Beer Quest West

“It’s like Portland, only a lot sunnier!”

That’s the way a beer lover described his hometown of Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Although he was right about the sun, he may have been exaggerating about similarity with the Oregon city. Portland has over two dozen microbreweries and brewpubs.

Nonetheless, Albuquerque is growing rapidly as a beer town. Since 2008, five microbreweries have opened and two more are in the planning stages. At present, there are seven breweries in the city and two in nearby Coralles and Rio Rancho. Breweries in Moriarity and Los Lunas, each under an hour’s drive away, have tap rooms in Albuquerque. And — a sure sign of any young and growing industry — one of the newer brewpubs has already gone out of business.

In a recent trip to Albuquerque, I had a chance to visit five micros or brewpubs, each of them a five-minute drive from Interstate 25.

Chama River Brewing Company: www.chamariverbrewery.com

It was close to lunch time, so I started my “tour” at Chama River Brewing Company, a wonderful gastropub. I took exit 229 and headed south on Pan American, the service road on the western side of the freeway. Chama River was at  4939 Pan American North East. I recognized it by the grain silo outside the building.

Chama River opened in Albuquerque in 1999, as Blue Corn Brewery, part of the Santa Fe Restaurant group. The name was changed in 2005 to distinguish its menu from the more specifically Santa Fe cuisine of its northern partner. Two of its brewers have gone on to start their own breweries. Ted Rice is one of the partners of Marble Brewery; Jeff Erway runs LaCumbre.

The menu features such items as crab stuffed mushrooms, cavatappi with red chile paremsan cream, local goat cheese stuffed zucchini, and cinnamon roll bread pudding. It is complemented by six regular beers ranging from light to dark and a number of very interesting seasonals.

Current brewer Justin Hamilton, who was trained by Rice and Erway, described Chama River’s brews. Class VI Lager “started out as a helles but now is more like a pilsner. It’s light and clean, but has a dry, malty edge.” Broken Spoke Honey Wheat Ale “is fairly dry for the style, but not overly sweet.” Amber Ale is designed for “the people who like New Belgium’s Fat Tire.” Rio Lodo Brown Ale is “hoppier than the British style.” Jackalope IPA, the flagship beer, is “a big, West Coast style ale. It’s for knowledgeable drinkers.” Sleeping Dog Stout, an oatmeal stout is chewy and roasty.

Nexus Brewery:  www.nexusbrewery.com

From Chama River, I took the service road south to Montano, turned left, crossed the freeway, and then turned left on Pan American north, the service road that runs along the eastern side of I-25. Nexus, Albuquerque’s newest microbrewery, is located at 4730 Pan American East.

Nexus, which opened in the summer of 2011, was created by Ken Carson, a home brewer and a former state bank official. “During my travels as a banker,” he remembered, “I sought out BBQ restaurants and brewpubs and began to think about starting a brewery. I felt that Albuquerque was big enough for another brewery and certainly had an enthusiastic and growing base of craft beer lovers. I wanted to create a  social gathering place and I wanted to be my own boss.”

He chose the name Nexus, meaning a point of connection, and decided to establish a brewery with a full restaurant, the better to bring people together. “I came from a soul food background and was raised in New Mexico, so I decided that we’s serve ‘New Mexican Soul Food’.” The signature dish, one he found on the menus of many soul food places is southern Fried Chicken and Waffles.  There’s also New Mexico Red Chili as well as Red Chili Flaked Onion Petals.

The beer menu was designed to complement rather than to compete with other local breweries. “We purposely set out not to do too many hoppy bears. We like malty beers.” Brewer Manuel Mussen, who trained at the food sciences school at the University of California, Davis, developed a fondness for lower alcohol, balanced beers while working in Cornwall, England, after graduation.

The signature beer is a Scottish Ale, one of Carson’s favourite beers from his home brewing days. “It’s like a wee heavy,” Mussen explained. “The Scottish yeast gives a hint of smoke. The malts contribute caramel, toffee, and coffee flavours. It’s strong, 7.8 per cent, but it’s not in-your-face. It’s good for sipping.”

Nexus also offers a cream ale, designed as an entry beer (although Mussen has also created a 9. 4 per cent imperial version), an American Red, a wheat ale (which he describes as being like Blue Moon, but not so spicy), an ESB that’s only 4.5 per cent, an English stout, and an American style IPA, which, along with the Scottish ale, is the brewery’s top seller.

“Our beers are for people who like flavour, but don’t want to be overwhelmed,” Carson remarked.

Il Vicino Brewing Company: www.ilvicino.com

After visiting Nexus, I returned to Montano Road, turned left and headed east to Carlisle Boulevard.  After that I turned right and drove south to Candelaria, then right to Vassar and right to Aztec. The Il Vicino Canteen, home of the brewery which makes the beers for the Il Vicino restaurant chain’s New Mexico locations, is at 2381 Aztec Road. In addition to the brewery, the canteen has a tap room and small restaurant.

Master brewer Brady McKeown, who has been with Il Vicino since the first restaurant opened in 1994, just as the microbrewing/brewpub movement was arriving in the southwest, noted that Il Vicino’s first beers were crossovers, unassertive blond and golden ales. It wasn’t until a couple of years later that they developed an IPA. “It’s our best-seller now.”

In addition to the Wet Mountain IPA, a hoppy American style beer, Il Vicino offers  four other beers on a regular basis. Slow Down Brown, which was inspired by the popular Pete’s Wicked Ale, does not have the malty sweetness of English versions of the style. 28 M is an American wheat ale that was designed to be a lighter-bodied beer that would complement the less spicy sandwiches and pizzas offered at the restaurants. Dark and Heavy is an American style stout.

Of the regular beers, only PigTail Pilsner moves away from American styles. It is a German pilsner, using German hops, malts, and yeast. Only the water comes from New Mexico.

McKeown told me that at the Canteen, as opposed to the restaurants, higher alcohol and hoppier beers are frequently on tap. “And we have some special one-off brews. One of my favourites was our ‘Fruitcake Beer.’ To a not too hoppy strong ale, we added fruit, molasses, cinnamon, cranberries, tart cherries, and orange and lemon zest.”

The Canteen’s small kitchen offers appetizers and a wide variety of sandwiches.

LaCumbre Brewing: www.lacumbrebrewing.com

I left my car at the Canteen and walked the two blocks — east on Aztec and then south on Girard Boulevard — to my next destination, LaCumbre, Located at 3313 Girard, LaCumbre opened just before Christmas 2010 and within a year has become one of the most acclaimed of microbreweries in the western United States.

When owner and head brewer Jeff Erway was growing up in Rochester, NY, what he calls the “home of industrial brewing,” he discovered Newcastle Brown and Sam Smith’s beers and quickly realized that Genesee, the town’s student beer of choice, was lacking in taste. “Then I discovered Sierra Nevada’s Celebration Christmas ale, and I was sold.

When he and his wife moved to the southwest to teach and enjoy the wonderful hiking, he discovered that he could still get Sierra Nevada, but not much else worthwhile. “So my wife and I drove into Flagstaff, Arizona, and bought a book on homebrewing.” He became a successful homebrewer and a certified beer judge and, when Ted Rice, then of Chama River, encouraged him to attend the American Brewing Guild he did.

After his studies, Jeff became head brewer at Chama River and earned three gold medals for his brews. But his dream of owning his own brewery kept nagging at him. And just before Christmas 2010, his dream came true. “LaCumbre Brewing Company” became a reality. The name comes from the Spanish for “mountain peak” and refers to the mountains of the Albuquerque area and the idea that Erway wants, as the advertising tag says, to create “beers at their peak.”

In less than a year, LaCumbre has become both a local and national success. Not only do they serve in their own tap room, which is always very busy, but also they have close to 70 taps in local restaurants and bars. Their beers won two gold medals and a silver at the 2011 Great American Beer Festival competition. The golds were for “Elevated” — an American style IPA and their American style pilsner and the silver was for “Malpais’ –their foreign style stout.

The brewery has five regular beers: Jefe’s Hefe (which puns on the owner’s name and the Spanish word for boss) a German style wheat beer, South Peak Pilsner, Pyramid Rock Pale Ale, and the IPA and stout. Several limited editions are also brewed, the most unusual of which, Jeff says, was a coffee and milk stout that used 20 pounds of coffee in the brew.

The tap room is not, Erway emphasizes, “a place for drunks,” and a three-pint limit is strongly recommended. There is no restaurant, although the fridge stocks sandwiches from a local caterer. Patrons are encouraged to bring their own food or to phone out for pizza from nearby establishments.

Erway hopes to have a canning line operational by the summer. In the meantime, growlers can be purchased at the bar.

Marble Brewing: www.marblebrewery.com

Back to my car and back on I-25 south to the Lomas exit, west on Lomas to Marble and two blocks north on Marble to the brewery that has grown so big since it was founded nearly four years ago it is already expanding facilities to a nearby building.

Head brewer Ted Rice, who discovered about good beer from his home brewing friends at college, came to New Mexico because his wife was pursuing a PhD in English at the Univeristy of New Mexico, began to work for the Santa Fe Restaurant group’s Blue Corn Restaurant, which became Chama River. He focused on hoppy beers, particularly IPA. “People here like the bold flavours with spicy New Mexican food.”

Ted wanted to grow as a brewer and so he and two members of the Santa Fe group decided to grow their own brewery. Naturally, their first product was an IPA. “We strove for rich, deep, fruity, resinous hop flavour,” he says of their flagship beer, one of the top-selling bottled microbrews in New Mexico.

There other beers include Wild Flower Wheat. “We didn’t want an American style wheat beer or a hefeweisen, so we used local honey to give a unique flavour.” Their other beers include a Red, which Ted described as “chewy, with toffee malt flavours;” an Amber, which, although it uses hops, is balanced, with subtle malt notes; a full-bodied, rich Oatmeal stout; and a German pilsner. These beers are available in 12 ounce bottles in much of New Mexico.

The Tap Room serves sandwiches made at Chama River. And patrons are welcome to phone out for pizza or bring their own food.

Albuquerque certainly isn’t Portland as far as beer goes. But it definitely is the most exciting and active beer town in the American Southwest. If you’re in the area, take time to sample some of the very fine brews and if you’ve got a cooler, pick up a growler from one of the breweries tap rooms. Then when you get to your hotel, you can phone for a pizza and twist open the growler cap and enjoy.

For directions and maps, hours of operation, menus, notices of music nights, and descriptions of special edition beers, check the various breweries websites.

For a small boy growing up in Victoria over 60 years ago, Port Angeles wasa town of wonder. When we watched the Ediz Point Lighthouse blinking, it seemed to be a beacon leading to a place where you could buy Cheerios (sponsor of the Lone Ranger radio program), Pepsi (two full glasses that’s a lot), bags of Hershey Miniatures, and comic books with 52 pages. None of these amazing products was available in Canada.

In later years, Port Angeles lost its lustre. It was just a small town to travel through on the way to Seattle and American points east and south. But late last fall, it again became a destination. I took the morning ferry from Victoria to visit the small Washington State’s town’s two brewpubs. They were both only a couple of blocks from the ferry terminal.

When I entered the first of the two, Peaks Brew Pub, on 130 South Lincoln Street, I thought I’d just stumbled into another ordinary bar — stools next to the bar and a few tables scattered about. But then I noticed the 2 barrel brewing system at the back and the nearly 20 taps at the bar. The taps featured the six regular Peaks brews and one seasonal, along with guest taps for some really fine Washington, Oregon, California, and Colorado brews.

Peaks is owned by Ed and Wanda Smith. By his own admission, Ed, whose family has been in the bar business for generations, used to be a lover of the “pale fizzy stuff” (he didn’t actually use the word “stuff”). But then he met the legendary Bert Grant, who introduced him to microbrewed beers. When he opened Peaks in 1999, Ed decided to specialize in the wonderful array of microbrewed products available. “It took some educating,” he laughs. “There are 16,000 people in this town, and I’ll bet I’ve educated half of them about really good beers .”

When he decided to set up his own brewery in 2005, Ed began with paler beers and “gradually worked toward the darker.” His first brew, “Wandafuca Gold Pale Ale,” pays tribute to both his wife and the strait that runs between the Olympic Peninsula and Vancouver Island. “I wanted to get people off their Buds,” he explained. “Wandafuca was a west coast style, but more lightly hopped and with a fuller body.”

Ed’s five other regular beers are Train Wrecked I.P.A., which uses some local hops, and comes in at over 7 per cent ABV; Mount Pleasant Porter, an English style drink that Ed has brewed to be a little dryer than the style usually is; Lincoln Street Bitter, a hearty 5.8 per cent ABV; Dungeness Spit, a variation of the Wanda Fuca gold that is dry hopped; and Ed’s Big Ass Red, which he compares to Thomas Hardy Ale, and comes in at a whopping 10 percent.

When I was there, the seasonal special was a spruce beer, which combined the Train Wrecked IPA with spruce tips from Alaska. “We put the tips in something like a very big tea bag,” says Jeff Abbott, who now handles the brewing duties. “Then we put the bag in the tank.” The process may look like brewing tea — but the result is different. There’s a tang that isn’t overwhelming, but imparts its own flavour to the IPA.

While you’re at Peaks, enjoy the pub grub, which includes wings, super nachos, burgers, and the house specialty, “Ed’s Killer Chili.”

Business is booming at the Brew Pub, which opens just before noon every day. But Ed is doing more than producing delicious brews in the tiny system at the back of the establishment. He’s now developing a stand-alone brewery which will supply the town and much of the Olympic Peninsula with kegs and 22 ounce bottles of his beers. Opening is planned for the early spring.

Barhop Tap Room is located two blocks west at 110 Laurel Street. It’s open at 4 pm Monday through Thursday and 11am Friday to Sunday. Unfortunately, the owners and brewers did not shop up for our scheduled meeting, so I was only able to look through the window at the place and then take notes from some placards on the door.

Owner Tom Curry, one of them read, grew up loving Sierra Nevada beers and decided to produce  “aggressive California-style ales, with a Northwest twist, using fresh Northwest ingredients.” The beers listed were an IPA, a pale ale, an ESB, a porter, a rye beer, a lager, and a gluten free beer.

I’m sure you can still get Cheerios, Pepsi, and bags of Hershey miniatures in Port Angeles, and maybe even comic books with 52 pages. But, now, even better, you can try some wonderful beers. And you won’t have to drive home from the pub. Just walk the two blocks back to the ferry and enjoy the boatride back to Victoria.

A few weeks ago, on a damp, drizzly December Friday, my friend and I decided to visit Victoria’s four brewpubs for a progressive pub lunch. We would start with soup and a complementing beer at one place and, after two intermediate stops for salad and sandwiches and more beer, end with dessert and beer at the fourth brewpub.

Had it been a sunny day, we would have walked, or better still, taken Victoria’s Harbour Ferry between our destinations. As it was, we drove.  

As our progressive lunch began, we made a dash through the heavy rain from our car, across a small parking lot and into the cosy atmosphere of our first stop: Moon Under Water Pub and Brewery (at 350 B Bay Street, a very short walk from the Point Ellis Bridge). There was a happy atmosphere, as Don, Bonnie, and Ron Bradley were one day away from celebrating the first year anniversary of the opening of their establishment. The soup of the day was just what we needed: Oysters Rockerfeller soup, a rich and creamy comfort food that featured spinich and grated swiss cheese. We washed our soup down with Blue Moon Best Bitter, a very good example of that style.

The rain had diminished to a drizzle when we made our second stop, midway between Swans Brewpub and the Canoe Brewpub, Marina, and Restaurant. We headed first to Swans (506 Pembrooke Street) for our next course: the house salad of cheese, lettuce, tomato, pumpkin seeds, beans and wild rice, along with herb bread with garlic butter. Arctic Ale, our accompanying beer, was a light-bodied, crisp and refreshing complement to the salad. While we were admiring the magnificant West Coast Native art that Swans founder, the late Michael Williams, had collected and decorated the restaurant and brewpub with, brewer Andrew Tessier, who had just won a silver and a bronze medal at the Canadian Brewing Awards, stopped by to chat about the local brewing scene.

On the way out, we noticed that one of the featured bands that would be playing later in the week was called “The Mid-Life Crisis.” We both laughed and remarked that that period in our lives was rapidly becoming ancient history.

As we walked down the steep hill of Swift Street toward the Canoe Bewpub, Marina, and Restaurant (450 Swift Street), the sun made a brief, very feeble attempt to break through the clouds. The air was still very damp and we were happy to get into the pub, content to look at the upper inner harbour from inside. Not used to big noon-day meals and wanting to save room for dessert, we decided to split a Cowichan Bay Farms pulled chicken sandwich, generously heaped with tomato, bacon, arugula, and lemon mayonnaise. It was accompanied with house made fries and house made tomato catsup. 

Artifact Amber Lager, a Vienna style beer crafted by Canoe’s new brewer Daniel Murphy, was more substantial than the Arctic Ale, but less so than the Blue Moon Bitter. It had some malty sweetness, but a clean finish that helped cut the richness of our sandwich.

We drove across the Johnson Street Bridge, past Vic West Park, where, over half a century ago, our family used to attend the Clyde Beatty Circus, to 308 Catherine Street to Spinnakers Gasto Brewpub, Canada’s oldest brewpub. As we took our seats by a window overlooking the outer harbour, the clouds separated and the sun shone on the waters, creating thousands of diamond-like sparkles. We ordered and shared a pint of nut brown ale, a piece of honey cheese cake, and a hazel nut tort. All three made a rich and satisfying conclusion to a great three hour progressive pub lunch.

We both agreed that we’d make the trip again, mixing the order of our stops so that we could try different courses and different beers. We’d watch for a late spring or early autumn sunny day for our progressive pub lunch. That way we’d be able to do some walking to build up our appetites and later burn off some of the calories we’d taken in.  We’d also be able to enjoy a couple of  relaxing rides on the harbour ferry.

NOTE: This is the second of a series about U.S. microbreweries relatively close to the Alberta or British Columbia borders.

Bellingham, Washington has long been a favourite day-trip destination for shoppers from B.C.’s lower mainland. It is now becoming a destination for people who enjoy really good craft beers. The Whatcom County city has two world-class, award-winning microbreweries: Boundary Bay Brewery and Bistro and Chuckanut Brewery and Kitchen. Between the two of them, they have won 23 medals in the Great American Beer Festival, one of the most prestigious competitions in the world.

Chuckanut is the new kid in town, having opened in July 2008. It’s guided by Will Kemper, who brings over a quarter of a century of experience to the brewing craft. He’s worked in Washington State, Colorado, California, and Massachusetts — centers of the microbrewing renaissance — as well as in Mexico and Istanbul.

When he and his partners opened Thomas Kemper Brewery on Bainbridge Island in 1984, the Pacific Northwest was in the early stage of its love affair with hoppy India Pale Ales. Now, they types of beer are everywhere. So, when Will decided to start a brewery in Bellingham, he chose to be different. He would create mainly lagers — not the indistinguishable, pale fizzy stuff churned out by the mega brewers — but a variety of subtle German lagers: dunkel,  helles, Vienna, schwarzbier, and pilsner.

“Good lagers are fragile and perishable,” Kemper expalined. So localness is the key. “We wanted to create beers that weren’t freshly available here. There were lots of good ales, so why not be unique.” This meant formulating an intent and then selecting ingredients and following a process that would get the finished beers as close to the intent as possible. “We play on the relationships between the hops and malts and we make sure we use the ingredients that will best achieve our goals for eacy style.”

Just how close Chuckanut brews have come to realizing what might be called Kemper’s platonic ideal are revealled, in part, by the awards they have garnered at the Great American Beer Festival. In 2009, his Vienna lager earned a gold, as did his dunkel, and his Schwarzbier. His German Pil took a silver. The next year, his Vienna again took a gold and the Pilsner bronze.

But this year, only the third in Chuckanut had entered the GABF competition, was the capper: two golds (for the helles and the kolsch), a silver for the dunkel, and a bronze for the alt  — all of them traditional German styles. And best of all — Chuckanut was named the small brewing company of the year and Kemper the small brewing company brewer of the year.

Chuckanut beers are available in Washington State from Lynden to Tacoma. But the best place to try them is at the brewery’s tap room and kitchen at 601 West Holly Street in Bellingham. And be sure to sample some of the kitchen’s wonderful food, all made from scratch and from as many local ingredients as possible.

If Chuckanut is noted for its German lagers, Boundary Bay, located just a few blocks to the east, is recognized for its ales, hoppy West Coast style pales and hearty, robust English beers. The difference between the two places becomes apparent in looking over the list of Great American Beer Festival medals — 13 in all — Boundary Bay has won since 1998. There are two lagers on the list: a boch and a pilsner. But the others include an Imperial oatmeal stout, a scotch ale, a barley wine, a winter warmer, and an ESB.

Aaron Jacob Smith, who has been head brewer since 1998, the year the GABF medals started arriving, was a home brewer who remembers drinking Black Label, then Labatts and Molsen before he discovered Rogue, Pyramid, and Grants ales. “I really appreciated all the different kinds of hops used in the beers.”

“When I first started work at Boundary Bay, our Scotch Ale was the flagship beer. And then we started to produce big and hoppy West Coast IPAs — 7 per cent ABV and 70 International Bitterness units and more. We were hoppy before the paradigm shift of a decade ago. We push what I like to call the lupulin threshhold. But we strive to make intelligent use of hops.”

The seven year-around beers include “Bellingham Blonde”, designed as a crossover or entry level beer; Best Bitter, which is hoppier and more carbonated than its English counterpart; Inside Passage Ale , an IPA that uses three hops; Amber Ale, which Smith notes is hoppier than most; a Dry Irish Stout and an Imperial Oaktmeal stout. The Scotch ale, which is sweet and strong (6 per cent ABV), is a favourite with students at near-by Western Washington University.

The complex, which includes a beer garden, a deck, a bistro (which allows children until 10 pm), and a tap room, is reported to largest brewpub in the United States, with a capacity of over 600 during good weather. It’s located at 1107 Railroad Avenue. But if you can’t make it there, several of the beers are available in 650 millilitre bottles in area grocery stores.

We don’t advise you turn your day-trip to Bellingham into a pub crawl. But, you might enjoy a progressive pub-lunch, starting with soup or salad and a couple of small taster glasses at one place and then heading to the other for your main course and a couple more tasters. That way you’ll experience some really good food and definitely the some of best lagers and ales produced in the Pacific Northwest.

Since BEER QUEST WEST went to press nearly a year ago, the two biggest news items relating to Vancouver Island microbreweries north of Victoria have been the opening of a new brewery in Tofino (see our post of October 4) and the sale and rebranding of what had been Fat Cat Brewery of Nanaimo. Otherwise, brewers from Campbell River to Salt Spring Island have reported that business is proceeding pretty much as usual.

WOLF BREWING (Nanaimo): Although, when I asked them in May 2010, Bunny Goodman and Rob Haselow denied that Fat Cat was for sale, the brewery was sold over the winter of 2010-11. The new owners, Corinne and Travis Findlater and Jennifer and Dean Lewis, very quickly began a process of rebranding. “We felt that the Fat Cat brand was about the previous owners,” Corinne explained. “As new owners we wanted to be taken seriously and so we decided to move away from the cartoon style labelling and the rhyming name.”

The result was Wolf Brewing, with sleek clean new labels depicting the stylized head of a wolf. The names of the beers changed as well. The IPA became Red Brick; the Black and Tan, Woodcutter Dark Ale; the Porter, Black Tail Porter; and the Honey Beer, Golden Honey Ale.

“We’re still using Rob’s recipes as the basis of our brews,” Corrine explained, noting that Haseloh worked with the new owners and new brewer Glen Lamontagne, helping them get used to the equipment and the techniques of brewing the brewery’s specific interpretations of the various styles.

“But we’re tweeking things a little bit,” she continued. “We’ve made the IPA, which is our best seller, drier and more citrusy; we have added more aroma hops. We’re also using different hops for each of the beers we’re doing. And we’re listening carefully to the feedback we’re getting from old Fat Cat customers. Over all, we’re trying to combine west coast and English styles. Most important, we want our beers to be clean and crisp and fresh.”

“We like hops,” Lamontagne remarked. “But we don’t want to blow your head off. We can’t be too hoppy around here. This is Bud and Lucky territory.”

So far the new Wolf brand seems to be doing very well. Corinne reports that they are now brewing twice a week to meet demand. “And we’re getting into more and more bars and restaurants between Victoria and Campbell River.”

MERECROFT VILLAGE PUB (Campbell River): The only major change here is that Martin Eschbaumer of Surgenor Brewing has replaced Harley Davidson of Longwood as the brewer.

SURGENOR (Comox): In March 2011, Bob Surgenor announced that his brewery, which had been in operation for just over two years, was for sale at a price of $1,999,999. He reports that the asking price has been lowered to 1,700,000. Otherwise it’s business as usual.

LONGWOOD (Nanaimo): Harley Smith reports that there is no major news to report.

CRAIG STREET (Duncan): The planned expansion of the brewery, including the introduction of a canning line, has been postponed.

GULF ISLANDS: Murray Hunter is planning to make Whitetail Ale (an alt beer) and Heatherdale Ale available in the near future in 650 ml bottles.

It’s a long, slow drive to Tofino, the home of British Columbia’s newest and Canada’s most westerly brewery. The many curves on Highway 4 demand thatthe driver be alert and cautious. Fortunately, there are enough turn outs to allow veteran travellers of the highway to pass by a white-knuckled newcomer. And some of the rest areas provide spectacular views of old-growth cedar trees, crystal clear lakes, and towering mountains.

As the driver gets closer to Tofino, glimpses of Long Beach, with the Pacific Ocean’s surf pounding on the sand, are seen through the trees. Many shiny new SUVs and old, battered Volkswagen busses carry surf-boards or sleek ocean kayaks on their roofs. Entering town, you see more and more carvings of bald eagles and banners depicting breaching whales.

And, if you’re looking carefully, you’ll see a small sign pointing down Industrial Way to Tofino Brewing Company. The brewery, which occupies Unit C and D in an Industrial warehouse, opened this spring.

Owners Brian O’Malley and Chris Neufeld bring limited experience to their enterprise. Chris defined himself as someone who enjoyed drinking really good beer. Brian had been a bartender and his grandfather had started a brewery in Quebec in the 1950s. The two believed that opening a brewery in a very small isolated town seemed a good fit. “There are over a million tourists who come here every year — to kayak, surf, fish, and watch whales. But more important it’s a close knit community that believes in buying local.”

“Most of our business is local,” Brian remarked. “We have taps in four places in town; but a lot of the locals come to the brewery to buy growlers. In fact, we do half of our business right from here.” Two taps are fixed on the wall that’s beside the counter/desk. While we were talking, several people drove up and came into the building clutching a growler or two, which they filled themselves.

Both owners noted that if they were to succeed, they needed an experienced brewer. In Dave Woodward, they found just such a person. He’d trained at Sunderland University in England and most recently created a variety of acclaimed beers for the Brewpub at Whistler, a member of the Mark James group of gastro-pubs. He noted that, although Tofino’s 10 hectolitre brewery has only two fermenting tanks, meaning that only two brews are available at one time, the small scale along with close contact with customers (the brewing equipment is all part of the same space as the sales desk) spurred creativity.

Only one beer — Tuff Session Ale — is always on tap. A five per cent, copper-coloured beverage, it’s a west coast style pale ale. The malts provide a degree of sweetness which is balanced by the warrior and cascade hops. “I wanted something that was drier than the typical English session beer,” Woodward explained.

The second fermenting tank has been filled with several different beers. “We wanted to try as many different styles as we could,” Chris Neufeld explained. “Being as small as we are, we could do that. We didn’t have to tie up a tank for a long time with one type of beer.”

The current second tap was a “California Common”, which would be called “Steam Beer” if San Francisco’s Anchor hadn’t copyrighted the term. It went by the name “Pils-Knot.” It was gold, light to medium, smooth mild beer, with chewy malt flavours and very little hop presence.

Other “second beers” have been Fogust Wheat Ale (a German style hefe), a pilsner, and an IPA. Plans were to offer a pumpkin ale later in the spring. Chris offered me a “growlito” (a one litre growler) of the IPA which had been preserved with pressurized carbon dioxide. It was a dark amber beer, in which the hops dominated, but didn’t overwhelm.

I bought two growlitos of the two current brews and took them, along with the IPA back to the mini-fridge in my motel. Then, after a long walk along the shore, watching little children surfing expertly alongside of adults and a variety of dogs chasing sticks and the occasional seagull, I returned to my room, had a small taste of each of the beers. After that, I went out for a delicious meal, accompanied by a Tofino brew.

As I sat outside watching the sun set over the Pacific, I realized that everything had made the long, tiring drive to Tofino worthwhile. The air was clean, crisp and salty; the scenery was in the best-sense of the phrase, world class; and the beer was very good.

Back at the motel, I made sure that the caps of the growlitos were tightly screwed on. I wanted the beer to be as fresh as possible the next day when I offered my Victoria relatives some beer that they wouldn’t find around their town.

It has been just over a year since BEER QUEST WEST went to press and since then there have been many changes in the British Columbia and Alberta beer scene — new brew pubs, brewers moving to new jobs, and — most important — some very good new beers. Periodically, we’ll be offering brief updates for chapters from the book, starting with this posting on Chapter One, which focusses on Central Alberta.

ALLEY KAT: Following up on the success of the limited edition brews Neil Herbst and crew created to celebrate the brewery’s 15th anniversary, Alley Kat has launched a Big Bottle series. Every six to eight weeks, they’ll be issuing a new brew in 650 millilitre bottles. “It gives our brewing crew a chance to be creative and our customers the opportunity to enjoy some styles they don’t usually find,” Herbst explained. “White Tail” a hefeweizen and “Red Dragon” a double IPA made exclusively with Simcoe Hops have been two of the early offerings. In addition, they’ll be issuing seasonal six packs, this fall’s being “Ein Prosit!” — a six per cent Oktoberfest. (It’s a delicious beer — but I confess that I’ll miss “Pumpkin Pi.”)

AMBER’S: The big news is that Terry Cameron, the founder of Roughneck, took over, this summer, as the full-time brewer at Amber’s. He’s involved with the production of Amber’s three new beers: “Zombie Apocalypse,” a red Vienna Lager, “Amber’s Smoothe” — a light ale, and “Cinnamon and Cardamon Beer” — which adds these interesting and unusual flavours to the light ale base. These new beers are only available in draft — although Jim Gibbons hopes to make them available soon in growlers) available at the brewery only).The brewery’s other two flavoured lagers “Sap Vampire Maple Lager” and ” Australian Pepper Berry,” are still around. The maple flavour of the former has been considerably diminished. It no longer tastes like a pancake breakfast. “Lunch Pail Ale” is now sold without Bub Slug’s name being attached.

BREWSTERS: Gunther Trageser, the chain’s Edmonton Brewer,  reports that “Lanigan’s Red Ale” has been dropped from the list of regulars and replaced by “Fruit Hog,” in which an ever-changing variety of fruid essences and extracts are added to the “Wild West Wheat Base,” and “Curly Horse IPA,” a west coast version of the style.

ROUGHNECK: Terry Cameron has scaled back production at his small Calmar facility. He sold his canning line because, he said, there just weren’t enough orders from the chain liquor stores to warrant continued production. He still has some bar and restaruant accounts for his lager and ale. He plans continued production, on a limited basis, of his two bottled products. “Brewmaster’s Choice India Pale Ale” he describes as not as crazy as the West Coast style. “Brewmaster’s Choice Brown Ale” is full-bodied, but drier and less sweet that the best -known version of the style “Newcastle Brown.”

YELLOWHEAD: Edmonton’s newest brewery continues to produce only one beer: a German style lager. The focus has been on building restaurant and bar accounts, although there are plans to package in six-packs in the not too distant future.

DRUMMOND: Down in Red Deer, Drummond’s main product continues to be the premium lager. An all-grain beer, it is budget priced, and designed for the “regular” Joe who is ready to try an American style lager that isn’t produced by the internationals. Late in the summer, Dave Neilly, who had worked for over four years at Calgary’s Wild Rose and before that at Bushwakker Brewpub in Saskatoon, took over as head brwer.

     Brewing companies call it “Value Priced” or “Budget” beer. Many drinkers call it “Cheap” and go on to use some impolite terms to describe its taste and appearance. My favourite term is “Lawnmower Beer” — something that will quench your thirst while you cut the backyard grass under a hot summer sun. And, because it’s value priced, or budget, or cheap, if it goes flat or gets too warm, or if the can tips over, you don’t have to worry — just go to the fridge and get another. Make sure it’s cold — realy cold. A lawnmower beer may have a low flavour profile, but when it gets warm it doesn’t taste so good.

But what is “IT”? Basically, it’s a pale North American lager that’s priced about three bucks lower a six pack than a half-dozen of the mainstream Molson/Coors or Budweiser/Labatt products. It is very pale, a washed-out straw colour; it’s very light-bodied (so light, a cynic remarked, that a glass of it seems to want to float upward): and it’s very fizzy — hundreds of little bubbles race to the top of the glass to form a frothy white head.

And, it is very light in taste — unthreatening and, for people who like the malty and/or hoppy qualities of microbrews, bland. That’s because the very restrained use of hops in the brewing give none of the bitterness and floral qualities that the little cone-shaped plant can impart. Some of the malt (barley or wheat), the basis of many a hearty ale, is replaced by corn and/or rice, which contain fermentable sugar as does malt, but which is much less expensive. The result is sometimes a sweet taste that, according to the sales departments of some larger breweries, is what tests indicate people want. Oh, yes, they also say that corn and rice give the beer a greater clarity.

Last Friday afternoon, to celebrate the end of summer, we decided to try three lawnmower beers. We didn’t expect them to please us like the beers we usually drink, but we wanted to give the “style” (I use the word to be polite) a fair chance. We chose one beer brewed in B.C., another in Alberta, and the third in Saskatchewan.

When Labatt started pushing Lucky Lager as one of its main western Canada value-priced beers, the words Vancouver Island were frequently used on posters and cartons. But the brew hasn’t been made in Victoria since the ealry 1980s, at which time Labatt closed its Government Street plant and tore it down, not wanting another brewery to take over the premises. The Lucky we tried was brewed in Edmonton. Light, effervescent, and bland, it was, one taster said, “perfect for what it is. It won’t offend anyone.”\

Our next beer was the 21st Century incarnation of a beer that many older Albertans remember fondly as “Lethbridge Pils.” But it hasn’t been brewed in the southern Alberta city for over two decades. The “Old Style” — its non-geographically specific name — that we tried came from Vancouver. The tasters preferred it over Lucky, noting that it had some roasty notes and a bit of a hoppy taste. “It’s as if they were trying to put good ingredients in it,” one person joked.

Our final beer was Olympia, which used to be brewed near the capital city of Washington state. Like many very popular breweries, the brewer went out of business and the name and recipies were bought up by the Pabst Company, who contracted the brewing of these “beers your father drank” to Miller in Milwaukee. The brewing of our six pack had been subcontracted to Great Western of Saskatoon. The can still bears the old tag-line “It’s the water.” One taster suggested, “They need to leave the definite article out of the slogan.” It was fuller-bodied than Lucky, but less so than Old Style. It did have malty notes.

Some of the comments about the three beers were quite humorous. ”It makes water seem thick.” “It’s as if they’ve been trying to put ingredients into it.” “Can I try some wine next?” We won’t say which of the three beers elicitied specific comments.

It was a sunny day on the patio; we drank from small tasting glasses so that we didn’t have to worry about our beer going skunky; and we had fun thinking up silly things to say. Best of all, we didn’t have to mow the postage stamp of a lawn that runs from the patio to the fence. The condo association’s maintenance people do that.

When I see them the next time they come to mow, I think I’ll offer them a Lucky or a Pil or an Oly. I still have quite a few in the fridge.

NOTE: This is the first of what will be an occasional series of articles about western United States microbreweries that are close to the Canadian border. They are businesses that micro-loving Canadians might want to visit when they take brief visits south of the line.

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Belt, Montana, a village of 700 people, is not on most Canadian tourists’ list of places to visit. But for beer lovers, it should be. Located just north of Highway 87, a 20 minute drive east out of Great Falls , it’s the home of Harvest Moon Brewing Company, one of the state’s more rapidly growing breweries . In a state that is ranked third in the U. S. in number of breweries per capita ( 27 breweries, one for every 36,645 people inMontana), it is steadily becoming more recognized for the variety and quality of its beer.

In the mid 1990s, Stan Guedesse, a long-time home brewer and owner of a home-brew supply shop in nearby Great Falls, and his friend John Ballantyne decided to start a micrbrewery in the only area of the state that didn’t have one. Instead of Great Falls, they chose to locate in Belt. “I lived there; it would be cheaper to build our brewery there instead of Great Falls, and the water was excellent for the kinds of beer we wanted to create,” Guedesse remembers.

They started with a pale ale. “But the market around here wasn’t ready for that style just yet.” Then they developed what Stan calls “a very generic amber style. It did OK.” Their next beer was a porter. “It did very well for this market. I think that the name we gave it, Pig’s Ass Porter, caught people’s attention. So they tried it and liked it. It’s still very popular.” Beltian White, a Belgian style wheat beer followed. “It started as a seasonal. It was a good transition beer for this market and we decided to make it one of our regular offerings.” It is now Harvest Moon’s most popular beer, accounting for 60 per cent of sales.

The brewery steadily expanded, moving from cramped quarters at the back of a small tavern to their present building. (Go under the railway overpass and turn right). A bottling line was added in 2006, and a canning line not long after. In the summer of 2011, the brewery was in the final stages of expansion. A new 30 barrel system would increase production to between 6500 and 7000 barrels a year.  The company produces four year-around beers (discussed below) and a seasonal (a double IPA).

Beltian White (the name is combines both the brewery location and the European style) uses coriander, curacao orange peel and saaz hops. Slightly hazy, it has malty chewiness along with citrus overtones and a crip finish. When Pig’s Ass Porter (named after an old expression his father used) was under development, the distibutor didn’t want to market something that would interfere with his Guiness Stout accounts. “So we created a full-bodied beerthat wasn’t ashoppy as a robust porter.” Somewhat sweet and smoothe, it has chocolate and coffee notes.

Although it is an Irish red ale in style, Charlie Russell takes its name from a well-known artist of western scenes who was very popular in the area. Bronze in colour, it has both sweet and tart notes. The hops “take a back seat to the malts,” but they do cut the sweetness. Great Falls Select, the newest regular, named after a favourite area beer of the mid 20th century, is “our pale ale. It’s not west coast and doesn’t have all that hoppiness.” The malt notes dominate, although there is a crisp finish. In some ways, it reminded me of a Belgian saison. “That’s not intentional,” Guedesse noted. “But it may be the yeast.” Northern Montanans were now ready for a pale ale — their own kind.

All four of the regular beers are available in bottles; Great Falls Select and Beltian White are also in cans. You’ll find Harvest Moon products in grocery stores in the Great Falls area, in many other Montana cities, and at the brewery. If you plan a visit to Belt, where you can sample and buy products in the tap room and tour the facility, give a call ahead at 406-277-3188.

Four decades ago.when we lived in Michigan, we would always return from our west coast summer vacation with a case of Coors. At the time, the Golden, Colorado product wasn’t available east of the Mississippi. So, when we invited neighbours over and shared a few cans from our case, everyone thought we were serving some rare and wonderful nectar. Until the cans ran dry, we were the heroes of the nieghbourhood.

Now that we live in the west and spend our summers in northern Michigan. Coors is available everywhere and doesn’t seem to taste half so wonderful as it used to. It isn’t necessary to bring any of it home, and I doubt if any of my beer drinking neighbours would want me to.

The beers from Bell’s Brewery of Kalamazoo, Michigan, became my drink of choice this summer. And, when the vacation was over and it was time to head home, we packed an assorted case of their various beers to take home and share with our beer loving friends. None of them had heard of Bell’s Brewery. The products are only available in 17 mid-Western and Atlantic coast states and in Arizona.

Larry Bell, who had been a homebrewer and then owner of a home-brew supply store, founded the brewery — one of the earliest microbreweries in Michigan — in 1985. He began using a 15 gallon soup kettle to brew his product, but continued to expand until the now state-of-the-art brewery produces well over 100,000 barrels annually (that’s around six million six-packs a year). Bell’s is the eighth largest microbrewery in the United States.

We tasted five different beers, ranging from the light coloured and light bodied ”Lager of the Lakes” and finishing with the hearty “Bell’s Best Brown.” Here are some of my neighbours’ responses.

Lager of the Lakes, a 5 per cent ABV pale American lager, is listed as the tenth best in its category by Beer Advocate. Light gold and effervescent, it is light bodied, crisp, and clean. One taster, noting that it had just the right amount of bitterness, remarked, “it just what it’s supposed to be .. an awesome summer beer.”

Oberon, a 5.8 per cent ABV American wheat beer, is probably the top summer seller of all of Michigan’s microbrews. Named after a character in Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” it is a rich golden colour and pours with a cloudy, yeasty haze. Not so sweet as some wheats, is has spicy and orange notes.  Another taster remarked, “I’m a wheat beer person; I’d give it top marks.”

Although Bell’s Pale Ale (5.2 per cent ABV) is listed as an American Pale Ale, this one tasted more like an English version of the style. “There’s more maltiness to the style than I’m used to — but that’s good.” Medium bodied and golden in colour, it is more balanced, with less hop bitterness than the American styles.

Big Two Hearted Ale, named after a northern Michigan river featured prominently in a Hemingway short story, is a fairly hefty 7 per cent ABV medium bodied American IPA brewed with generous amounts of Centennial hops. But it’s in no way a hop bomb. Malts provide a balance to the hops. Medium bodied, it has a clean, but light hop finish. “I like the fact that it seems gentle in your mouth,” remarked one taster.

We ended our tasting with Bell’s Best Brown, an English style beer, that pours a rich brown with a frothy head. It has roasty, chocolatey notes, but not the sweetness one associates with the classic example of the style, Newcastle Brown. That’s probably because the hops give an understated bitterness that prevents the malt flavours from becoming cloying. One taster remarked that it was a little rich for him during this warm summer day, but said that if I went back to Michigan in the late fall, I should bring some back for him to try.

The tasting finished, all agreed that Bell’s beers were excellent. “When are you going back to Michigan?” I was asked. I wondered at first if, as in my Coors tasting days, I was only popular as long as I was serving hard-to-find beer. I prefer to think that it was because they hoped that I’d soon be bringing back the Bell’s.

If you’re travelling in the Midwest, you might want to check www.bellsbeer.com, to see where the product is available. If you’re travelling along Michigan 28, on your way to or from Ontario, Econofoods of Marquette and Hillside Party Store of Munising stock lots of Bell’s and other very good Michigan beers.