The first Thursday of every month is Craft Beer Thursday at the BC Liquor Store at 39th and Cambie. Here is their April selection:
The beers are arrayed in the order you should drink them, starting with the right hand beer, a Farmhand Saison by Driftwood Brewing in Victoria. This was probably my favourite, a Belgian-style ale with a bit of black pepper added – the pepper probably inspired by those crazy Belgians who will add anything to their beer!
Next was Down Easy Pale Ale by Hoyne, also in Victoria. I found it so-so, and the same with the Mirror Pond by Deschutes Pale Ale in Oregon. Maybe I’m just not a pale ale drinker, as both of these beers rate fairly high on some of the tasting lists around.
The last two were both honey porters so we did a two-fisted tastings, as recommended by the tasting hosts. The Killer Bee Porter by DSBrewing was the best of the two porters, although I’m not a big fan of porters, and I didn’t taste much honey either. Still it rated a 2 from me, and would have rated a three if I liked porters.
St. Peter’s Honey Porter from England was all about heavy, heavy honey with a weird overtone of flowers – lavender? clover? First sniff and first sip was interesting but after that… I would have thrown it out if I didn’t have the Killer Bee handy to wash out the taste. So no stars from this one.