Tag Archives: mild

Adrift Hop Blonde Ale – Britannia Brewing Company

by Mike

From Britannia Brewing Company in the Richmond with a tasting room in Steveston Village comes their “Adrift Hop Blonde Ale”.  The beer pours a golden colour with a white head. The aroma is of floral hops, sweetness and fruit. The flavour is of grainy and bready malts, citrus, tropical fruit, grassy notes and mild hops bitterness. The alcohol content comes in at 4.7% with an IBU of 25. This is a good sessionable and aprochable beer. It wont knock your socks off but you should enjoy it. 

Commercial Description: Inspired by our home surrounded by the ocean and mountains this natural ale is brewed with generous late additions of local hops, creating aromas of citrus and tropical fruit. The palate is balanced and dry with subtle bitterness to complete this refreshing ale. “Set yourself Adrift”

Hathi ISA – Hathi Brewing

by Mike

The Fraser Valley has its newest gypsy brewer. Hathi Brewing is currently leasing tank space at Old Abbey Ales in Abbotsford. Their first commercial release is the “Hathi ISA”. The beer pours a fairly deep copper orange colour with a white head. The aroma consists of some floral hops, and some fruity notes although the aroma is quite mild. The flavour is of some malts, fruit, resin, earth and some bitterness but all on a small scale which is not surprising from an India Session Ale. The alcohol content comes in at 4.7% with an IBU of 40. Especially for a first commercial batch of beer this is pretty tasty. With the brewers saying they hope to bring an Indian twist to their beer they have my attention. I wonder what twist they can bring from India.  I look forward to seeing what they bring out in the future.

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Red Racer Maple Bacon Ale Launch Event – The Pint Vancouver

by Mike

For the second year in a row Central City Brewers & Distillers have collaborated with the Vancouver radio station 99.3 CFOX to bring us the ultimate breakfast beer the “Maple Bacon Ale”.  The launch party was on April 28th, 2015 and was held at The Pint in Downtown Vancouver.

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The Pint is lucky that it has a large downstairs portion of the venue so they can hold large private parties like this one.  The launch party was reserved for people that won the chance to attend on 99.3 CFOX’s Jeff O’Neil Show and for local beer media.

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Everyone that attended the event was given two drink tickets that were to go towards sampling the Maple Bacon Ale.  Just to sweeten the deal Central City Brewers & Distillers had arranged a breakfast buffet with the Pint that included both bacon and pancakes to put maple syrup. Why not drink a beer called a Maple Bacon Ale with both maple syrup and bacon?

The beer seemed to be quite the hit as they ended up running out of the beer and had to start serving the Red Racer IPA instead (For those that didn’t realize that is a Central City Brewers & Distillers brand).

But the real question is what did the beer taste like?

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The Maple Bacon Ale is an Amber Ale and poured an amber colour with a tan head.  The aroma consisted of caramel malts and a mild maple finish.  The flavour was of caramel, mild maple with some very mild smoke and a hint of citrus.  Last years batch was to smoky and maple filled for many CFOX fans so this edition was toned down quite a bit.  I found that it still was an enjoyable beer although it really has nothing that resembles bacon and has almost no maple flavour.  Just a side note this beer is vegan friendly as their is no actual meat in it!  The alcohol content comes in at 5%.  I seriously preferred last years edition but this is still well worth the purchase.

Full sized photos can be found here

Here is a link to last years edition.

Fire Rock Pale Ale – Kona Brewing Company

by Mike

From Kona Brewing out of Kailua Kona, Hawaii (The Big Island) comes their “Fire Rock Pale Ale”.  The brew pours an amber colour with an off white head.  The aroma of the beer is of is very faint but consists of an earthy hops.   The flavour of the beer is malty, caramel with some fruity characteristics and a fairly mild hopyness.  This is a nice tasting beer but not all that like an American Pale Ale (not hopy enough) and it is not distinctly Hawaiian.  Dont get me wrong you will not go wrong picking this beer up!  The beer has an alcohol content of 6% and an IBU of 35.

COMMERCIAL DESCRIPTION
Fire Rock Pale Ale is a crisp, refreshing “Hawaiian-style” pale ale. Its signature copper color results from the unique blend of specialty roasted malts. The pronounced citrus-floral hop aroma comes from the liberal amounts of Galena, Cascade & Mt. Hood hops added to each brew.

Check out about more Hawaiian beer and where to buy it!

Seadog Amber Ale – Vancouver Island Brewery

by Mike

From Victoria BC’s Vancouver Island Brewery comes the “Seadog Amber Ale”.  This beer has been created in honour of the Canadian Pacific Naval Fleet that resides in Victoria.  The beer pours an amber colour with a white head.  The aroma of this beer is malty, with some light sweet caramel.  The taste of the beer is similar with malts, sweet caramel and a very mild hops.  This beer is not very strong in flavor but it is very tasty none the less and goes down a little to easy!  The beer has an alcohol content of 5.2%.

Commercial Description “Sea Dog is an amber ale fashioned after the German Altbier style. Like a true Altbier, it is fermented with ale yeast, but at a colder lager temperature. This gives it a clean finish with no esters like a lager, but retaining the malty quality of an ale. Its deep copper colour comes from a heavy addition of dark crystal malt, and a touch of chocolate malt. Sea Dog is lightly bittered, so as to not mask it’s intense maltyness. Most of its hop character comes from a heavy dose of Willamette and Hallertauer hops at the very end of the boil.”