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Friday Wrap-Up for September 1st, 2023 – News from Burnside Brewing, Landwash, Banished, Mauzy, Trailway, Tata, and, would you believe it, Pumpkin Beers!!!

Posted by acbbdamian on 2023-09-01
Posted in: Friday Wrap-Up. Tagged: Alexander Keith's Historic Brewery, Annapolis Brewing Company, Banished Brewing, Beer of Fundy Festival, Bellwoods Brewery, Brasseurs du Petit Sault, Breton Brewing, Burnside Brewing Company, Garrison Brewing, Good Robot Brewing, Great Roads Brewing, HopYard Halifax, Horton Ridge Malt & Grain, Landwash Brewery, Lone Oak Brewing, Lunn's Mill Beer Company, Mauzy Cidery, Newfoundland Craft Beer Festival, PEI Brewing Co., Propeller Brewing, Quidi Vidi Brewery, Sea Level Brewing, Stillwell Beergarden, Tanner & Co Brewing, Tatamagouche Brewing, Tire Shack Brewing, TrailWay Brewing, Unfiltered Brewing, Upstreet Craft Brewing. Leave a Comment

Warning, while it is September 1st at the time of writing, below you may experience shock and surprise due to the releases of multiple styles of Pumpkin & Fall type beer releases. We don’t blame you if you want to hold onto the last bits of summer before conceding to the grips of the orange crush, but we’re just here to deliver the news! It seems like these Pumpkin Spice releases are coming earlier each year, is that because of global warming or just September starting on a Friday? We invite you to pour yourself a beer and contemplate. Onto the beer-y news!

Straight outta Burnside (and their Antigonish location), Burnside Brewing has a brand new release from this past week. Beer Can Square Pants is a Pineapple IPA that’s hazy, sweet and tasty with a smooth and creamy pineapple flavour. With a slight addition of real pineapple juice, the main pineapple aroma is from the mix of hops in the boil and the dry-hopping from Azacca, El Dorado and Bru-1. The grain bill of Pilsner malt, flaked oats and honey malted oats brings the sweet and creamy mouthfeel and flavour while Kveik yeast brings all the smooth, tropical flavours together. Coming in at 6.1% ABV, this tasty IPA is available now from both Burnside locations and will be available at private stores all across Halifax (including Liquid Assets!). See below for your chance to work with the Burnside team at their soon-to-open location in Truro!

Hopping over to the Rock, Landwash’s first release of the week was the return of their newsletter after 2 years! Check out their socials and website for how to sign up for their news right from the source. The Landwash Dispatch was packed with content this week, starting with one release available now.

Froze Det is a Cold IPA that brings a light bodied, dry, and crisp IPA to your tastebuds. Featuring some big double dry hopping (DDH!) of Columbus and Cascade, you’ll get grapefruit, citrus, hop spice, and a bit of dankness as well. Fermented with a Kolsch yeast, this one is canned and 6.5% and only available in their taproom and retail shop. 

We’re gonna take this next bit right from their newsletter, hinting at three big releases coming this month. We’ll be there to fill in the blanks as they hit the taps and shelves!

Festbier – new release!
A smooth, malty German lager that’s deep gold in color with an ivory head. Brewed with high quality pilsner and Munich malt. Subtle toasty notes and light, sweet bready flavors are delicately balanced by German noble hops, with mild floral and spice notes rounding out this soft, approachable beer. 5% ABV

Make/Shift Kraken IPA – this is a new one in the Make/Shift series. 
A throwback to the classic West Coast IPA, additions of Chinook and Simcoe hops give healthy notes of pine and citrus, while the generous dry hop addition of Evergreen hops delivers punchy stone fruit and orange zest. This hoppy profile is complemented by a subtly sweet base of Golden Promise and crystal malt. 6% ABV

Smiling Land Lagered Ale – this is a returning release. 
Inspired by German Kölsch, Smiling Land is our Lagered Ale. Fermented warm with Kölsch yeast, conditioned cold with love, this crisp and bright beer is hopped with Czech Saaz and German Saphir for notes of spice and citrus. 4.5% ABV

Let us wait no longer, and hit you with a sextet of Pumpkin-related releases from across the region. As they’ve all hit the taps in the last couple of days, let’s get these to you in alphabetical order:

  • Brasseurs du Petit-Sault is bucking the trend with their La Bonhomme Sept-Heures, opting for a higher alcohol content in their pumpkin beer. At 8.5% ABV, this one will warm you from the inside out! Look for it at the brewery shop and taproom in Edmundston, and making its way to your local ANBL reeeeeal soon!
  • Breton Brewing has brought back Spiced Up, their 5.5% ABV amber ale, brewed with more than 75 kg of roasted pumpkin in the mash, with spices added to give the full pumpkin pie experience. Available at their taproom and home delivery, and at NSLCs too.
  • Garrison Brewing released Oh My Gourd! this week as well, their 5.0% ode to the orangest of veggies. Pumpkin puree keeps it authentic, and their use of the spices that many of us love, make for a great fall drink. So good, it was awarded best in the Herb & Spice category at last year’s Canada Beer Cup!. Available now at their two Halifax locations on tap and in cans, with delivery an option as well. Private and government shops in NS, NB, and NL will also be carrying the beer shortly.
  • PEI Brewing Company has brought back their Pumpkin Ale, featuring real pumpkin, a touch of brown sugar, and great spicing to the glass. Available at their PEIBC and Gahan locations across the Atlantic provinces, and on shelves at ANBL and NLC before the end of the month.
  • Back to Halifax, where Propeller continues the tradition of using Howard Dill’s world famous giant pumpkins in their beer for a true taste of the region. Spicing with cinnamon, nutmeg, and clove, caps off the experience. Available today at their three shops (as well as delivery and shipping across the country), private stores in HRM, and select NSLC locations across the province.
  • And finally, we’re back to the gentle island, where Upstreet Brewing has brought back the spookiest of their offerings, Gravedigger Pumpkin Ale. Amber in colour, and weighing in at 6.5% ABV, the full body and heavy-but-just-right spicing reminds us that maybe pumpkin beers are pretty darn good after all! Hitting the shelves at noon today!

The unstoppable duo of Banished Brewing and Lone Oak have released the first of a Home and Home pair of collaboration brews this week. A tongue-in-cheek ode to their collected history gave rise to the name of a Hazy Triple IPA hitting the taps in Paradise recently, Mustard Pickles. Bright yellow in colour, with a hint of green (thanks to all those Citra and Talus hops used, no doubt!). This bitter, yet smooth, dank, yet citrusy, 10.1% ABV beer is a blast in a glass! It made its debut just in time for last weekend’s Newfoundland Craft Beer Festival in Banished’s newly-opened Beer Garden at their Maverick Place location. The BG will stay open as long into the fall as the weather allows. Speaking of the NLCBF, their 12 Beers of Christmas has been announced for November 17 – 18, with tickets available today! And if you’re into NFL and football pools, you’ll want to check out this page for your way to win free Banished beer for a year, in addition to some sweet perks at their taproom every Sunday during the season. Late breaking news: Lone Oak released their own batch of Mustard Pickles Friday after publishing, so those near Borden can get their fix now too!

Mauzy Cider has another small batch release out now, featuring the use of hyper-local ingredients from Thimble’s Cottage at O’Brien Farm in St. John’s. Thimble’s Own was made with 2022 Season apples from an unknown varietal tree in front of the cottage, affectionately known as Kate’s Apples. Added to that were hops, also of unknown variety, grown at the farm and aged before co-fermentation. Syrup made from maple sap collected at the farm, along with honeycomb from their resident bees added to both the fermentable sugar used in and overall character. Fewer than one hundred 750ml bottles were produced, and they are only available at Thimble’s Cottage, so make your way to this oasis in the city to enjoy a taste of O’Brien Farm.

Fredericton’s Trailway Brewing is continuing their Land series of Belgian beers, with a foray back into the monastic styles. Wood Land is a Belgian Dubbel, a style known for caramel, dark fruit, a bit of spice character, and raisin/date notes from the combination of malt, sugars, and yeast. Darker malts sit on the base grains, with the yeast lending some spice character to complement the Noble-like earthy hop choice. Natural carbonation helps to soften the mouthfeel, and keep the mouthfeel from being too cloying, despite the 7.5% alcohol content. To that end, the Tw Crew made their own dark candi sugar, taking advantage of the science behind the Maillard reaction for a bit “more” from the carbonating yeast and sugar, during the months-long process. Available now at their Main Street location in Fredericton, as well as Saint John’s Union House, plus delivery and shipping through their website.

On the North Shore of Nova Scotia, Tatamagouche Brewing has released a couple of new beers this week, both with a Belgian bent. First up, in a truly classic style, is Waterlily, a Belgian Witbier. Brewed with raw wheat and treated with curaçao orange peel, fresh cracked coriander, and elderflower, though it’s bright and slightly citrusy, you can also expect the soft mouthfeel that a large proportion of wheat brings to a beer. Look for aromas of citrus, pear, and spice, no doubt with some contribution from the yeast. At 4.4% ABV, this one has “a couple” written all over it, especially with this weekend’s pending weather. On the slightly less traditional Belgian side is the latest in the Intertidal series of IPAs: Intertidal White IPA. Pairing juicy tropical hops with the fruit-forward nature of Belgian yeast strains, this one is easy drinking at 5.8% and boasting flavours of pineapple, mango, and mandarin. You can grab both of these beers from the source in cans, via online order, and (maybe not immediately, but soon) from other places where you find Tata brews. Note that these are both seasonals, however, and when they’re gone they won’t be back for a while.

Down in the Annapolis Valley, Sea Level Brewing has a new one on the taps, so new that it doesn’t actually have a name. Going by The New Unnamed Light One for now (we won’t be surprised if that sticks, minus the “new” and maybe the “unnamed”), it’s a clean and crushable American-style light ale. Consistent with American-style lagers, this one is very light in flavour and body, with no significant hop aroma or flavour, and a slight malt flavor. No doubt fermented with a clean yeast, so there’s not likely to be much in the way of esters, what you’re going to find here is “beer flavored beer” in a very crushable 4% ABV package. If this sounds like your jam, check it out on tap for pints and fills or in cans to go at both Sea Level locations.

There’s a couple of beery events on the go for the long weekend in Nova Scotia:

The gang down at Horton Ridge Malt & Grain Co. have big things going on all weekend in the Annapolis Valley with a four-day festival they’re calling the Beer of Fundy Festival that celebrates Nova Scotia’s grain-to-glass experience. Uniquely poised to do so as the producers of the malt, they’ve got quite the line up of events starting tonight, and going right through ‘til Monday. Key to the weekend’s events are six different beers from six different breweries, all of which have been made with Horton Ridge malt, which itself is malted from grain grown along the Bay of Fundy:

There are several ticketed events over the course of the weekend, beginning with the Beer Makers’ Circle tonight, and finishing with the Beer at the Bottom of the Bay event early Monday afternoon, which will see folks transported to the seafloor of the Bay of Fundy during low tide (weather dependent, of course). In between will be a wide variety of talks and workshops, including one on brewing and another on foraging and elixir-making, and musical events. We can’t do them all justice here, so we encourage you to check out the full program. There will also no doubt be updates and additional details available on Horton Ridge’s socials (Fb, Ig). Tickets can be purchased on-site, which will help you avoid some fees. If you’re not up for any of the ticketed events, but want to try the beer, you’re free to come by the taproom all weekend where the featured beers above will be pouring alongside Horton’s regular lineup, with seafood-focused fare from Mega Munchies Food Truck.

[ed. We’d just like to take a moment to give a big shout to Horton Ridge, not just for putting on such a big and varied weekend slate, but for how much info they’re providing, especially the full listing of events with ticket prices and all fees clearly spelled out, and the ability for people to just come by and have a beer as normal at the taproom.]

For those in Halifax (or planning to be in Halifax) tomorrow afternoon, Saturday, September 2nd from noon to close (or sellout), there’s a bit of a thing going on down on Spring Garden Road. Stillwell Beergarden is celebrating the Labour Day weekend with a lovely pairing of liquids and solids. Pouring from the taps will be a delightful mix of hoppy things and sour & fruity things from one of Canada’s best breweries, Bellwoods:

  • Cat Lady IPA
  • Jelly King Cherry
  • Jelly King Pineapple, Tangerine & Grapefruit
  • Jelly King Spicy Margarita
  • Jutsu Pale Ale
  • Roman Candle IPA

To satisfy your need for sustenance, there will also be Korean BBQ Street Food coming off the grill. Dubbed “Bell-Gogi”, no tickets are required, but this event is likely to be pretty popular given the beer and food and the nice weather that’s forecast, so think hard about when you want to get down there to ensure you and your crew get seats!

Lots of jobs for those looking to start, or mix up, their career in the art and science of brewing. Hopefully you’ll find something close to you!

In Sydney, Breton Brewing is hiring a Production Brewer to join their staff.

In Truro, The Common by Burnside Brewing is hiring a Taproom Manager and Associates.

In Elmsdale, Good Robot is hiring a Packaging Associate in their state-of-the-art brewhouse.

In Lower Sackville, Great Roads is looking for an Assistant Brewer to join their team. Experience/education is a must!

Tanner Brewing in Chester Basin is also hiring a Brewer to fill out their roster.

A few quicker mentions to lead into your long weekend:

Moncton’s Tire Shack has a couple customer favourite beers back after some time away. Killed by Death is a massive Triple IPA weighing in at 10% ABV and featuring irresponsible amounts of Citra, Mosaic, and Vic Secret. Having won a silver at the US Open Brewing Championships and a gold at the Canada Beer Cup, it’s earned a spiffy new all-black package. You’ll also find a much lighter brew, the cardamom witbier Zenith Libation available. One of the first beers the brewery ever made, it’s smooth and creamy and 5% ABV with a touch of cardamom spice.

With fall just around the corner, that means “fall beers” other than pumpkin ales (<insert cheering from the anti-gourd crowd here>) are coming around as well. Quidi Vidi’s got their 5.5% Oktoberfest Märzen, featuring a toasty malt profile and a dash of herbal bitterness, available from the source, at NLC locations, and in your favorite convenience stores that stock QV brews.

Halifax’s Unfiltered has a returning engagement for you this weekend: Inducement, their ode to shitty sales practices in the industry, is a classic 7.5% NASH DIPA full of tropical hop flavors. It’ll mostly induce you to have another one. Grab a pint at Charm School (live chill techno Sunday afternoon, 2 – 5pm) or have your growler filled to go, because cans of this won’t happen until next week (but there’s still plenty of DOA cans available, and no doubt other stuff too).

Sad news to end the post this week, but we wanted to pass along our good wishes and kudos to the staff of Hopyard Halifax, who learned of the closing of the establishment at the same time as the rest of us earlier this week. After five years at the Gottingen Street location, there is not (yet) a lot of information on the reasons for the closing, but from our outside view, the staff were always gracious and knowledgeable, most recently demonstrated during this week’s “One Pint at a Time” event co-hosted by the Change is Brewing Collective and Boxing Rock. We’re hoping for quick recovery from this set back, and for bigger and better things for all involved.

Friday Wrap-Up for July 28, 2023 – News from Flying Boats, Acadie-Broue, Stillwell, Annapolis, Lunns Mill, Horton Ridge, Little North, Tanner, Trailway, Gahan, Banished and Shipwright

Posted by acbbdamian on 2023-07-28
Posted in: Friday Wrap-Up. Tagged: Acadie-Broue, Annapolis Brewing Company, Banished Brewing, Flying Boats Brewing, Gahan House, Halifax Seaport Beerfest, Horton Ridge Malt & Grain, Little North Brewhouse, Lunn's Mill Beer Company, Shipwright Brewing, Stillwell Brewing, Tanner & Co Brewing, TrailWay Brewing. Leave a Comment

Happy Friday! Let’s kick off the week’s post with the great news, one of you has won a pair of tickets to the Thursday August 10th session of Halifax Seaport Beerfest… Congratulations to tyler.muffins for the pic and story of them enjoying a pint on the weekend! We’ll send along your tickets momentarily! And for those who entered, thank you very much! We were thrilled to see you make us part of your beer and cider adventures! To continue those adventures, be sure to grab your tickets for the Fest taking part on the Halifax Waterfront in less than two weeks! Thursday August 10 til Saturday August 12, grab your tickets here! There are also Volunteering opportunities before, during, and after the Fest, which will get you some swag and a chance to check out the festival with a backstage pass! More on what you can expect in last week’s post.

Let’s start off this week in Dieppe, New Brunswick, where Flying Boats invited Patrice Godin of Acadie-Broue into their brewhouse for a truly special brewday. Relying heavily on the well-researched books of Lars Marius Garshol and Mika Laitinen, they brewed a rustic ale in the Norwegian and Scandinavian traditions. Beginning with a hollowed out spruce log as their mash and lautering tun, known as a kuurna, a filter bed was created with alder, fir, and spruce branches, which only stood to increase bright wood and resinous properties. A very short pasteurization step, rather than full boil, was used to kill any beasties, before the Ebbegarden Kveik yeast from Escarpment Labs was added. As is tradition, there was a healthy roar let out when pitching, which also gave rise to the name, Screaming at the TrØlls. The resultant beer is full-bodied, with a light wild character, and a bright woodsy aroma and flavour. Given the dimensions of the kuurna, this beer is in short supply, and will not be packaged, so your only chance to enjoy it is at Flying Boats’ taproom at 700 Malenfant Blvd. But we can tell you that there is at least one more beer from the same brewday that will be released in the coming months, so stay tuned! Be sure to check out the great pictures of the day from Mathieu Leger, on Flying Boats’ IG post.

Your Friends in Foam™ at Stillwell Brewing have, right under our noses, managed to stealthily brew a candidate for “beer of the Summer 2023.” Anyone who follows his Insta account knows that brewer CPR spent some time in Czechia earlier this year (or was it late last year?) and anyone who knows the man would have been daft to think he didn’t come home planning a Czech Lager. But then there was the taproom opening and the introduction of Stilly Cream Ale and then summer happened and here we were, blissfully unaware. WHAM. That’s how they get you. On draught at Stillwell properties today, and maybe some other places around town is 10º Czech Pale Lager. The 10º doesn’t mean anything about temperature, it indicates the degrees Plato of the initial wort before fermentation, which is how much sugar is available for the yeast to consume; this is the standard way of describing beer strength in Czechia and the Stillwell gang is staying true to it here, even if it means the name doesn’t really roll off the tongue. Featuring all-Czech ingredients, including floor-malted Moravian Pilsner malt, Czech Saaz hops, and a Czech yeast strain by way of Escarpment Labs, the only thing not Czech about it is the water (although we’re sure Chris thought about it). That said, Halifax’s somewhat soft water is very apt for the style, so no harm, and certainly no foul. Double-decocted (if you know what that means you just cringed at the effort) and naturally carbed via spunding for maximum tradition, it took three months to go from grain to glass. The result is a 4% ABV beer with an impeccable head of foam and a carbonation that fairly dances on the tongue. Described by CPR himself as “kinda savoury, [and] zesty!” it’s the magic of the old country in a glass. Given the ingredients, the techniques, and the conditioning time, this one will likely be a once-a-year treat from the brewery. Fortunately it’ll be packaged in cans next week so you can enjoy it in the comfort of your own home as well as out in the world. And the one of us who has already experienced it can tell you it absolutely tastes like another, and probably another after that. We do, however, recommend making sure to have a slow-poured pint off the Lukr taps at the Stillwell Freehouse, as we can vouch for the way that they can amplify an already stellar beer!

A trifecta of Annapolis Valley breweries came together earlier this month to celebrate and showcase locally-grown and malted grain. When Horton Ridge announced they had some 2-Row malted barley from a local farm, Annapolis Brewing jumped at the chance to use it, bringing along their pals down the road in Lawrencetown, Lunn’s Mill. Opting to brew a Belgian Pale Ale, thank you to the malts character and excellent extraction and fermentability, which enhanced the light spicy phenolic character of the yeast chosen. Simply named Belgian Pale Ale, this 4.9% ABV beer is available on draught only at the three participating breweries along the 101 Highway!

Little North Brewhouse, out of Baie Verte, Newfoundland has a brand new release. If you’re hot on the Cream Ale train and can’t stop dreaming of the cream, these fine folks are bringing you Good Friday, a cream ale coming in at a very drinkable 4.3%. This is available now at 410 Grocery in Baie Verte, Grand Falls Windsor and Gander NLCs and will be in Corner Brook NLC over the weekend. Grab these cans if you’re local (and want to send us some!).

Though they’ve had some troubles with the recent flooding, Tanner & Co Brewing still manages to come out with a new small batch brew for the weekend. Sahti is a new release in the style of the traditional Finnish beer. This is a 9.5% full bodied beer featuring juniper branches and local malt in the mash and hopped for balance to 10 IBU. Hefeweizen yeast brings it all together for a very unique style of beer. The yeast should bring the banana flavour while the juniper flavour should come through for a unique flavour for one of the oldest beer styles in the world. This is only available for a short time on tap for pints and growler fills  at the Duke Street taproom.

A regular to these weekly posts, Trailway Brewing has some news out of their Fredericton and Saint John locations. First up, Green Island is back! This is a taste and aromatic 6% IPA that packs the tropical fruit with its mix of Cashmere and Idaho 7 hops. Lots of citrus and tropical fruit complement this juicy New England style IPA. 

Other notes from Trailway include the return of Hu Jon Hops Ultra, a 1.5% ABV version of the Hu Jon series. This is in 4 x 355ml packs at ANBL stores and Trailway locations. Also, if you’re looking for the ultimate Trailway experience, they have 2 AirBNB units above the Union House Brewpub in Saint John. You can check them out here. 

If you were part of the two big weekends in Cavendish this month, you may have seen a new brew from the Island-native Gahan. Coming fresh off the festival circuit and into wider release is Balmy Island, a pineapple sour. This is a 5% sour with real pineapple additions that was a hit at the festivals. This sour, tart, refreshing and juicy sour is now canned and available now in wider release at PEI Liquor locations, PEI Brewing and Gahan shops.

Never one to shy away from the new stuff, we’ve got a few hits from Banished Brewing. First up is a brand new release, Makes Less Sense is a Hazy Session IPA clocking in at 4.0%. This is the little version of their Hazy IPA, Makes Sense. This is available in cans from the brewery and online right now.

In the event news, the Banished folks go from one island to another where they take over the taps at Hopyard Charlottetown! There will be 4 taps pouring on Thursday August 3rd. The four featured Paradise brews are: Paradise Town (fruited sour), Little Jim (session IPA), Private Line (Kolsch) and Makes Sense (the previously mentioned Hazy IPA). There will be a late night variety show kicking off at 10PM that night as well, but no tickets are necessary, so it’s a great chance for the Charlottetown folks to try some of the Rock’s finest.

If you’re down in Lunenburg, Shipwright Brewing has a new feature on tap. Cherry Hill is a Belgian Sour using cherries from Terra Beata Farms right in Lunenburg. This one is 4.5% and features a nice tart Cherry flavour, with that slight sour refreshing hit on your palate, good for a hot summer. This is available now at the bar and taproom for pints and also crowlers to go.

Friday Wrap-Up for June 9, 2023 – News from Jym Line and CBANS, Garrison, Trailway, Banished, Tanner & Co, North, Breton, Annapolis, Mauzy, Upstreet, and plenty more!

Posted by acbbaaron on 2023-06-09
Posted in: Friday Wrap-Up. Tagged: Annapolis Brewing Company, Backstage Brewing, Banished Brewing, Bogside Brewing, Breton Brewing, Candid Brewing, CBANS, Craft Brewers Association of Nova Scotia, Gahan House (Halifax), Garrison Brewing, Hardisty Brewing, Horton Ridge Malt & Grain, Jym Line Glassware, Lake City Cider, Mauzy Cidery, North Brewing, Paul G Hammond, Serpent Brewing, Tanner & Co Brewing, Tapestry Beer Bar, Tatamagouche Brewing, Think Brewing, TrailWay Brewing, Two Islands Brewing, Upstreet Craft Brewing, Yarmouth Craft Beer Festival. Leave a Comment

Happy Friday y’all! We hope those who attended the Canadian Brewing Awards and Conference in Halifax enjoyed their time here, and went home with some hardware in their carry-on. And that the hangovers didn’t make this week too unbearable! There was a decent enough showing from the AC breweries (summarized here), and we can all work together to have an even better showing in Hamilton next year!

In light of the devastating fires that have been burning in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick for the past two weeks, Jym Line Glassware, provider of glasses and growlers to many Atlantic Canadian breweries, has launched a fundraiser with the Craft Brewers of Nova Scotia to launch Together for NS. At participating breweries, you can help by donating a minimum of $20, and in return you’ll receive a specially-branded glass and a large sample of beer to say thanks! All of that donation will go to the Canadian Red Cross and their Nova Scotia and Atlantic Canadian Fire Relief, with both the provincial and federal governments matching that donation as well! That one sample is worth at least $60 to those looking to rebuild their lives, with the goal to sell all of the glasses to raise more than $150,000. More details on the participating breweries is here (and is growing), there should be one in your neck of the woods!

One beer launched last weekend for the CBAC, but after blog publishing, was the Nova Scotia collaboration Fer ‘Fax Sake!. Garrison Brewing welcomed in breweries from around HRM and beyond to take part in this “Welcome to Nova Scotia” beer, with Backstage Brewing out of Stellarton, Antigonish’s Candid Brewing, Colby Village’s Hardisty Brewing, Spryfield’s Serpent Brewing, and Two Islands Brewery from Parrsboro. This 5.0% Pale Ale was formulated to be juicy and quaffable, and features plenty of late-usage hops, with Apollo, Citra, Eclipse, Idaho 7, and Simcoe filling the bill. Think tropical, with mango, papaya, and lychee notes throughout. Grab this in small cans, perfect for packing in and out on a hike, at the host brewery’s retail locations!

Fresh off of some new awards from the CBAs, Trailway Brewing has two new releases. No rest for the winners… First up is a new iteration of The Blend, their Smoothie Sour series. This one features pineapple, passion fruit and black currant, with each can having about 200 grams of pure, real fruit. With all smoothie sours, keep these cold and try to drink as fresh as possible, and a little rolling beforehand won’t hurt to even it out. There is lots of real fruit to chug down in a tasty 5.3% package. Get this in cans only, and available at Fredericton and Saint John locations.

Second up is a brand new release with a cool label that may seem familiar. Sunny C is an Orange sour made with orange juice concentrate. The concept here was a brunch beer, sort of like a mimosa. The sour style works well with the citrus and orange, pairing nicely with the tartness. This is 3.5% and totally crushable. This is available now in cans from both locations. 

Paradise’s Banished Brewing is celebrating some vibrant new artwork in the brewery this week, as their long-time artistic collaborator Paul G Hammond unveiled a massive mural named Astral Puffins’ Paradise. Check out the Making Of video, as well as the finished product! And what better way to celebrate than with a new beer, and PGH label, release?! Paint With Light does just that, featuring a painter working on a canvas. When first grabbed from the freezer or backpack, the canvas is blank, ready for anything the painter (or drinker) may wish to fill in. But when brought into sunlight, the canvas springs alive with colour, thanks to the UV-activated photochromic ink used. A beautiful and fitting tribute to this relationship, named thanks to Jason Normore and his attitude towards photography. The beauty does not stop with the label, as the beer inside the can lives up to the high bar set on the outside. A 6.0% Hazy IPA, double dry hopped with Loral Cryo and the Cryo Pop blend, both offering plenty of tropical aroma with very little hop material to increase yield. Think citrus and floral, pineapple and stone fruit, both on the nose and on the tongue. Available at the brewery on tap and in cans, and coming to local retailers real soon!

Chester’s Tanner & Co Brewing is wading into the Cold IPA style, a bit of a tongue-in-cheek amping up of the traditional West Coast IPA style, and rebuff of the juicy/hazy IPAs of the past several years. Conceived as a clean IPA with a pronounced bitterness, featuring a bit of corn or rice in the malt bill to reduce the sweetness of residual sugar, keeping it crisp and easy drinking. And decidedly not hazy/thick, and not just another name for an India Pale Lager! For a fun treatise from the originators of the style, Wayfinder Beer out of Portland, OR, check this out. Back to Nova Scotia, and Tanner is rolling out 1320 Cold IPA, at 6.5% and about 50 IBU, it fits right in the pocket of the style. The name is inspired by an experimental hop, YQH-1320, which has imparted flavours and aromas of guava, grapefruit, pineapple, and even a hint of coconut in the beer. Malt from Horton Ridge is in the glass too, supporting our local malting company to boot! Cans of 1320 are available at both Tanner locations (at the brewery in Chester Basin, as well as their taproom in the town of Chester), as well as their online shop for local and HRM delivery.

North Brewing is releasing a beer this week that is of its time but also a reflection of history (but fairly recent history). It’s safe to say that IPA is still a dominant style in the craft beer world these days, but it’s also fair to say that many, if not most, of the IPAs on the market these days would be well-nigh unrecognizable as such to a craft beer drinker from, say, 2004 (although, to be fair, the opposite might be true as well for those who started drinking craft after 2015 or so). North Brewing’s new Let’s Go! IPA is a bit of a throwback to the darker, clearer, and more bitter standard that many of us cut our teeth on. Featuring pale malt, Munich, and some crystal malt for flavour and colour, they leveraged four different hop varieties (probably at least a couple of which begin with the letter ‘C’) across both the kettle and the whirlpool, yielding a well-rounded hop character. Carefully keeping the bitterness in check to ensure it’s not too foreign to the modern palate, the team is quite happy with the way it turned out. You can grab this 6.1% beer in cans at all North locations and it will also hit the shelves at the NSLC next week.

We’ve got a limited release out of Breton Brewing this week and its return to bottle-conditioned form! Stirling Hefeweizen is a core brand in cans, but like last year, Breton is featuring a limited run of 500ml bottles that have undergone a bottle conditioning process for several weeks, staying true to the style’s European roots. The recipe is their same authentic German Hefeweizen style and features the big lovely banana and clove flavours you would come to expect. Still staying at 4.6% and very delicious, this is available today from the brewery and online for delivery in CBRM and HRM. 

In Annapolis Royal, the folks at Annapolis Brewing are the latest to ask an online “AI” (ChatGPT in this case) to produce a beer recipe and produce the result. As always, we recommend reserving judgement on the concept as long as the beer is good. Produced on their one barrel pilot system, the beer is a classic APA, with a full malty body and a balancing hop character. Dry hopped with a touch of Centennial that, full disclosure, wasn’t part of the recipe as written, subtle hints of pine and spice pair with citrus for an easy drinking pint. Due to the small batch nature of this one, ChatGPT Pale Ale is only available on tap at the brewery on St George Street in downtown Annapolis Royal.

The gang at Mauzy Cider, operating out of Banished Brewing in Paradise, NL, have a new release this week, and let’s just say there’s a lot going on there. Forest Farmer’s Piquette is, as is right in the name there, a piquette, meaning it is primarily made by adding water to previously pressed fruit, macerating for a period to pull out the remaining sugars, and then fermenting the result. In this case, as Mauzy is a cidery, the pomace was from apples, namely William’s Pride, Liberty, and Honeycrisp from Jefford’s Orchard in Kelligrews and additional Honeycrisp from Mt. Scio Farm. Local Paradise water (“the essence of life!”) provided the rehydration. Giving the product a bit of extra kick were Centennial hops from Jenning’s Farm, which were co-fermented in the primary. Once primary was done, a secondary fermentation was undergone that featured lees from Mauzy’s Dolgo crabapple cider and De Chaunac grape skins from Fixed Farms. Lastly, at packaging, Baccalieu Trail Honey was used to bottle condition the result, which comes in at 4.6% ABV. Only 60 cases of 341ml bottles of this ultra-local product were produced and we’ll be honest, we’re a little jealous of the folks who are going to get to try this one. Expect a refreshing and spritzy, but also slightly funky experience, with a touch of salinity to encourage that next sip. Look for it at Banished, but also at a few other places around the area, including Bar Brewdock, Chinced Meats, Papillon Cocktail Bar, Portage Restaurant, and Toslow.

From one island to another, Upstreet Brewing comes to you this week with a new iteration from their Neon Friday IPA series. This new release, in the NEIPA style, is a big tropical bomb packed with as much hops as their system can handle. Featuring big amounts of flaked wheats and oats, the hop bill features as much cryo Idaho 7 and cryo Mosaic as could be handled in the whirlpool. The hop part doesn’t stop there, as Idaho 7 and Azacca dry hopping rounds out the beer. There are big peach, pineapple and mango flavours. This one is for sale at the taproom and Craft Beer Corner and PEI Liquor stores for the summer. It may be available in Dartmouth later this summer as well. 

We’ve got two beer festivals in Nova Scotia going on this weekend, check at least one of them out…

If you’re from down that way, you know exactly what the LCLC is! The South Shore Nova Scotia venue is hosting a craft beer and cider festival on Saturday, June 10th. Tickets are about $50 and the show will feature bevvies from Annapolis Brewing, Annapolis Cider, Big Spruce, Boxing Rock, Bulwark, Burnside, Breton, Firkinstein, Libra, Lunn’s Mill, Propeller, Saltbox, Sourwood, Tanner. Get your tickets here. Oh and the LCLC is the Lunenburg County Lifestyle Centre and it just rolls off the tongue!

And for those even further down the South Shore, the Yarmouth Craft Beer Festival is also being held tomorrow, June 10th. The Rodd Grand Hotel on Main Street will be hosting breweries, cideries, and wineries from across the province, including Boatskeg, Casa Nova, Coldstream, Corberrie, Heritage, Lunn’s Mill, Maison Meuse, Nine Locks, Rudder’s, Saltbox, and Tusket Falls. Grab your tickets now!

Gahan is hosting a cool event at their Halifax location in the Nova Centre (is this another chance to link to our CBA award winners post since Gahan is just next door). On Thursday, June 15th, at 6pm, they’re hosting a Behind the Brew event where they’ll discuss recipe design, brewing process and beer and food pairings with Gahan Nova brewer Ryan Shirtliff. This is a $40 event and you can buy tickets here. 

Looking to get in the beer biz? Look no further!

Love beer and live in Montague? Love beer and want to live in Montague? Bogside Brewing has a great opportunity with an assistant brewing position. With a full-time, salaried position, the successful candidate will be helping with brewing, packaging, cellaring and logistics. Check the link here to apply. 

Those looking to sling some great Nova Scotia beer in Lower Sackville, heads up! TAPestry Beer Bar is hiring! They are looking for someone to take on 3 or 4 shifts per month to start, and ramp up as things get busier. Of course, knowing beer is a big plus, as is experience already in the bar or brewery serving world. Check out this post and pop-by for a chat with Ian today!

A few more newsbites before we release you for the week!

We’ve got two returning releases from the two-headed calf brewery. Tatamagouche Brewing brings back a pair of Berliner Weiße buddies in Buddha’s Hand and Guava Heist. First up, Buddha’s Hand is a type of citrus fruit from Asia that is zesty and is quite similar to lemon. This is 3.8%  and with some floral notes on top of the lemonade type flavour in a thirst quenching summer hit. Guava Heist adds real guava to the Berliner Weiße base, with the base beer aged on organic guava. Big guava flavour comes through here in a really refreshing package. These are both available from the brewery, online and will likely show up at some private stores around HRM. 

Short and sweet (or tall and sweet, if you’re talking about the cans!) update from Lake City Cider. Watermelon is a brand new release from the Darkside cidery (Darkcidery?) that is a blend of their apple cider, blueberry and watermelon. It’s a bit dry, but also sweet, with a great punch of watermelon flavour for the hot summer ahead.  This is 6% and available at the cidery on tap and in 473ml cans (and online, too!).

Now to a returning beer with some wider distribution for Spryfield’s finest. Serpent Brewing’s Townie Overpass Syndrome NEIPA and is the second product of Serpent’s to hit the NSLC shelves and will be available in 40 locations as of next week. As a reminder for this beer, it’s basically a Belgian New England IPA, using Belgian Witbier yeast with their New England IPA recipe. The hop bill features large helpings of Mandarina Bavaria, Amarillo, and Ahtanum. This is 6.3% and 40 IBU and if you want to try it now, you could get it from the Serpent brewery.

In other news, we are joining the celebrations for Think Brewing who are moving to a new and larger space in Moncton as of June 1st! They’ll be adding a new beer release to their core lineup and are moving to bigger and better things. There will be more news to share with Think in the future, so stay tuned here and on their social media pages.