Love Good Beer

Washington Winter Beer Festival 2009

Thursday, November 12th, 2009 | Events | No Comments

The Washington Beer Commission is holding the 2009 edition of their Winter Beer festival this December 4th and 5th.  I recently received an email containing the beer lineup and it looks to be a good one.  I attended the Washington Cask Beer Festival last Spring and really enjoyed it, so I imagine the winter edition is similarly epic.  Serious BC beer fans should consider heading down the I5 to take part in what promises to be a good festival.  I really considered buying tickets, but am planning on attending the Dix Winter Caskival on December 5th instead.  Both events will be good, but Dix is just so much closer to home!

Cheers,

Chris

Tags: DIX Brewery, washington beer commission, washington cask beer festival, winter beer festival, winter caskival

Hopscotch Festival 2009

Tuesday, November 10th, 2009 | Events | No Comments

The annual Vancouver Hopscotch Festival is an event that showcases scotch, whiskey and beer.  The 2009 edition starts this weekend, with the Grand Tasting Hall events taking place next Thursday and Friday, the 19th and 20th of November.  Erik and I went to the Grand Tasting Hall last year and weren’t particularly impressed from a beer perspective.  We don’t drink whiskey or scotch regularly enough to judge the quality of that aspect of the event, but the beers on hand were highly uninteresting.  There were a few winter ales available that were good to try, but still nothing unavailable in stores.  That being said, we are likely more knowledgeable about beer than the average person and someone who isn’t much into beer would likely enjoy trying the different styles on hand.  For me, why would I pay for a ticket and wait in lines for tiny cups of beers I’ve already tried and can easily just buy off the shelf? The answer this year, I wouldn’t, so I’m not going.  Hopscotch also provides attendees with the chance to get publicly drunk amongst a large crowd of people, which can be enticing (including to me, but not this time round).

An upcoming beer festival that I am excited about is the Dix Winter Caskival, which will feature upwards of twenty cask condition winter concoctions crafted by some of BC’s more adventurous (and talented) craft brewers.  The summer Caskival was a blast, so I’m looking forward to December 5th.  To get in, just line up outside of Dix at noon, no purchase of tickets beforehand required.

Cheers,

Chris

Tags: DIX Brewery, hopscotch festival, winter caskival