West End by the team at People’s Pint Brewing Company, Gosé Cuervo Tequila Lime Sour with Salt is basically a margarita in a 4.9% beer. Sold in 500mL bottles with pretty rad labels, Gosé is brewed with lime juice, lime zest, salt, and barrel aged Mexican reposado tequila.

 

 

This salty citrusy treat is hazy, with a pale golden hue. It pours with a thin layer of white suds and it has a tart and briny aroma—big citrus and considerably salinity. The beer really does have a margarita-esque flavour, packed with lime and a salty tang. There is a bit of tequila present, but honestly, for such a strong flavour, it is pretty understated.

More than a gimmick, Gosé Cuervo is a damned tasty sour and salty offering. Personally, I’d not be inclined to quaff a second one in a go, but the beer is undeniably interesting.

Rating: 8.0 out of 10.

Solstice Double Dry Hopped Sour

At a respectable 5.5%, I found Solstice Double Dry Hopped Sour practically irresistible when putting together a mail order from Toronto’s Bandit Brewery, though the price tag for a single bottle, while not outrageous, convinced me that one was enough. Sold in 500mL bottles, Solstice proved to be a hazy pale straw ale with a fluffy white head.

Solstice has a tart aroma accented with lychee. The flavour, too, has some lychee elements, as well as some sour plum. Of the double dry hopping, I can’t say that I detected a whole lot, other than a floral surge at the back end.

In Solstice, I found a sour beer that was worthy of the name, but a DDH beer with questionable pedigree. I liked, but didn’t love it.

Rating: 7.0 out of 10.

Odyssey Double Dry Hopped IPA

On a rainy afternoon, doing a little stubborn grilling, I selected a 355mL can of Odyssey Double Dry Hopped IPA to be my backyard companion—its label features an intrepid space raccoon, which felt appropriate to the task. Odyssey, from Toronto’s Bandit Brewery, is a 6.5% effort. A hazy IPA, it had a golden orange hue and poured with a helmet of sudsy off white head. According to the Bandit website, this beer owes its flavour profile to double dry-hopping with Galaxy hops.

Citrus and tropical notes jumped out to my nose, and the flavour continued down that same path, with OJ and passion fruit elements in the vanguard and a modestly floral bitterness bringing up the rear.

I thought Odyssey was an agreeable but not overly memorable entry in the crowded hazy DDH IPA category. It’s clearly well made and undoubtedly enjoyable, but if you asked me about this beer in six months, I’d have to pull up this review. It really is quite a good beer, made by a brewery that knows what’s up—it just didn’t offer anything unique.

Rating: 7.5 out of 10.

Goldie Boat English Golden Ale

Waiting for a big ol’ thunder storm to kick off on a sweltering Friday evening, I pried the cap off of 500mL bottle of Goldie Boat English Golden Ale from Toronto’s People’s Pint Brewing Co. The 5% ale proved to be a ruddy gold liquid with a short lived white head.

Goldie Boat had a malty, sweet, and metallic aroma, with bready notes. The flavour kicked off sweetly, displayed some enthusiastic malts, and withdrew into an ever-so-faint English ale bitterness (32 IBUs). Along the way, it was a bit coppery, too.

A decent English-style ale from an excellent Toronto suds manufacturer, Goldie Boat isn’t one of the best from People’s Pint, but it’s definitely good enough.

Rating: 7.0 out of 10.

Razzle Dazzle Nitro Sour Ale w/Raspberry and Vanilla

Razzle Dazzle Nitro Sour Ale w/Raspberry and Vanilla. That name is basically a sentence. The beer, a 6% brew from Toronto’s Blood Brothers Brewing, comes in 355mL cans that are, as always from BB, super stylish.

The beer directs its drinker to “shake before pouring”, because this potion is thick. Even rattled (but not fully shaken), the beer left some serious sediment in its can. It’s a vibrant plum-coloured ale that pours with a pink-hued head. The nose is quirkily balanced between sweet-as-can-be vanilla and tart red berry. The flavour keeps the party going, although the result is a bit overwhelming. The raspberry tartness doesn’t really get off the ground before the vanilla sweetness cuts its legs out. The finish is sweet, fruity, and short.

The real keystone that makes Razzle Dazzle so engaging—more than its liberal use of raspberry (which I love)—is it’s smooth texture. This beer is sour velvet. In truth, I’d have cut the vanilla element completely, or else reduced it significantly, because I found the result a bit too sweet and a smooth, sour razzer without the sweetness would be exquisite. Still, this beer is worthy of praise for its innovative style and execution.

Rating: 8.0 out of 10.

Daywalker Micro IPA

While waiting on a slab of beef to marinate before grilling, I reached for a cold can of Daywalker Micro IPA, a low-alcohol offering from Toronto’s fabulous Rainhard Brewing Company. I’m not always sold on the micro/session IPA as a style, as I prefer my hops to be backed with ballast, but I’ve always liked Rainhard and so I was prepared to give Daywalker a whirl.

Sold in 473mL cans, the beer contains a slight 3.9% alcohol. It’s a slightly hazy pale golden ale that poured with a thin layer of white foam that was down to a sudsy ring before I was done smelling the stuff. Speaking of smelling, the beer had respectable tropical fruit aromatics, accented with a whiff of grapefruit. The can calls for “notes of white grape and citrus”, and I thought both of those elements were equitably represented in the moderately tart flavour, along with some melon sweetness. The finish had a semblance of bitterness, but not much more.

The make or break for micro or session IPAs, in my opinion at least, is the mouthfeel. Too thin or watery and I won’t take the beer seriously. This little offering, while certainly on the light and thin side, isn’t watery. It manages a decent crispness that makes it a swell companion for a sweltering afternoon. One of the better low-octane IPAs on the Ontario market, if you trust my opinion.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10.

Paniza Premium Pilsner

Paniza Brewing Co. hails from Toronto, Ontario. Seemingly kicking off their operation without a bricks and mortar location, it appears that Paniza is contract brewing to start, though a quick google search didn’t turn up where their beer is made and I didn’t bother digging any deeper. The first Paniza offering I came across was their Premium Pilsner, 473mL cans of which are sold in the LCBO. The cans feature an astronaut and the motto “out of this world”. Weighing in at a standard 5%, Premium Pilsner is billed as a German-style pilsner, and it checks in at 25 IBUs. 

Clear gold, nicely carbonated, and topped with a white foam, this certainly looked convincingly pilsner-like. The beer has a grainy aroma accented with fresh hop notes. The flavour proved to be highly agreeable, with a measured blend of noble hop and grainy malt elements, and a timid honey subtext.

I really enjoyed my lone can of Premium Pilsner and wished I’d had the foresight to purchase a second. It isn’t exactly crisp, but the flavour manages to be light and delicate, with some subtle substance. I’d have liked it to be more vigourously bitter, but otherwise I was pretty impressed. I’ll be keeping my eye out for future Paniza offerings, because this one was quite solid.

Rating: 8.0 out of 10.

Devil’s Trill XVI—Trill Bill Volume 16

One of the treasures of a beer mail delivery from Toronto’s Blood Brothers Brewing was 355mL cans of Devil’s Trill XVI—Trill Bill Volume 16—great homage on the label, too. It’s an 8.5% imperial IPA brewed with a trio of hops—Amarillo, El Dorado, and Sabro.

 

The beer is a hazy orange gold with a fluffy white nimbus on the top. It has pungent and sweet aromatics, with tropical fruit playing lead and a vanilla subtext on rhythm. The flavour is a quirky blend of grapefruit and vanilla that is accented with booziness and culminates with a heady dose of bitterness.

The sixteenth iteration of Blood Brothers’ Devil’s Trill is a subtle bruiser with an interesting flavour profile. It’s a touch too sweet, perhaps, but it is definitely intriguing.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10.

Junction Hazy IPA

A New England-style ale from Toronto, Junction Hazy IPA is a 6.2% brew from Junction Craft Brewery. The beer, which clock’s in 473mL cans, is a gently hazy dull-gold colour and pours with a puff of white suds.

JHIPA has a bashful aroma punctuated with tropical fruit notes. The flavour is considerably more sweet and substantial than the nose, with mango and pineapple tones, a malty and metallic base, and a decent bitter finish.

Junction Hazy IPA is a slightly over-sweet offering that isn’t actually all that hazy. There are some nice flavour notes, and there is balance between malt and bitterness. However, in a cluttered market where hazy IPAs are over-represented, this one falls into the average category

Rating: 7.0 out of 10.

Granite’s Best Bitter

Granite Brewery’s Best Bitter is a 4.5% alcohol English-style ale. Sold in generic 473mL cans, this Torontonian classic pours with a clear, amber colour and an attractive plume of eggshell head.

Granite’s Best Bitter has a comfortable aroma that blends caramel, copper, and a whiff of bitterness. The flavour has roasted malt and caramel out front, with a metallic subtext, and a back end that tiptoes into bitterness. The mouthfeel delivers decent creaminess, too.

If you asked me to imagine an English-style ale, Granite’s Best Bitter would be pretty close to my vision. It packs a lot of traditional flavours into a low-alcohol frame. 

Rating: 8.5 out of 10.

Midnight Cow Tipper Milk Stout

Midnight Cow Tipper Milk Stout is a dark ale from Toronto, brewed by Eastbound Brewing Co. Sold in 355mL cans, MCT contains 5.2% alcohol. It is a near black ale that pours with a short-lived tan head.

MCT has a jumbo chocolate aroma, built on top of a roasted malt foundation and accented with coffee notes. The flavour is sweet and chocolaty, with some molasses and iron elements. It finishes sweetly, with a slight nod to espresso bitterness.

A nice and well made milk stout, Midnight Cow Tipper is a pretty decent offering. Good balance and a decent texture.

Rating: 7.5 out of 10.

Town Brewery Trove--Outside Jokes Pale Ale

All of the beers I purchased from Whitby’s Town Brewery came in attractive 473mL cans, but to my mind, the best looking one housed Outside Jokes Pale Ale—a blue, gold, and orange miasma of a cloudscape on the label really drew my eye.

Outside Jokes is a 5% pale ale. It’s an extremely hazy yellow gold offering with a fluffy white crown of suds. The beer has orange and grapefruit notes driving its aromatic profile, with some fresh lime acting as subtext. The flavour is less of a citrus medley and more of an alcoholized orange juice—it blends sweet, tart, and bitter in an agreeable but unremarkable fashion. The back end trends toward bitterness, but in a reserved manner.

Compared to Town Brewery’s IPA and DIPA offerings, Outside Joke fails to provide anything extra—rather, it’s a lower alcohol version of the boozier, hazy and juicy formats. That’s not to say it isn’t enjoyable—quite the contrary. I liked it a fair bit. I just found it to be a lower enthusiasm offering of the brewery’s burlier beers. But the flavour profile treads the same path as Finer Things IPA and Close Talker DIPA, and those two brews impressed me more.

Rating: 7.0 out of 10.

Town Brewery Trove--Finer Things

Finer Things is a hazy IPA from Whitby, Ontario’s Town Brewery. Sold in 473mL cans with paisley labels, this stuff has got a decent 6.4%. The beer is orange gold, with a blanket of white suds.

FT has a surprisingly mild aroma—it has juicy citrus notes and a slightly floral hops vibe. The flavour is considerably more vibrant. It’s packed with orange notes as well as a hint of vanilla sweetness. The back end is modestly bitter, but the sweetness persists.

There ain’t really a thing wrong with Finer Things—it’s a well-made beer with a decent flavour—but among hazy IPAs, this one doesn’t really stand out all that much, other than the lilt of vanilla. A good beer, but not a game-changer. I’d definitely buy it again though.

Rating: 7.5 out of 10.