The release party last night was fantastic with a great show of local beer aficionados, many thanks to everyone for coming out!
There were a lot of familiar faces and quite a few new ones as well, it was great to see everyone come out for the event and I hope you all enjoyed the beer and food as much as I enjoyed catching up with most of you, and my apologies to those that I didn't get to meet or chat with.
Cheers
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Inaugural Beer Release Party
Ladies and Gentlemen you are all invited to....
Our Inaugural release party! It will be held July 29th 2009 @ 7:00 pm At 1869 Upper Water St Halifax, NS @ The Hart & Thistle Gastropub & Brewery in Historic Properties on the waterfront, this is a very casual event.
The inaugural bews will be featured with some fantastic hors d'oeuvres created by our very own - Chef Sean Kettley. Everything will be infused with beer (of course), and on the house to boot.
We'll be featuring....
- Tandoori Prawn Lollipops with warm grapefruit mango relish paired with 37hr Simcoe SMaSH.
- Salt Cod, Smoked Jalapeño & Havarti Fritters paired with Black Nitro.
Hope to see you all there.
NASH
Our Inaugural release party! It will be held July 29th 2009 @ 7:00 pm At 1869 Upper Water St Halifax, NS @ The Hart & Thistle Gastropub & Brewery in Historic Properties on the waterfront, this is a very casual event.
The inaugural bews will be featured with some fantastic hors d'oeuvres created by our very own - Chef Sean Kettley. Everything will be infused with beer (of course), and on the house to boot.
We'll be featuring....
- Tandoori Prawn Lollipops with warm grapefruit mango relish paired with 37hr Simcoe SMaSH.
- Salt Cod, Smoked Jalapeño & Havarti Fritters paired with Black Nitro.
Hope to see you all there.
NASH
Inaugural Batch #2 - 'Black Nitro'
Born July 29th 2009
Our second inaugural batch will be on the taps along with '37hr Simcoe SMaSH' this Wed evening July 29th '09.
'Black Nitro' is a hybrid of sorts and I've dubbed it an organic Black Pale Ale. It's tasting nice and as you may have guessed, it's served from the nitro faucet.
Vital Stats
Gravity - 12.5P/1.050
IBU's – 75
Hop Rate - 1.8 lbs/bbl
ABV - 5.5 %
Malts – Organic Canadian 2-row, Roasted Barley
Hops - Amarillo and Warrior Pellets
Formulated as a West Coast Pale Ale with organic malts and a couple twists, I upped the bitterness to 75 IBU then added enough roast barley to darken it up, and dark it is. With flavours leaning toward coffee and bitter chocolate, the citrusy zing of west coast hops and slightly vegetal from the dry-hopping with a long lingering semi-dry finish, light bodied with a somewhat full mouthfeel from the N2 gas.
Cheers
Our second inaugural batch will be on the taps along with '37hr Simcoe SMaSH' this Wed evening July 29th '09.
'Black Nitro' is a hybrid of sorts and I've dubbed it an organic Black Pale Ale. It's tasting nice and as you may have guessed, it's served from the nitro faucet.
Vital Stats
Gravity - 12.5P/1.050
IBU's – 75
Hop Rate - 1.8 lbs/bbl
ABV - 5.5 %
Malts – Organic Canadian 2-row, Roasted Barley
Hops - Amarillo and Warrior Pellets
Formulated as a West Coast Pale Ale with organic malts and a couple twists, I upped the bitterness to 75 IBU then added enough roast barley to darken it up, and dark it is. With flavours leaning toward coffee and bitter chocolate, the citrusy zing of west coast hops and slightly vegetal from the dry-hopping with a long lingering semi-dry finish, light bodied with a somewhat full mouthfeel from the N2 gas.
Cheers
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
'37hr Simcoe SMaSH' - Inaugural IPA
Born July 29th 2009
Our inaugural Simcoe SMaSH beer was 37 hours in the making with a 26 hr simmer @ 182F. The mash-hopped and 1st-wort hopped wort simmering was a comedy of errors but we are definitely on to something here!
Vital Stats:
Gravity - 16.7P/1.069
IBU's – 100+ (150 Calculated)
Hop Rate - 3.5 lbs/bbl
ABV - 7.0 %
Malts – Canadian 2-row
Hops - Simcoe Pellets
Initial planning was for a hopped up IPA (surprise!) but we were unable to procure the specialty malts in time for the brew so I decided to pull off a twisted San Diego style IIPA, twisted in the way that it would become a San Diego style IPA and hell, why not make it a SMaSH beer at the same time since we only had one malt (SMaSH = ‘single malt and single hop’ beer). A blonde, light bodied hop delivery vehicle with an intense bitterness, soon thereafter the plans all changed. 8a.m. Sunday morning July 12th 2009 Simcoe SMaSH was born, partially at least. The mash was happy as could be. I had planned to boil the first runnings for 45 minutes to get some body and colour formation but the poor little steam jacketed DME copper clad 5 HL kettle couldn’t, wouldn’t do it, actually it was the boiler that couldn’t do it. After trouble shooting for a few hrs with the kettle full and SLOWLY gaining ground toward the boil we called in the repair guy but to our dismay he was as useless as a 10 IBU beer. By 8 pm that evening we decided to leave the wort to simmer overnight and call in the big guys first thing Monday morning to fix our boiler problem. The problem wasn’t corrected until some 26 hrs after initial temps hit 182F, 5pm that fateful Monday the boil was on and the hops were pounded into the kettle by Bruce Keith – owner of the Hart & thistle. Now I gotta hand it to the guy – Bruce isn’t a brewer nor has he ever brewed before or so much as heated water on the system but since I was brewing in another city 250 kms away by this time, Bruce finalized what has become 37hr Simcoe SMaSH. I walked him through each step via SMS messages and phone conversations until he finished. The yeast was pitched into the wort by 9pm. Bruce finished the clean-up around 1:00a.m. Kudos to you Bruce and thanks for thinking dumping it might be a less than stellar idea!
The biggest surprise came when I returned to analyse the beer. The colour and body formation are incredible, this isn’t San Diego style anymore! The Maillard reaction kicked in big time, caramelization and melanoidan formation are amazing in this beer. The FG of the beer also reflects this coming in way thicker than what was anticipated.
We'll have this and one more treat on tap asap, stay tuned....
Our inaugural Simcoe SMaSH beer was 37 hours in the making with a 26 hr simmer @ 182F. The mash-hopped and 1st-wort hopped wort simmering was a comedy of errors but we are definitely on to something here!
Vital Stats:
Gravity - 16.7P/1.069
IBU's – 100+ (150 Calculated)
Hop Rate - 3.5 lbs/bbl
ABV - 7.0 %
Malts – Canadian 2-row
Hops - Simcoe Pellets
Initial planning was for a hopped up IPA (surprise!) but we were unable to procure the specialty malts in time for the brew so I decided to pull off a twisted San Diego style IIPA, twisted in the way that it would become a San Diego style IPA and hell, why not make it a SMaSH beer at the same time since we only had one malt (SMaSH = ‘single malt and single hop’ beer). A blonde, light bodied hop delivery vehicle with an intense bitterness, soon thereafter the plans all changed. 8a.m. Sunday morning July 12th 2009 Simcoe SMaSH was born, partially at least. The mash was happy as could be. I had planned to boil the first runnings for 45 minutes to get some body and colour formation but the poor little steam jacketed DME copper clad 5 HL kettle couldn’t, wouldn’t do it, actually it was the boiler that couldn’t do it. After trouble shooting for a few hrs with the kettle full and SLOWLY gaining ground toward the boil we called in the repair guy but to our dismay he was as useless as a 10 IBU beer. By 8 pm that evening we decided to leave the wort to simmer overnight and call in the big guys first thing Monday morning to fix our boiler problem. The problem wasn’t corrected until some 26 hrs after initial temps hit 182F, 5pm that fateful Monday the boil was on and the hops were pounded into the kettle by Bruce Keith – owner of the Hart & thistle. Now I gotta hand it to the guy – Bruce isn’t a brewer nor has he ever brewed before or so much as heated water on the system but since I was brewing in another city 250 kms away by this time, Bruce finalized what has become 37hr Simcoe SMaSH. I walked him through each step via SMS messages and phone conversations until he finished. The yeast was pitched into the wort by 9pm. Bruce finished the clean-up around 1:00a.m. Kudos to you Bruce and thanks for thinking dumping it might be a less than stellar idea!
The biggest surprise came when I returned to analyse the beer. The colour and body formation are incredible, this isn’t San Diego style anymore! The Maillard reaction kicked in big time, caramelization and melanoidan formation are amazing in this beer. The FG of the beer also reflects this coming in way thicker than what was anticipated.
We'll have this and one more treat on tap asap, stay tuned....
Welcome to the Brewers' Blog
This is the spot to get in on all the latest news about our handcrafted cutting edge beers, I'll be pushing the envelope and breaking down the boundaries on beer styles as we know them so be sure to check back often to see what we've been up to down at the Thistle!
The inaugural beers will be released very very soon so stay tuned for some exciting announcements.
Cheers, NASH
The inaugural beers will be released very very soon so stay tuned for some exciting announcements.
Cheers, NASH
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