Mid-Summer Beer of the 

Year goes to …

It’s time to vote for my Beer of the Year.

Okay, it isn’t time yet. It’s only the middle of July. So it’s time to vote for the IPA Tales Mid-Summer  Beer That Most Rocked My Socks Off Award

To be fair, to be considered for this prestigious honour the beer must have been consumed multiple times. No one-offs, no matter how outstanding.

So that eliminates eight outstanding brews right off the bat. These beers, in another dimension, one in which I drink exotic and awesome beers all day long, would be vying for the big prize. But alas, I had them just three times or less.

My four finalists, in no particular order, are: My Bitter Wife from Great Lakes, Dernier Volonte from Dieu du Ciel, Rhyme & Reason from Collective Arts and Smashbomb Atomic from Flying Monkeys.

But first, a few words for those eight wonderful brews that could have been contenders but for the sad fact that I didn’t drink enough of them. Don’t blame the beers. Totally my bad.

From Beyond the Pale, we have Super Guy Imperial Rye Pale Ale, which I found on tap at Buster Rhino's in Oshawa. Powerful stuff at 9.1 per cent and 90 IBUs, this beer is another reason why I'm falling in love with rye pale ales. It's billed as a malt forward beer but I notice hops - grapefruit, orange, pine - and plenty of them right off the bat. Rate Beer scored it a 94. I scored it higher.

From Montreal’s famed Dieu du Ciel brewery, I enjoyed The Alchemist Moralite at C’est What after Toronto’s spring ComicCon. This most delicious brew, a collaboration with The Alchemist Brewery of Vermont (home of the legendary Heady Topper) that I will probably never see again, was exceptional. Silky smooth and quite aromatic. A very, very good beer.

Sculpin IPA from Ballast Point Breweries in San Diego was one of the spectacular American beers I tried on my Florida trip in April. This seven per cent grapefruit-forward hop bomb was a massive hit with me and the world – it scored a perfect 100 on Rate Beer. With a nice bitter and boozy finish, this was a gem of a find that I wish I had bought more of. Awesome beer!

Witchshark, the nine per cent Imperial IPA from Bellwoods, came with huge hops and a top notch bitter finish. I fell in love with this beer instantly. Enchanted, I was. Really need to go back to Bellwoods for more.

I was super impressed with the All Day IPA from Founders. This session ale is just 4.7 per cent and 42 IBUs, but it packs a powerful hoppy punch. It’s honestly hard to believe it’s less than five per cent alcohol. There’s a strong grapefruit taste and the beer is nicely balanced. The best sub-five beer I’ve had by a long shot. I really could drink this all day.

I made my first visit to Toronto’s famed Indie Ale House in late spring and while there was no Cockpuncher IIPA in the bottle shop, they did have Instigator, their signature IPA. This was real special. Pours a cloudy orange and packs a pungent punch in the nose with citrus hops and then bam! right in the kisser with a bitter finish of tropical fruit and pine. Really smooth – almost creamy – and it boasts an intoxicating aroma. Awesome label too.

Need to go back there too.

When my brother sent me some IPAs he had found on a B.C. business trip, it was Fat Tug I was most looking forward to trying. It did not disappoint. At seven per cent ABV and 80 IBUs, it has some punch of its own, along with a strong aroma of citrus – especially grapefruit – on the nose and on the tongue. Some pine and biscuit malts helped give it a delicious bitter finish. An outstanding beer. One of my all-time favourites and Rate Beer’s too. It scored 99.

And then there was Immodest IIPA, the real star of my drunken day At Donny’s Bar and Grill following my return from Florida. Another exceptional beer from Nickel Brook, this nine percent, 85 IBU hop daddy tasted like a grapefruit and orange smack upside the head. It poured a cloudy orange with a thin head but it was so hoppy! A real lip-smacker. Damn fine beer.

As for the final four, My Bitter Wife showed up in Toronto LCBO outlets in the spring and I didn’t wait for this seasonal offering to make its leisurely way into Durham Region, driving into Don Mills one Saturday to snap it up. Well worth the drive.

This aggressively hopped seven per cent IPA – produced as a tribute to Carrie Nation, a “nearly unstoppable force” behind the temperance movement and one who was known for her violent attacks, hatchet in hand, on bars and public houses all over the USA – was fantastic.

I got the usual grapefruit but also something tropical. Mango, I’m thinking, which is also how I would describe the colour. Bitter and boozy, this beer is not big on aroma but very big on taste. I soon adopted My Bitter Wife as my top IPA choice through the spring and into the summer, with a strategy of see one, buy one. And repeat. Sadly, supplies have since run out.

Dernier Volonte, the fantastic Belgian IPA from Montreal’s legendary Dieu du Ciel Brewery (again), is exactly why Montreal is on the must-visit list.

The beer is a creamy and deliciously smooth delight. It poured a cloudy orange with citrus, some stone fruit and spices on the nose with a nice biscuit malt backbone. An exceptional beer. Really top notch.

I have no idea why I waited so long to try it. But I buy it whenever I see it. Which isn’t often.

We have a winner. I seem to like this one

Rhyme & Reason, the only non-IPA finalist, made the final four on the strength of its citrus deliciousness and wonderful balance. Classified as an extra pale, this 5.7 ABV brew from Collective Arts (soon to be called Arts and Science Brewery once a merger with Nickel Brook is finalized) has punched above its weight from the moment I tried it.

A real go-to beer for me.

The last finalist is the first craft beer I fell in love with. The IPA which got me started on this beer blogging path: Smashbomb Atomic IPA.

The beer chimes in at six per cent alcohol and packs 70 IBUs in a classic grapefruit-forward hop bomb. So good, always. My fridge is usually stocked with at least a few of these. There are two in there right now.

Sorry. Just one now.

And the winner of the IPA Tales Mid-Summer  Beer That Most Rocked My Socks Off Award is: My Bitter Wife.

Congratulations Great Lakes Brewery. You can come to Oshawa anytime to claim your prize. Please bring beer.

*

A few more facts and figures from last weekend’s Durham Craft Beer Festival:

• I mentioned that a full house of nearly 800 people attended the festival. That was the capacity, but people come and go and nearly 1,500 tickets were sold
• More than 10,000 – 10,650, to be exact – samples of beer were sold in just under eight hours. That's a beer poured every 2.5 seconds. That works out to 1,570 litres of better beer
• There were zero fights. zero disorderly, and the security team said they were “super impressed” with the behaviour of the crowd.
• Host Darryl Koster said the brewery who gets the ‘above and beyond award’ was, Lake of Bays Brewing Company who actually went to the LCBO and bought beer off the shelf so they could keep serving festival goers
• The first beer to be poured out: Thrust! An IPA from Great Lakes Brewery
• About 1,200 kilos of ice was used to keep the beer cold

 Cheers!