Tag Archives: dark ale

Steve’s Beer Advent Calendar Day 7 – Dive Bomb – Powell Brewery

by steveeh

Vancouver, BC’s Powell Brewery, Dive Bomb, a dark ale.

It pours an almost perfectly opaque black, held to the light there are deep mahogany highlights. The head is a nice light khaki with very fine bubbles.

The nose is almost leathery with a slight cola note.

The flavours include beautifully bitter cocoa powder, dark toffee and burnt caramel. It is very dry, giving a champagne impression. The body is dense but the very fizzy carbonation makes feel light.

Commercial description:

This far Ale is surprisingly light and refreshing and sessionable. Flavours of caramel, toffee, chocolate and nuts are complimented with holding hops that add just the right amount of bitterness and a slight floral aroma.

Midnight Peach Dark Ale – Tin Whistle Brewing

by Mike

From Penticton BC’s Tin Whistle Brewing comes their “Midnight Peach Dark Ale”.  The beer pours a very deep copper colour almost brown with a tan head.  The aroma consists of peaches, caramel and honey and chocolate.  The flavour is of peaches, honey, caramel, chocolate, some roasted malts and maybe a hint of earth and coffee.  The alcohol content comes in at 5.5%.  Who would have thought that chocolate and peaches would go so well together?  Oh wait that is a gimme.  This is a tasty new release from Tin Whistle Brewing and would go very well with desert.

Commercial Description:  Straight from the Okanagan comes this unique blended beer with hints of chocolate and caramelized honey combined with succulent peaches to create a full bodied dark fruit ale.

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Fest-Of-Ale Beer Judging 2016 – Penticton

by Mike

For the third year in a row I was invited to be a judge for the Okanagan Fest-Of-Ale.  Like the last two years the judging took place on day 2 of the festival.  Last year we had 10 Categories to judge from but this year it was up to 14.  The categories were as follows Pilsner/Golden Lager, Pale Ale, Wheat Ale, Belgian Golden/Saison, Amber/Dark Ale, IPA, Dark IPA, Dark Lager, Belgian Strong, Stout/Porter, Blender, Sour, Ciders, Fruit Beer.  With the increase in number of beers being judged this year the organizers of the Fest-Of-Ale invested a few new judges and broke us into three groups.  Each group of judges tasted a third of the beers put in for judging.  Each group picked their top beers beer of each category.  From those they were asked to pick their top two.  These two from each group were brought together to make 6 top beers to choose Best In Show.  From this we sat and sampled each of the six and discussed what one should be the winner.  The following photos of the Judges come from Kim of DogLeg marketing.

Meet The Judges

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Joe Wiebe – Author, Chelsea – Brewtiful BC, Jeremy – Craft Beer Vancouver

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Jason Van Rassel – Daily Beer, Stephen – The Growler, Jim Martin

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Me, Brady Strachan – CBC Radio, Jan Zeschky – Beer writer with The Province

This was a blind tasting like every beer competition.  We used a very simplified score card to decide which beer we though best fit the style and tasted best.  Once again Warren Everton was the Director of Judging.  Each group of three judges tasted their samples individually then came together to discuss their personal favourites.  When we came to a consensus of our top beer in each category the group decided what their top two beers overall were.  For my group there was not a ton of deliberation as we all were fairly similar in or opinions.  When all three groups came together after a short break to taste the top 6 beers and decide what one would be chosen as the Best In Show it actually went pretty well this year.  This year there was much less animosity about what beer should be the winner.  The only real hard discussion we had was should the winning beer be very approachable or should it be our overall favourite. When it came down to it I think we ended up picking the beer that was both our favourite as well as a very approachable beer.  The juding this year started at 10am like normal but it seemed to go a bit quicker than previous years.

Once we had made all of our decisions about best beer of every category and best of show we were given the names of all of the winners we had chosen.

Best in Class, Judges’ Choice Awards:

Pilsner/Golden Lager – Bohemian Pilsner – Hearthstone Brewery, North Vancouver
Pale Ale – Persephone Pale Ale – Persephone Brewing Company, Gibsons
Wheat Ale – Smoked Hefeweizen – Steel & Oak Brewing Company, New Westminster Belgian Golden/Saison – Old Barn Saison – Fernie Brewing Company, Fernie
Amber/Dark Ale – A Wee Angry Scotch Ale – Russell Brewing, Surrey
IPA – Slingshot Session IPA – Fernie Brewing, Fernie
Dark IPA – Disruption Black IPA – Category 12 Brewing, Victoria
Dark Lager – Black Lager – Tree Brewing, Kelowna
Belgian Strong – Delirium Tremens – McClelland Imports
Stout/Porter – Dry Irish Stout – Ravens Brewing, Abbotsford
Blender – Smoke & Mirrors Imperial Smoked Ale – Coal Harbour Brewing, Vancouver
Sour – Sour Raspberry – Old Abbey Ales, Abbotsford
Ciders – Calville’s Winter – Twisted Hills Craft Cider, Cawston
Fruit Beer – Tropic Vice Tropical Fruit Ale – Dead Frog Brewing, Aldergrove

Best in Show, Judges’ Choice Award: 

Persephone Pale Ale – Persephone Brewing Company, Gibsons

After all the judging was done we had a few group shots taken by Kim of DogLeg Marketing.

After all the judging was finished we were left to our own devices with what was left of the Saturday portion of the Fest-Of-Ale.  The only thing we had to do was be at the main stage for 3pm so that we could be on the stage for the announcement of the winners.  The following photos are taken again by Kim of DogLeg Marketing.

Fest-Of-Ale Beer Judging 2015.

Fest-Of-Ale Beer Judging 2014.

Full sized photos

Gathering Storm Cascadian Dark Ale- Howe Sound Brewing

by Mike

From Squamish BC’s Howe Sound Brewing comes their “Gathering Storm Cascadian Dark Ale”.  This CDA pours a deep black with a tan head.  The aroma consists of roasted malts and coffee.  The flavour is of roasted malts, espresso , a slight sweetness and a good hit of hops.  The alcohol content is 6.8% and the IBU is 76.  This is a very tasty CDA and might be a good replacement for coffee on a winter morning.  Just Kidding…. or am I?

Commercial Description:  Gathering Storm Cascadian Dark Ale (CDA) is a delicious, flavorful hoppy brown ale, brewed with six different barley malts and three varieties of Northwest hops – Nugget, Mt. Hood and Cascade. Sometimes referred to as a “black IPA”, the Cascadian Dark Ale style is brewed in recognition of the craft brewers and hop suppliers of the Pacific Northwest. The strong bitterness of this beer is balanced by the substantial maltiness and roasted flavours of the barley mash, while the citrus aroma of the Cascade hop remains prevalent.

Food pairing as per brewery:  This darker ale goes well with hearty fare such as hamburgers, sausages, stews, smoked fish, lamb, beef and game as well as other numerous foods such as fried seafood and highly spiced cuisine.