All Brew’d Up

September 21, 2015 beerwinnipeg Leave a comment

As the last of my Spruce Tree IPA begins to dwindle down it comes time to brew once again. This is my second batch since getting back into scratch brewing and I wanted to try another style of beer I really like.

Anyone who has followed this blog knows that Peak Organic White IPA got my top pick for the Craft Beer Advent Calendar last year. I’ve had a number of White IPAs and it is definitely a style that I really enjoy. I also like to be creative and try things I haven’t had before. It’s why I got into home brewing, I wanted to try different things out, see what works and what doesn’t, and make beer I want to drink. So, rather than the tradition orange and coriander combination oft found in White IPAs, I went with lemon and thyme.

I never did get around to posting an update to my Spruce Tree IPA. It turned out really well. I was very happy with it and the spruce definitely comes through. I’ve had the opportunity to share it with a number of people who I trust and overall the reception has been good. I do end up with a bit of cold haze in the beer and there are times when the spruce isn’t as strong as I’d like, but overall I am happy with it. I did make a few of mistakes and I am trying to learn from this time.

First off, I didn’t treat my water. For those who don’t know chlorine and chloromine are often found in city water. It’s a way for them to ensure the water clean. Chlorine boils off during the brew process, but chlormine does not and can interact with the proteins in your wort and make for a funky taste. I lucked out on my Spruce IPA that I didn’t end up with a noticeable change with this interaction, but this time I treated my water to remove the chloromine. This should improve this batch of beer.

The second mistake I made was not cold crashing. I was new to doing this before I picked it back up and something I’ve recently learned is that you want to cool your beer down after the boil as quickly as possible. This is a cold crash. It also helps with the cold break to allow the particulate in your wort to drop to the bottom so you don’t transfer it over to the fermenter resulting in a clearer beer. As well, dimethyl sulfide is a compound which forms in wort when it is hot. This is boiled off but if you don’t cool your beer quickly it can form again resulting in off flavours in the finished beer. Again I was lucky to avoid any significant off flavours, but something I wanted to learn from and made sure I did on this batch.

The third (yes I made three) mistake I made was not considering the hop profiles. I was so excited to get started I just grabbed a few hops not even considering how they might play with the spruce. This time around I made sure to consider this and end up using Chinook hops from Prairie Gem Hops.

Overall, I am quite pleased with this batch so far. It smells really good and I’m hoping that the taste will be there at the end of the day as well. As I am still new to this, I don’t mash. So for this recipe I used extract. I also ended up using pellitized hops for the knockout.

Recipe:

5.25lbs pale malt extract
2.5lbs wheat malt extract

2oz dried chinook hops (Praire Gem, 60 minutes)

5 oz dextrose (30 minutes)
whirfloc tab (30 minutes)

1/2 oz dried lemon peel (5 minutes)
1 oz fresh thyme (5 minutes)

Centennial (knock-out)
Willamette (knock-out)

wyeast 3787 (High gravity trappist yeast)

Now I just play the waiting game. I’ll let you know how this one turns out.

-Beer Winnipeg

Interview

Prairie Gem Hops

September 7, 2015 beerwinnipeg 2 Comments

As a beer drinker and a home brewer I am always looking for good quality beer and ingredients. I think it is important to support local farmers and industries so that our businesses in our province can thrive and be successfully. I’m a huge supporter of local farms and buy from them as often as I can. So when I heard that there was a hop farm just outside the perimeter I had to check it out.

Sandra Gowan and Paul Ebbinghaus started Prairie Gem Hops and have been growing in Manitoba since 2009. Sandra was a gardener and grew a variety of vegetables and plants and was always interested in pushing the limits of what can be grown in the Manitoba climate. After reading an article about the hop shortage she decided to begin researching hop growing and eventually decided to give it a try.

Her and her husband started with 3 varieties of hops to see how they would fair. After a successful grow season they started adding varieties, moving to 12 and eventually to 18 different hop varieties. As well as a spin on a native hop (Brewers Gold) she produces many others including chinook, nugget, centennial, galena, sterling, cascade and Willamette. All this is grown on a ¼ acres of farm land. While Sandra has 225 plants, producing hops is a little bit like making maple syrup. You need more than you get. From 5lbs of hops Sandra will produce 1lb of dried hops for sale. Last year Sandra produced 280lbs of dried hops from her 225 plants.

Prairie Gem Hops does their best to grow their plants as safely as possible. They don’t use any chemicals and focus on composted fertilizer to provide the nutrients her plants need. This becomes a challenge when fighting bugs, but Sandra wants to make sure her product is grown in the safest way possible and is willing to deal with them naturally.

The hops that are produced at Prairie Gem Hops are used not only in commercial beers, selling to breweries like Fort Garry, but also for the home brewer market. Sandra sells to Grape and Grain as well as Hop and Vine and is willing to sell directly to home brewers.

Prairie Gem is harvesting now and this is the perfect time to be looking at buying hops. Sandra is willing to accommodate brewers who are looking to make a fresh (wet) hopped beer with fresh local hops as well. This is also a great time to be growing hops in Manitoba due to the growth in the craft beer. With all the breweries looking to open there is also the hope that they will be trying local producers to meet their brewing needs.

Sandra’s farm is fantastic. She is passionate about growing hops and has a fantastic product. While there are a number of producers of hops to choose from, supporting local businesses is really important for me, it’s why I focus on local beer and breweries. I’ve talked about how the brewing industry is incredibly supportive of new breweries opening their doors and I only hope that these same breweries will start to look local when brewing beer. I know that I’ll be using Sandra’s chinook hops for my next home brew and I hope others will do the same.

Happy Brewing,

-Beer Winnipeg

Uncategorized

Interview with Oxus Brewing Company

August 29, 2015 beerwinnipeg 5 Comments

Manitoba is pretty far behind when it comes to the craft beer scene. Our liquor laws received a complete overhaul in 2014 and the brewery scene has taken notice. While no one has told me the laws have made it easier to open a brewery, I’ve heard that the attitude of the liquor commission and liquor and gaming authority has shifted as has the appeal. With growler bars, tap rooms and a clamoring public it is no wonder that there are more breweries wanting to get into the game.

I’ve spoken with Barn Hammer and Peg City Beer Co over the past few weeks and this week I had the opportunity to sit down with the guy behind Oxus Brewing Company.

The young computer programmer is an immigrant who came to Canada from Tajikistan. When he lived in Tajikistan they had 4 or 5 breweries that brewed what’s called “Czech style” beer. Despite what you might think, it was not a pilsner but more of a “Russian style beer” as Sean describes it. It was in Tajikistan that Sean’s desire to open a brewery really began but the process was very difficult and he was forced to put his dream on hold.

Sean has lived in Canada for the past 5 years and moved to Winnipeg in 2012. Since arriving here, Sean, who is a programmer by trade, has been working at his own company doing software development. Since living in Winnipeg he has delved deeper into the brewing process. As a member of the Winnipeg Brew Bombers for the past two years he has had the opportunity to learn from some really talented brewers and worked very hard at becoming one himself. Sean, who has always wanted to open a brewery, decided that now was the time to do it.

Once that decision was made he read every book and blog he could about starting a brewery while also meeting with David Rudge of Half Pints for advice and guidance on the process. For the past year, Sean has been working out the details and perfecting his recipes with the hope of opening up the doors of a brewery in the summer of 2016.

It is his goal is to open Aurora Craft Brewery debt free and as such will most likely be the smallest brewery in Manitoba. He’s already purchased the brewery equipment and plans to have a maximum brewing capacity of Aurora will be 1800 h/l, though at opening the capacity will likely be about half that.

The 28 year old says that they will for sure have a growler fill station and two session beers to start. As it is still very early in the planning process he hasn’t decided on style but he said you can bet on finding hoppy beer.

Sean decided to do some session beers (an ABV of under 5%) because he likes the idea of being able to have a few drinks without knocking your socks off. He was emphatic that when he says “a session” he doesn’t mean a weak, flavourless beer. He is also very optimistic that he will be able to put out bi-weekly specials similar to the test batch Tuesday done by Half-Pints.

As this is very early on in the process for Sean, he has not yet chosen a location. He is looking in the St. James area and wants to secure a site as soon as possible. While Manitoba Liquor and Lotteries and the Liquor Gaming Authority have both been very helpful, he needs to have a location to move forward with the licencing process. Finding the space is crucial.

The most difficult thing Sean had to overcome was the fear that he will lose everything. As with any business, there are no guarantees, but Sean has sunk his entire life savings into this venture and it truly is his dream. Sean is not only passionate about beer but he told me starting the brewery “wasn’t about money.” Although he put his savings into this and hopes it succeeds, first and foremost he wants to do something he loves and make good beer that people enjoy. Sean wanted to do something that he could call “the work of my life.” Sean wants to “dedicate my time to making high quality beer and being part of the community.”

Sean is doing this venture alone: he is going to be the owner and brewmaster. While there might be others on the team, right now it is him and him alone. With his passion and drive I am optimistic for what is to come. I asked him what he would say to people who are skeptical with an opening date so far away. He said that “I want to do something I love and I’ve put my savings into this and I am willing to take this brewery all the way.”

One thing that has become clear from these interviews is how much the brewing community relies on and respects one another. Sean has met with a number of the people behind the other breweries and has echoed statements I’ve heard about how helpful they all have been. He told me “it’s amazing how much people are willing to help.” With the amount of beer being produced Sean doesn’t think that he will ever see the other breweries as competition, instead it is an opportunity to put more craft beer on the shelves of Manitoba liquor stores and on tap in Manitoba bars.

Every time I get the chance to sit down with someone and talk to them about their plans I’m excited for the future of brewing in Manitoba.

-Beer Winnipeg

Beer News, Interview

Interview with Barn Hammer

August 17, 2015 beerwinnipeg 6 Comments

This is a really exciting time for craft beer in Winnipeg. With changes to the liquor laws making it more appealing for breweries to open, making brew pubs possible, and expansion of the growler bars, craft beer drinkers have a lot to be revved up about.

I spoke with Nicole Barry from Peg Beer Co. last week and this week I had the opportunity to sit down with Tyler Birch and Brian Westcott, the small but mighty team behind the new Winnipeg brewery Barn Hammer.

Tyler and Brian are an excellent team, bringing two important strengths to the brewery – business and craftsmanship. Tyler owns and operates a fencing company with his father Ted. TnT Fenceworks has been successfully operating for the past 10 years successful. While working there, Tyler became interested in home brewing and spotted the low number of breweries in Manitoba compared to other provinces. With his sincere love of beer and interest in brewing, Tyler wanted to do something to fill that gap and began working through the process to create Barn Hammer Brewin Co.

When the laws began to change, it made it more appealing and helped Tyler get his plan off the ground.

By chance, Brian Westcott, former production manager for Alley Kat Brewing Company in Edmonton, was looking to move to Manitoba. Brian started brewing in university with about 6 or 7 carboys on the go at any given time. His first degree was in Biochemistry and when he got a job in Fort St. John he found himself with a lot of time to read about brewing and decided to become a professional brewer. He was hired by Alley Kat Brewing, but after about 18 months on the job, he wanted to learn more. So, Brian headed back to school and as a graduate of Scotland’s M.Sc. program in brewery science worked for another 7 years at Alley Kat but was always hoping to move back to Manitoba. (His wife is a native of northern Manitoba.)

The timing on their move couldn’t have been better. After meeting with Tyler to discuss the vision of the brewery, Barn Hammer officially had a head brewer and a partner to round out Tyler’s home brewing knowledge.

While Tyler has not been involved in the brewing industry at all, he has a strong business sense from running TnT for the past 10 years. This combined with Brian’s extensive experience working in all aspects of brewing make for a dynamite combination. Add the fact Tyler’s wife Sable is an accomplished graphic artist and this three person team has a lot of the bases covered for getting a brewery up and running.

Tyler started planning about a year ago- again, mostly due to the fact Winnipeg is so far behind the rest of the country in the local craft market. Now he gets to work with Brian to create beer “I want to drink” while using his already honed business skills to get that beer into the hands of Manitobans.

One of the biggest challenges Tyler and Brian faced was finding a good location. They wanted an industrial site that wouldn’t be so far away people would be hesitant to visit. They also needed a landlord who was willing to lease. Plus there was an extra self-imposed condition: it had to be close enough Tyler could bike to work.

Luckily they found this location at 595 Wall Street and have begun renovations for their planned opening in December.

When it comes to the actual beers they will be producing, the team at Barn Hammer has some ideas, names and concepts but are really only in the test brewing stage. With Sable on board, they have a unified label design in mind but still have to finalize their beers. When they open in December the goal is to have two beers canned with a seasonal on tap at their brewery. Brian told me he was just getting a Winter Ale test batch underway – a little weird being summer, but something they hope to have ready when they open. At the brewery opening they plan to give the public an opportunity to try some of their beers on tap – an activity they want to continue as they try new things out and experiment.

Barn Hammer will be running a 15 barrel system and plan to be producing a little over 1000 HLs in the first year with the goal of moving up to 5000 H/L in a few years. Both Tyler and Brian want to grow to a comfortable size where they can produce beer they like while still experimenting and staying truly small and local. With their plan of having a couple of mainstays and constant experimentation, I think Winnipeggers and Manitobans will welcome this newcomer and be excited for the new brews as they become available.

As I said before, Tyler and Brian hope to have two beers in cans to start with the rest in the tap room and growler area. Their focus for the opening will be the brewery itself, but they told me with 100% certainty they’ll have a growler fill area when they open, so we’ll be able to head in and try things out right from the get go. I was really excited when Brian told me they would be keeping things experimental and “interesting” -Tyler and Brian don’t’ want to get complacent, they want to stay small and focus on the craft of brewing beer.

I am always interested in how those involved in brewing view beer. It’s something that has come up in a number of my interviews and the answer, I find, is very telling. Brian reiterated what I’ve heard from those passionate about beer when he told me beer is a “beautiful meld of science and art. Beer is one of those things where you can be as scientific as you like, but at the end of the day there is some art to it”. Tyler said beer is a “gathering place. Everyone has different tastes but the debate and discussion unifies beer drinkers.”

The name for the brewery comes from Tyler’s experience out at the lake. Their cabin has an old Barn on its land and one summer his father, Ted, decided to try and pull it down using his truck. The truck was not up to the task and as a joke Tyler started calling it the “Barn Hammer” and the name stuck.

Barn Hammer plans to open in December of this year with two beers ready to be canned with at least one seasonal on tap for growler fills. Be sure to follow them @barnhammerbeer on Twitter and add them to your list of breweries to visit once they open. I’m really excited to see what beers they have in store for us.

Interview

Interview with Nicole Barry

August 9, 2015 beerwinnipeg 7 Comments

I was lucky enough to sit down with the wonderful Nicole Barry. Those unfamiliar with Nicole will certainly be familiar with the brewery she helped found, Half Pints, and have most likely heard that she is the force behind the up and coming brew pub, Peg Beer Company.

To give a little bit of a bio, Nicole is a mother of two whose professional background is accounting. She got into accounting not to work for an accounting firm but to “be an entrepreneur and be successful at it.” For the past year she has been working diligently to get Peg Beer Company ready to open. The opening has been officially announced for the brew pub. Nicole hopes to be open in December. The brew pub will be located on the corner of Pacific and Lily.

I wanted to sit down with Nicole and find out a little bit about what we can expect from Peg Beer Company as well as how the changes in the laws have impacted the opening of the brew pub.

Nicole describes herself as unsuspecting. She is a beer person, not a brewer, who knows her craft beer. She loves the artistic creativity of brewing and has an obvious passion for it. She became involved in the brewing industry in 2002 and has seen a significant change over the years in the number of people who actually know what craft beer is. Like me, Nicole believes that education about craft beer is a big thing. She describes it as “the art and craft”. For Nicole craft beer is about not only the way you doing things but why they are done that way and also giving back to the community.

Nicole has been wanting to open a brew pub ever since she visited her first one. She had the opportunity after leaving her previous brewery and has been working full time on getting Peg Beer Co ready to open for about a year now. Nicole says that this is about average for opening a brew pub.

When Nicole first decided to open a brewery in 2002 she called the Liquor Commission and they laughed at her on the phone. This was a time of struggles for Manitoba breweries and while she was eventually successful in getting Half Pints open in 2005/6 she says that the climate is much different now. Not only is Nicole a known commodity but the mindset in Manitoba has changed. Manitobans want breweries to open and they want them to be successful.

In respect to craft beer, Manitoba is still in its infancy. While there is a much bigger demand for craft beer and people are starting to become more educated, Nicole told me that over the years she has sat down with dozens of potential breweries that never came to be. For there to be multiple breweries announcing that they are opening is a good change.

Rather than opening a brewery, Nicole decided to open a brew pub. She was involved in helping to change the brew pub legislation and showing them why it needed to be changed by giving examples of what exists elsewhere. In revamping the laws it helped make it easier to open a brew pub while at the same time being able to produce, package and distribute from the same location. This will also let Nicole have other local breweries on tap rather than being limited to only serving the beer they produce.

Essentially, Nicole wanted to put her money where he mouth is. What’s good is that the LGA wants Peg Beer Company to be successful and it gives Nicole the chance to create the atmosphere where she would like to hang out and drink beer. With Peg Beer Company Nicole is paying homage to all of her favorite places like Pizza Port in California.

As for Beer, well Nicole is a sucker for a good IPA but also likes other styles like Sours as well. For her, beer is a form of creativity and art in a glass, not something to be pounded back to get drunk. Yet for Peg Beer the food and beer menu design is still a work in progress. Nicole has a theme in mind but wants to have the collaboration of the rest of the staff in designing the menus.

What is exciting is that Nicole also wants to get feedback from the community. She said that they will not be packaging beer for the first 3-4 months. Beer will only be available from the taps on site. This will give them time to get feedback on their recipe design, find out what people like and what they don’t and will help them refine their beers before moving to the packaging stage. This is fine by me, with the tank to tap system they will have I’m excited to have the opportunity to give feedback on the beer.

Nicole does have the brewing team in place but bit of information must be kept quiet for now. Make sure to follow @pegbeer on twitter because that’s where it will be announced it officially.

Obviously along with taps and a restaurant they will be brewing on site. The capacity of the brewery on will start at about 2000 hectalitres. They will be using a 15 barrel system and she hopes to be up to 5000 hectalitres by year 4 or 5. They will have the capacity to package in a variety of formats and sell from on site. Nicole also has some other plans up her sleeve for the brew pub for the future but she needs to keep some mystery about what’s to come.

Nicole let me have a look at the plans for the site and I have to say the location looks awesome. I for one am really excited about visiting there when it opens and I cannot wait to see what beers Nicole has in store for us.

The brewing community here in Winnipeg is very tight knit. In fact, while talking to Nicole the guys from Barn Hammer happened by. Nicole is really excited about the other breweries opening and thinks that all of them are bringing the right attitude and perspective to the table. All of them seem to really care about the industry and want to brew with integrity.

I had a fantastic time sitting down with Nicole. Not only is she an incredibly knowledgeable person with a passion for craft beer, she was willing to give me some of her time. For that, I’m very thankful. What I’ve learned from interviewing people so far is that beer folks are some of the nicest folks you’ll meet.

This week I’ll be sitting down with Barn Hammer to find out what their experience has been with opening a brewery here in Manitoba and to find out what they have in store for us in the near future.

Thanks for reading.

Interview

Interview – Colin Enquist,

July 27, 2015 beerwinnipeg Leave a comment

So, yesterday I decided to do something a little bit different. Rather than interviewing a brew master or someone trying to open a new brewery here in Manitoba (though that is coming), I decided to sit down and chat with Colin Enquist of 49^th Parallel Group.

For those of you who do not know Colin, he is a 30 year old graduate of the creative communications program at Red River College who aspires to someday be a screenwriter. For now, he has the very interesting job of being the territory manager for 49^th Parallel group here in Manitoba.

49^th Parallel group is an agency that specializes in the marketing, selling and promoting of craft beer in Western Canada. Representing 20 breweries across North America, the goal of the group is to help spread the wealth of craft beer into various marketplaces and dealing with all the red tape that comes along with it.

Colin, like most of us, started off not really liking beer. It wasn’t until he moved to Edmonton where he really got into beer. He was out one night and wanted to have a drink, so he grabbed a beer, “It was a Kilkenny Irish cream, not a great beer but it was new to me”. From that point Colin says that he was hooked on trying new beers. When he moved back to Manitoba he started meeting people who were into craft beer and growing his interest. He met his good friend Adrian Trimble, with whom he hosts the great podcast “Pubchat”, and eventually had the opportunity to work for 49^th Parallel group representing craft breweries here in Manitoba.

Colin started off doing this gig part-time while he went through the creative communications program. When he graduated he was offered the job full-time and has been working there ever since. For about 2 ½ years Colin has been working hard to try and get craft beer onto the shelves of the Manitoba Liquor Marts. This mostly entails making sales calls to the LCs, being the contact if there are problems or questions, doing tastings and training and most of all “trying to educate people about craft beer”. It also involves writing beer themed recipes and doing a “beer and book” pairing from time to time as well. You’ll have to follow him on twitter @49thparallelmb to get the beer and book pairings.

I asked Colin about the biggest difference he notices between provinces. Colin told me that it’s what sells. Here in Manitoba we are mostly a “can market”. Beers in tall-boy cans seem to sell better here than in other markets. “This may have to do with the cabin lifestyle” Colin told me. This is different in other provinces “In Alberta it’s mostly 6 packs and the 650ml bottles do really well”.

We also talked a lot about craft beer, obviously. Since Colin is someone who has the opportunity to drink so many beers I wanted to know his favorites. He told me that Stouts are his favorite style of beer and that right now his favorite beer is probably Ten Fidy Russian Imperial Stout made by Oskar Blues. When it comes to breweries he’d have to list Flying Monkey’s, “I love pretty much everything they do”, and Oskar Blues out of Denver.

Colin and I also talked about the red tape and all the challenges in place to getting the beer on the shelves in the province of Manitoba. When you compare our craft beer market to that across Canada we are really quite far behind. When you look at a city like Vancouver with over 1000 breweries compared to Winnipeg where we have two, (three if you count the Brewing and Malting Barley Research Institute), you can see the vast difference in growth. While there is progress being made, it’s slow but Colin did say that he noticed a huge difference in the knowledge of attendees at this year’s Flatlander’s beer festival compared to the last two years.

We are also seeing for the first time an upswing in potential breweries opening. With Peg Beer Co, and Barn Hammer Brewing Company announcing their plans to open, we are seeing progress here in Manitoba.

Since I was sitting down with the Territory Manager I figured I should ask what we might be seeing coming in the near future. Colin told me that we should be seeing:

Rogue Double IPA and Kolsch
Phillips Barn Stormer Saison IPA and the Phillips Anniversary Beer
Parallel 49 Cornhop IPA

So, keep your eyes peeled for those as well as the rest of the awesome stuff they bring to the shelves.

I have to say, it was really great to sit down with Colin and chat with him about beer. His knowledge about beer is just phenomenal. As someone who is passionate about beer and brewing it’s also nice to sit down with someone who has that same, if not higher, level of passion. It’s great to know that there are people like Colin and the 49th Parallel group working hard to get craft beer into Liquor Marts and to help these breweries thrive.

So, be sure to check out the beers at your local liquor mart, check their website for the new products arriving and be sure to follow Colin on twitter @49thparallelmb to get the latest news from the source. You should probably also follow me on twitter @beerwinnipeg if you haven’t already.

Next for me is I’ll be sitting down with Nicole Barry of Peg Beer Co to chat with her about opening a new brewery here in Manitoba. I also hope to be able to sit down with the folks at Barn Hammer, and of course, I’ll be posting about the progress of my homebrew and reviews of beers I try.

Thanks for reading.

-Beer Winnipeg

General Post

Summer Time – Brew Time

July 13, 2015 beerwinnipeg 1 Comment

Well, I’ve been pretty terrible. With May and June being absolutely crazy at work and having to also try to fit in time working on my Master’s Thesis, I’ve neglected this blog far too much. I’m sorry. I have more free time now so I will try to get back into the groove. That begins today.

With this free time I’ve decided to try my hand once more at home brewing. One of my favorite beers I’ve had was a Spruce IPA that was put out by Half Pints a couple of years back. It was tasty and I really loved the spruce. It also happens that Picaroon’s does a “Christmas tree IPA” which is very similar. So, I decided to try my hand at this.

The recipe I used is as follows:

2kg light malt extract
1lb Crystal Grain
2lb Two Row Pale grain
1 oz Nothern Brewer hops (bittering)
1 oz Cascade Hops (flavouring)
1/2 oz Williamette Hops (flavouring)
1/2 oz Goldings hops (finishing)
1/2 oz Godlings hops (dry hopping)
1/2 oz Williamette Hops (dry hopping)
American Ale yeast
1 1/2 cups of fresh spruce tips – Added with bittering hops at beginning of boil.

So far everything is coming along nicely. I’ve got it in the secondary to allow for some clarifying and aging as well as the dry-hop part of the process. I ended up with less than I expected. Using a new pale I must have mis-measured and have 20 litres instead of 23. Will see what impact that has. You learn from your mistakes and I’ve certainly made sure I will not do that again.

I’ll let you know how it turns out. It’s been quite a long time since I’ve brewed from scratch and I’m excited to getting back into it. I’ve already started working on the recipe for my next beer,

Interview

Interview With Fort Garry’s Brewmaster Matt Wolff

May 31, 2015 beerwinnipeg 6 Comments

I got the opportunity to meet with Matt Wolff, the head brewmaster of Fort Garry Brewing Co. I had a conversation with him about brewing in Manitoba and the future of craft beer. I’ve been curious about Fort Garry’s take on the direction our province is going. As the largest brewery in Manitoba I wanted to see what plans they have and how these changes have impacted their brewing.

History of the Brewery

Fort Garry is Manitoba’s oldest Microbrewery and really does have a storied history. Established in 1930 by B.W. Hoeschen it produced two brands of beer to start; Frontier Beer and Frontier stout. These beers gained recognition when they won best in class in England against other commonwealth breweries.

In the 1960s Fort Garry was sold to Molson and was brewed under the label Molson’s Fort Garry Brewery Co. This company ran for 30 years until 1990 when Molson merged with Carling-Okeefe and closed the facility that was Fort Garry Brewing.

Bringing it back into the family, Richard Hoeschen, the great-great grandson of the original owner, who Matt Wolff describes as “a true visionary”, and John Hoeschen Sr. resurrected the brewery under the original Fort Garry name. As well original beers like “Frontier Pilsner” they also introduced a family of full flavor beers to the market. At this time really starting to crave something besides the status quo. To keep up with demand they built a state of the art facility at 130 Lowson Cresent in 1998 taking up a full 25,000 square feet. This facility was unique as it was built to be a brewery rather than a warehouse space renovated to fit the bill.

In 2001 Richard Hoescehn passed away. Under his leadership Fort Garry had become a household name. Matt told me that there were some struggles at this point within the brewery but people wouldn’t stay quiet long about their desire for something different. In 2006 the President of Russell Brewing in BC sampled some of Fort Garry Dark and fell in love with the beer. He was sol captivated by the quality of the beer and the love Manitobans had for their local brew that in 2008 Fort Garry Brewing amalgamated with Russell Brewing Company with a goal to build on the legacy of the Hoeschen Family.

About Matt

Matt Wolff is an interesting character and brings a long history with Fort Garry to his role as Brew Master. When he was just 18 and a new graduate from high school, his brother’s future father in law started the Two Rivers brewery. Being essentially a dream job for an 18 year old he started working their part-time. Starting with remedial tasks he worked his way up to doing the packaging and filtration.

When Two River amalgamated with Fort Garry in 2003 he continued to work there part time while doing a degree in air craft maintenance at Red River College. When he graduated he took a job at the St. Andrews air field for a couple of years but found that job wasn’t for him. He came back to work at Fort Garry full-time, this time in the brew house. Matt uses his skills as an aircraft technician to solve mechanical issues on the fly, “We don’t have to always wait for someone to come fix it, I can usually either do it myself or I have a connection.”

When the brew master and president retired Matt was given the opportunity to take over as Fort Garry’s brewmaster. This also was when we started seeing the craft beer movements from the east and west starting to make inroads into Manitoba.

Still, it wasn’t until after the amalgamation with Russel Brewing Co. that Fort Garry started coming out with their first new beers. Fort Garry saw great success originally with its Munich Eisbock which then expanded into the brewmaster series.

With this success and the introduction of the growler bars there was more of a demand for fresh and new beers. This year Fort Garry is putting out 2 new beer every 6 weeks. A huge step forward in drawing in the demand for new beers. This isn’t easy, Matt told me that “On top of maintaining our flagship beers, finding time to sit down with the guys and hammer out a recipes is one of the hardest parts of brewing.”

About the Brewery

As I had mentioned, in 1998 the location still used today by Fort Garry was built. This doesn’t mean they’ve stayed stagnant. The brewery itself is completely automated running on a computer system that monitors the process at every stage of production. Today they don’t even need to clean the tanks by hand as the computer system will measure out the proper cleaning solution and do an over the top job in cleaning every aspect of the brewing process. Matt said that “when we are inspected they say we clean as well as Dairy Farms, which is a pretty high standard”.

The brewery even has a lab so that they can do tests on the beer at various stages and make sure that there are no hiccups along the way. Spot tests are done on the tanks at different stages to be certain that the cleaning was done well and the beer is brewed to the highest possible standards of quality.

With a 4 vessel system and a 100 hectolitre kettle they can brew 10,000 litres of wort which translates into about 8,000 litres of beer for fermentation. They have two different fermentation tanks, 15,000 litres and the other at 8,000. This allows for some versatility in batch sizes. The smallest batch the tanks can brew is 1,500 litres. This limits their ability to do some niche small batch brews which plays a role in the recipe choices by Matt and his team. “We can’t do something like a Triple IPA, so instead we make a really good IPA”. During peak production time in the summer Fort Garry employs 22 staff including part-time and temp staff. On the brewing side there is Matt and 3 others.

At any given time they have all of their core brands brewing in various stages with seasonals and new beers entering into the mix as needed. They have a cellar comprised of 21 tanks hold beers in various stages of the brewing process. The total capacity of this cellar is 2000 HL which means they have a lot of space and gives them the ability to have some in the hopper ready to go.

Growler Bars and Creativity

This is still one of the main reasons I wanted to meet with Matt as well. The growler bars as we saw from my previous interview with David Rudge have had a huge impact on the ability for brewers to be creative. Given that Fort Garry is larger and run a bit differently, I wanted to see what the translation was.

One of the hardest things about brewing for Matt is recipe development on top of maintaining a presence with the core beers. Because they can’t brew batches under 1,500 litres they really need to consider not only creativity of the beer but also accessibility. They don’t want to produce a beer and then just have it sit on the shelves. As a company it is a combination of being creative but also being able to sell beer.

It has been really important for Matt and his team to get new beers out. They want to keep the taps moving and the ability to produce beer without having to worry about packaging and labeling has made this a much easier process.

Wanting to supply the growler station every 6 weeks has really opened up the creativity of the brewing team and has pushed them to be innovative. The process at Fort Garry starts with brain storming. The team tastes a lot of other beers from around Canada to find good examples of styles. They take notes on what they like and what they feel they could improve on. Matt said that “the ideas often start simple like let’s make a wit, then become more complex like with our Sassy Saskatoon”.

Matt said they “don’t want to make just another beer they want it to be big and bold while at the same time accessible to a large group of people.”

Their first test is done in their small 20 gallon pilot system and this is sometimes a big flop which means going back to the drawing board. Once they have something they think it at the level it needs to be they present it to the General Manager, some of their reps and even bring it to the Winnipeg Brew Bombers or River City of Manitoba Brewers for some feedback. This isn’t a yay/nay process that would impede the creativity, rather so long as they do the best they can do, that’s the goal. I asked Matt about expansion plans and he said it’s always something they need to look at. Maybe with the next expansion we will see a small brewing unit for those specialty beers!

Still, with the need to be putting out so many new beers in short times, the growler bars have given them the opportunity to brew new beers but also gauge the success and decide which could be put out in cans as well. Matt told me that the next two new brews coming down the pipe, Maple Cream and Sassy Saskatoon, will be released in cans and growlers. Growlers are a lot of beer and “being able to pick up a couple of cans after you’ve tried it out makes the beer more accessible”. It also allows for you to try multiple different beers at a given time.

This has been really important for Fort Garry in peaking interest in their beers. Matt said that “when you see the same thing on the shelf over and over it’s easy to want to try something new.” Fort Garry needs to keep fresh and trying new things otherwise those people seeking new tastes and new beers will grab something else.

At the same time, growler bars have certainly helped to increase sales for Fort Garry and bring people back to them. I think Manitobans crave good local craft beer and with Fort Garry working hard to deliver I understand why they are seeing an uptick in sales.

They will be tasting there new beers at Flatlanders on June 4^th and 5^th, and I know I’ll be there with bells on. I got to see the mock up for the Maple Cream Ale can, and it looks and sounds tasty!

Craft Breweries Initiative

I’ve talked a bit about the new initiatives coming from the province. With the ability for breweries to open tasting rooms and the confirmation I received from the MLCC that growler bars are here to stay, this opens the doors for more craft breweries to enter the market here in Manitoba without the immediate concern for packing and shipping.

Matt believes that there is still room to grow here in Manitoba and is excited about the breweries that could be opening. He said that “if we look west and we look east we see how many breweries they are able to support.” This growth is putting pressure on big breweries to let go of franchise places and allow for craft breweries to move in. Matt doesn’t believe this is competition but rather “more good beer on tap”.

I think we will also see the breweries will feed off one another and as Matt said he hopes the “complacency will be gone.” New beers also means we might see more collaboration. Matt and I talked about the “Brews Brothers” mixer pack from Parallel 49 and how it’d be really cool to do something like that here in Manitoba.

Matt is also a really strong supporter of new breweries in general. He told me that he “wished I knew who all the players were. I’d love to talk to them and help them out.” This is really the kind of guy Matt seems to be. He wants to help people brew beer, something he is obviously passionate about. He provides space for the Winnipeg Brew Bombers and the River City of Manitoba Brewers, two home brew groups in the city, offers courses and even orders malts and hops from distributors that will only deal with brewers. So when Matt says he just wants “more good beer on tap”, I believe him.

With Peg City Brewing being officially announced by Nicole Barry and the possibility of a couple of more down the road, Matt says he “wouldn’t be surprised that if in one year there might be 10 breweries”. That would be a sight to see.

I think that a lot of this boom we are seeing has to do with the loosing of laws and the fact that a brewery can now be entirely profitable without sending a single bottle or can out the door. Things still have some movement, but Manitoba is getting with the times in respect to liquor laws.

Overall, meeting with Matt was fantastic. He was a down to earth and really friendly guy. Given all he knows and all his work he still finds time to help out the local home brew clubs. As the biggest brewery in Manitoba Fort Garry still has a passion for quality Manitoban beer and with Matt at the helm of the brewing side they’ve started producing some unique and tasty beers. I hope that this trend continues and that we see more of what this brewery has to offer. I for one will be doing my part to support local craft beer here in Manitoba, I hope you’ll do the same.

Beer Review, Brews Brothers Collaboration Pack

Stone Crazy Imperial IPA – Parallel 49 and Powell Street Brewing

May 18, 2015 beerwinnipeg Leave a comment

Stone Crazy - Imperial IPA

Well apparently I haven’t been able to do one a day. I guess that was a little ambitious given that it was a long weekend and I was travelling. As well this week is a crazy work week so I would not expect to be able to post much until it’s over. So, this post will have to carry you through.

Today’s Brews Brothers Beer is called “Stone Crazy” and it’s an Imperial India Pale Ale done in collaboration with Powell Street Brewery. I’ve already gone over who Parallel 49 Brewing Co is and I’ll just take this moment to thank them for their great mixer pack. You’ve brought together a great pack of collaborative beers. So, who is Powell Street then?

Powell Street Brewery is aptly located on Powell Street in Vancouver BC. They don’t post a lot of details about their brewery on their website in respect to who founded it and why. What they do tell us is that they are a 4500 sq ft brewery capable of 17.5hl micro brewhouse with a 3.5hl nano brewhouse as well.

They sell a number of different beers ranging from Pale Ales to Porters and do growler fills, glasses and bombers right out of the brewery, something I hope we will be able to see more of here in Winnipeg. The beer that they’ve done in collaboration is named Stone Crazy. This entire pack is blues themed and this name comes from the song Stone Crazy by Buddy Guy with his soulful guitar rhythms and voice this beer really captures the smooth and soulful feel of this song.

Essentially what we have here in an Imperial IPA is a double IPA. The names are fairly synonymous. The term Imperial tends to come from the Russian Imperial Stout, a style of strong stout that was originally brewed in England for the Russian Imperial Court. Double IPA tends to be the most common/preferred term and essentially indicates that you have an incredibly hoppy beer on your hands with high alcohol content and good robust malty balance. IBU on these beers tend to range from 50-120 (although 90+ it’s hard to tell the difference) depending on the brewer. Let’s get to the beer!

Rating: 87/100

Appearance: Cloudy golden brown coloring with a good 1” head that retains well. Some sediment at the bottom that needed to be left behind.
Smell: Hoppy, citrus (pineapple at the front with some lemon and some orange) with some sweetness coming through on the backend from malt (some caramel notes).
Taste: Not as big and bold on the hops but not necessarily a bad thing. The hops are definitely there with the sweetness of the malt backbone bringing in some caramel notes to give this particular Imperial IPA a smooth and well balanced taste. The hops bring in their resinous citrus tones to blend in with that caramel malt to give you a dangerously easy to drink 9% ABV beer.
Mouth feel: Good mild carbonation with a smooth mouth feel.
Overall: Nice and smooth double IPA. Alcohol content is at 9% but not noticeable in this beer. Sweetness is great to and blends well with the hops which don’t assault the taste buds letting you enjoy all the complexity in this beer. Overall a very strong double IPA.
Do I like it: Yep. Big fan of this one. I love IPAs and this one is well balanced and smooth giving a drinkable double IPA that brings some nice hop bitterness that isn’t overpowering. Very tasty.

Beer Review, Brews Brothers Collaboration Pack

Little Red Rooster – Brews Brothers Mixer Pack – Bomber Brewing and Parallel 49

May 14, 2015 beerwinnipeg 2 Comments

Alright folks, so I picked up the Brews Brothers 12 beer collaboration pack. 12 beers from 12 breweries. I’m going to do my best to try and write up a review on all of them. I can’t promise it will be daily, my day job is keeping me nice and busy these days, but I will do my darnedest.

So, what is this Brews Brothers Collaboration pack anyway? Well, Parallel 49 Brewing out of Vancouver has brought together 12 BC breweries to create a boxed set of 12 blues inspired collaborative beers. Bringing together 12 breweries from BC’s booming craft beer industry was likely a hard challenge. Deciding who to collaborate with and what beers each would make. The breweries participating in this Blues themed mixer pack are: Townsite, Steel & Oak, Firehall, Bomber, Persephone, Storm, Rossland, Dageraad, Moon Under Water, Brassneck, Yellow Dog and Powell Street

The collaboration pack

Parallel 49 is a brewery that spawned out of three friends love for good beer. Mike, Nick and Anthony all grew up about 10 minutes away from where the brewery now stands. Having been avid home brewers and lovers of good craft beer, these three friends quit their day jobs in 2008 and opened a restaurant which quickly became known as a mecca for good craft beer in Vancouver. Wanting to put their money where their mouth was and stop talking and start brewing, they partnered with Graham With, a respected Home Brewer, and Michael Tod, a friend who had the business savvy and experience in the Vancouver craft beer industry, the Parallel 49 brewing team was born.

This particular collaboration is done in conjunction with Bomber Brewing. This small mico-brewery opened in February of 2014 after three good friends put their love of hockey and beer into practice forming a committed crew together to make good beer. Don Farion, an award winning home brewer, brought not only that talent but 20 years in the hospitality industry together with Cam Andrews’ 20 years of design and marketing experience to create a brand that was unique and stood out from the boom of the craft breweries opening in Vancouver. The head brewer Blair Calibaba brings experience working with Ambleside Brewing as well as 11 years of experience running a brewery to the table as well as his knack to create accessible and approachable beers.

Together these two breweries have created Little Red Rooster, a Red India Session Ale. Session ales are essentially any beer that contains no higher than 5% ABV and features a balance between the hop and malt characteristics and, typically, has a clean finish. According to Beer Advocate the term session likely referred to one of two allowable drinking periods in England that were imposed on shell production workers during World War 1. The fact that they were highly drinkable allowed for these workers to consume multiples during their allotted time period. Today, sessions used to refer to beers that meet the criteria but could come from a variety of different styles.

This one, for example, is an American IPA. Different from a standard IPA and more flavourful than a British IPA it ranges in colour from pale golden to reddish amber. The hops can tend to have a big herbal flavor or citric notes with a good malty backbone. This one, as a red session, is the amber in colour and brings some nice herbal and citrus notes in the hop with a smooth balanced malt at the end which eliminates any lingering bitterness.

Onto the review!

Rating: 81/100

Appearance: Cloudy reddish amber color with a 1” head that dissipates quickly leaving a lingering foam.
Smell: Citrus and some herbal smell which I can’t distinguish but is almost like spruce or pine.
Taste: Good citrus on the front with a refreshing bitterness that doesn’t linger long. Fading at the finish into the malty sweetness with only a slight lingering taste of tannins making for a dry finish.
Mouth feel: Light carbonation, smooth drink, dry finish.
Overall: Very nice. Good balance of the hops and malt. More hops would likely showcase the style of beer more but given the accessibility and approachability that bomber goes for that wouldn’t be in their style of brewing. The lower alcohol content is offset by the good hop/malt balance making for decent, if not delicious beer.
Do I like it: I do like it. It was a good beer to start with and I think that if this is a sign of things to come that this will be a very good collaboration pack. To be fair, this isn’t anything to write home about. Falling within my Good range, it was good and I’d certainly be happy drinking it again.

Thanks for continuing to follow along with my blog. I’ve got an interview with Matt Wolff at Fort Garry scheduled so looking forward to getting that up in the next couple of weeks! Keep checking back, I’ll be trying to post more about the Brews Brothers mixer pack.

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