Twitter vs Facebook: just one gets me out of the house (for beer)

I've always been a loyal Facebook supporter but I'm starting to really warm to Twitter. Much against the better judgement of my lazy ass, Twitter is getting me out of the house more.

Only to breweries so far, but hey. Baby steps.

I have a soft spot for Facebook, as it has allowed me to reconnect with old friends and stay in touch with new ones and offered a sounding board to try and say funny or poignant things from time to time.

I use Twitter more for business, such as pumping up the blog or giving shout-outs to great breweries in the hope they offer me a job or free beer one day.

And now I use it to get the hell off this chair and into the big wide world and Lord knows I could use the exercise.

One such day recently started with me on Facebook, where I read the news that Sawdust City - makers of the very awesome Lone Pine  IPA - was finally getting around to brewing a double IPA called, appropriately, Twin Pines IPA. My pal Don - who watches nature shows in case he ever gets off Facebook and has to go outside -  immediately took to Twitter to declare it a must-have, even though the beer`s release would be limited to the brewery (Gravenhurst) and lucky pubs around the province.

All I could hope was that Darryl, my favourite bearded publican, would get some for Buster Rhino's in Oshawa. As Sawdust City and Buster Rhino's have a healthy`relationship based on making money and selling great beer, I could afford to be hopeful.

Beer...and chocolate

It seemed only minutes later Don was back - this time on Twitter - but now he was raving about the LCBO release of Karma Citra, the world class IPA from Great Lakes Brewery of Toronto, Canada`s two-time Brewery of the Year. "It`s showing up in all the Burlington LCBOs. Get on it!" he said to me, to Great Lakes and to whoever was listening on Twitter at the time. "Not showing up out here at all," said I, after googling the LCBO's product search site. I wasn't the least bit concerned, however, as I had been drinking it all week at Buster Rhino's after the recent Great Lakes tap takeover. "I'm sure it'll be here by Monday," I told him.

But all this talk of beer was making me thirsty and I remembered that I still hadn't paid a visit to the Manantler boys, who had just opened up a brewery in Bowmanville.

Today seemed like as good a time as any.

Manantler is about as new as it gets, having opened their five hectolitre brewhouse this winter (Train Bridge Pale Ale and Rococo Chocolate Milk Stout were the first two offerings) after nearly a year of brewing off-site.

Their abbey-style Pursuit of Abbeyness was one of the hits at the Durham Craft Beer Festival last September but after brewing it at Church Key Brewery in Campbellford (and none of this, "here's the recipe, go nuts" stuff - these guys took over the brewery for the day and brewed, cleaned, carbed, filtered and packaged it themselves) the four home brewing friends who make up Manantler were eager to open up their own brewery.

On February 21 they got their wish, setting up shop in a very cool brownfield site adjacent to the historic (1901) Bowmanville Foundry, just north of the downtown. With a chocolate factory, a candle maker and a caterer - among other tenants - the area is quickly becoming a feel-good gentrification project for the town; if one can accept that something next door to a century-old working iron castings foundry could be 'gentrified.'

And now there's a brewery in the mix, clearly driving the coolness quotient through the hop-stained roof.

Manantler has basement digs in this place and entering the bottle shop/tasting bar was not unlike walking into Sam Malone's bar on TV's Cheers - not that anyone called me Norm, and not that I'm beginning to look like him. Tasters and flights of whatever Manantler was brewing at the time was available at the bar, and with a skeleton of a deer/man riding a bicycle on the wall and antler tap handles on each of the kegs the lads could be accused of having an unhealthy relationship with deer bones.

Chris, one of the friendly
neighbourhood Manantler dudes

Or it could just be cool.

(Food at the bar is provided by neighbour Kings Court Caterers, who come in on the weekends to use Manantler beer to create dishes like crab cake malt balls; beer braised pulled pork sandwiches with Manantler BBQ sauce; and steak and ale pie with porter gravy. Mmmmm.)

I had a flight of Rococo Chocolate Milk Stout; The Dark Prince Black IPA; and Clown Punch IPA; and went home with a bottle of each.

The Rococo was quite tasty, with coffee and dark chocolate on the nose and more chocolate (semi-sweet this time) and more roast coffee on the way down. Very smooth with a hint of plum at the end.

The Dark Prince was one of the better Black IPAs I've had. With a gorgeous bubbly head on an ebony body, this beer gave up a citrus and coffee aroma, followed by more coffee, some dark chocolate and caramel sweetness and a bit of a citrus tang. Nicely carbonated, the beer showed off its 'dark' side with a bitter finish. Solid.

The Clown Punch had lots of pine and sweet malt on the nose, and then lots more pine and bready malts. There was pineapple and some dark fruits from the hops, albeit somewhat subdued. I thought it needed more bitterness but it was a good IPA start for these guys.

I told Chris, who was manning the bar this day, to not be afraid to throw some serious hops at their IPAs in the future. Us hop heads, I said, can handle it.

"We are not afraid," Chris promised, and told me to keep an eye out for their next offering in the hops department.

I'm looking forward to it.

On the way back to Oshawa I decided to stop in at the Bowmanville LCBO. Just in case Karma Citra, the fourth-ranked IPA in Canada (according to Rate Beer) and the highest ranked IPA with any kind of shelf time at the LCBO, was going to make an appearance.

A quick walkabout revealed no Karma Citra and I was about to leave when a staffer came into the beer cooler and started opening a case. "Uh, is that Karma Citra?" I asked, seeing the Great Lakes logo on the box. I didn't need to wait for an answer. "I'll take three," I said, reaching in and helping myself.

Turned out to be a pretty good day - I just had to get out of the house.

Thank you, Twitter.

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It was only a couple of days later when Twitter told me to get out of the house again. This time the voice on the internet told me to go down to Buster Rhino's and see what was on the chalkboard.

I  saw a bunch of bottles from Bellwoods - one of my favourite Toronto breweries - and was set to order a Catherine Wheel, a fine Belgian IPA I'd enjoyed about a year ago, when I saw the words Twin Pine IIPA.

That didn't take long.

This was a powerful pint of pine and earthy goodness. Drinking it was like being slapped in the face with a pine bough and loving it. But not just any old Jack Pine from some Group of 7 painting, no, sir. This was like being smacked across the head with a branch from  a 200-foot Ponderosa Pine, with the Incredible Hulk doing the smacking. After you stole his beer. Twin Pines (8.8 percent ABV with 88 IBUs in honour of being Sawdust City's 88th brew) was full of pine, citrus, tropical fruit and booze with a huge bitter bite at the end. Dangerous and delicious.

The next day Twitter was at it again, informing me that Manantler had another IPA in the fridge. A Double IPA at that.

Out of the house I go.

Roadkill was the beer's name and it came with generous helpings of Amarillo, Citra and Chinook hops. The aroma wasn't much but it tasted of pine and pineapple and the booze - 7.5 per cent - was masked beautifully. Really nice and bitter on the finish.

The boys at Manantler are not afraid to brew a hop bomb or two, just like Chris promised.

Colour me impressed.

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I have a couple of reviews of Beyond the Pale (Ottawa) beers to finish this blog, starting with Tongue Twister, a Double IPA that clocks in at 8.2 per cent. Maybe not as deliciously sadistic as advertised, but it is a piney hop monster with a ton of dankness. Pine, citrus, tropical fruit and some floral notes stay with you until the swallow, then it’s big caramel malts and a hit of booze with more pine. Deceptively and dangerously smooth.

I followed that up with Rye Guy, the little brother to the amazing Super Guy I enjoyed last year. There is plenty of pine on the nose with some citrus notes. Tastes of pine, orange peel and rye spiciness. Sweet bitter finish but overall light in body. Tasty.

Cheers!