My local craftie, Nickel Brook, ready for giant step

Nickel Brook co-founder John Romano is currently in negotiations to
acquire the old Lakeport Brewing plant in Hamilton in a joint venture with
Collective Arts Brewery, who brew their Rhyme & Reason at Nickel Brook

When your son turns a year older, as mine did today, well then, it's high time for a special Father-Son excursion, isn't it? Granted, we had to go grocery shopping anyway but just down the street was my first destination - my local Burlington craft brewers, Nickel Brook Brewery.

It was a bit of an emergency, actually. My two growlers were empty - not a drop of my beloved Headtsock IPA in either one. Because I, you know, drank them. So I said to David, "Wanna visit Daddy's special beer place?" (Look, I don't give a damn what qualifies as an emergency at your place  - fires, floods, Bubonic Plague, the flu, whatever... at Donny's Bar and Grill, it's empty Nickel Brook growlers...)

The Nickel Brook Brewery, a.k.a. Better Bitters
Brewing: it's small and cozy. Just like my small
and cozy apartment, it's filled with tasty beer...

Turns out David was more than game... eager, even. So off we went. Once there, I spotted Tony, my favourite brewery dude who has served me so often and knows my tastes so well, that he often steers me to new finds, like their brand-new Belgian Pale Ale. But first, David did his obligatory introductions, as he always does, pro-offering his hand for a firm shake as I have taught him to do and saying, "I'm David Redmond and this is my father, Don." (That part he came up with.) Tony wryly smiled and noted, "Yes, I know your Dad... but it's very nice to meet you!" I sampled the Belgian Pale Ale, loved it and was set to get a growler of it... when the keg kacked. No surprise, Tony noted, they had sold a lot of it in the past week. Given the average 50-litre keg holds seven and a half cases of beer and a growler is roughly a six-pack, about 30 growler fills will kill a keg.

But because he knew it was David's birthday, Tony went out of his way to give us the nickle tour... or Nickle Brook tour, I suppose. David loved the shiny equipment - the bottling equipment alone cost a quarter million dollars which is why brewery owner, John Romano, refers to it as his "Ferrari."

Hey now, beer geeks, that's A LOT bigger than cozy, isn't it?

I was more captivated by the huge storage of wooden barrels, many of which are bourbon barrels used to create their outstanding Old Kentucky Bastard Imperial Stout. But when we went back out of the retail store, David immediately walked over to their awards area in the corner and exclaimed, "Wow! What's this?" Tony explained to him that they had won many awards over the years, including what he was filling my growlers with: the Headstock IPA, which, at the Great American Beer Festival a few years back, snagged a gold medal. (I think it was that fest - it was a big American competition, that much I know.) Not surprised. It's been one of my favourites since I discovered IPAs late last summer.

Collective Arts Pale Ale, which is outstanding, is brewed
out of Nickel Brook. Now as it turns out, they will be a key
stakeholder if Nickel Brook scores the old Lakeport Brewery

So anyway, a great father-son excursion. It was his birthday, I took him to a craft brewery, I got a Belgium Pale Ale sampler and two filled growlers, we got a tour... what could be cooler than that? That sound you just heard - David's Mom reading this, sighing and rolling her eyes... That other sound you just heard, the other three Craft Beer Musketeers, Glenn, Cat and Stevil St Evil, clamouring, "Father of the Year!" David declared Nickel Brook to be "really cool." Like his Dad, he's easily distracted by shiny stuff...

But moving on from my dubious parenting skills... According to a newspaper article just last week, it would seem that our main man Romano is looking to buy the old Lakeport Brewery in Hamilton. Once upon a time, it was the Amstel (Canada) brewery and then newcomer Lakeport took it over and became huge for their buck-a-beer policy and line of beers. At the time, Better Bitter Brewing was a brew-your-own wine and beer place. Lakeport's buck-a-beer policy really walloped the brew-your-own-beer industry, including Better Bitters Brewing. But knowing he was creating some damn fine beers in his brew-your-own, John didn't curse the gods. He simply started Nickel Brook Brewery up, instead.

Ryan Morrow is the brewmaster behind both Nickel Brook
beers and the Collective Arts's delicious Rhyme & Reason

So what goes around comes out, right? At the moment, Nickel Brook is brewed out of a (roughly) 13,000-square-foot facility. They're at capacity... plus. Romano told the newspaper it was almost pointless to send sale-people on calls. They can't brew beer more quickly at this point. The old Lakeport plant, a nifty 50,000-square-foot facility, would certainly ease their space constraints. When Labatt's bought it a few years back, they shut it down and simply took over the Lakeport line. Now the plant is some kind of manufacturing or construction holding facility. If John gets his way, that may soon change. And in a way that makes Brew-Ha-Ha very happy because it'll be a brewery again! (Little known fact: Nickel Brook is named after John's two kids, Nicholas and Brooke and that is pretty damn cool. See, David's Mom, craft breweries and children are a natural pairing!)

Matt Johnson, who's been in the brewing game for a dozen
years, is a busy man after founding Collective Arts Brewing.

So John is in negotiations with the Hamilton Port Authority, who went on record to say they would love the old Lakeport plant to be a brewery again, to secure the land. Maybe he will, maybe he won't... but man, my fingers are crossed for a reason. City Hall, especially in Ontario regardless of constituency, is a tough task-master. Did you finish those first 87 forms? Great! Here's 2,087 more! Just fill those out... and then just another 3,547 to go!

However, John is so serious about needing more space that he has already bought brewing equipment from a defunct brewer out east and is storing it in an Ontario barn. Regardless, he's not flying solo on this venture. The Collective Arts people, a Toronto grass-roots brewery comprised of 85 Toronto artists, writers, musicians and film-makers who brew their outstanding Rhyme & Reason Pale Ale out of the Nickel Brook facility, are in on the action as partners, including Matt Johnson, who is co-founder of Collective Arts Brewing. Rhyme & Reason versus Spearhead Hawaiian Style Pale Ale as Canada's best pale ale is an ongoing battle between me and Craft Beer Musketeer Glenn... more on that next time...

Rhyme & Reason Pale Ale: every label is a new piece of art

In the end, whatever happens (and believe me, I'm watching carefully), Nickel Brook stays put in Burlington in the most important way - I can still fill my growlers there. Remember, what's good for me personally benefits society-at-large. (Ask anyone. Start with me, though.) They'll just brew their big guns elsewhere. A new brewery - with a different name, comprised of Nickel Brook and Collective Arts people - opens somewhere in either Burlington or Hamilton. Maybe the old Lakeport property. Maybe somewhere else. Nickel Brook brewmaster Ryan Morrow keeps creating new beers, something he seems incredibly adept at. Here's hoping.... Ontario's craft brewing is poised to explode. I wanna walk away from that explosion with my sunglasses on... in slow-motion... looking cool. But I'll probably flinch. Kind of a wuss about loud noise. David wouldn't bat an eye, though.

I love this beer. And I am far from impressed
with the food services at the Rogers Centre

Okay, all feel-good stuff so far and I don't wanna end on a downer... but I'm kinda chaffed. Steam Whistle was the first craft brewer ever to make it into the Rogers' Centre last baseball season. (For those of you over 25, we call it the SkyDome.) They had one little beer-selling kiosk on Level 100. One... there's dozens of other big brewery mainstream beer selling venues in the SkyDome. No joke - dozens. Steam Whistle, who brew just ONE beer, a Czech-style pilsner, and are literally across the street from the SkyDome were recently told, "Hey, thanks for coming out for the team... but we don't need you this year" from Aramark Canada, the food services people for the SkyDome. That bothers me. Actually, it bothers me a lot. It's not like Steam Whistle is Amsterdam Brewery or Left Field Brewery or Mill Street Brewery with dozens of outstanding choices. How exactly is one Czech-style pilsner, however excellent, that threatening to the big guns? That's some weak tea, my friends... And now we are the only ballpark stadium  in ALL of Major League Baseball without a local craft beer. This pisses me off to no end and I do not get pissed easily. I say Steam Whistle gets some big-ass screens and we watch the games there. Frankly, the ambiance is better at the brewery.

Homer enjoys a Steam Whistle at a Toronto Blue Jays game.
He clearly knew they were getting yanked at the SkyDome...

Okay, before I go, I wrote last time about Guinness Draught for St Paddy's Day and here is an incredibly-awesome Guinness commercial that's over two minutes long. Enjoy this sheepdog fun in: Herding The Lads Okay, then we have Glenn and his over-insistent proclamations on pale ales, in which he is well-meaning but wrong and well, god bless him, he actually read the inside of the caps on Flying Monkey's Smashbomb Atomic IPA... and tells us all what they say. Read that here on: Someone Had To Read These I would have read the caps but I never noticed they had stuff written on them. A little too eager to drink the beer? Certainly a possibility. Also a possibility? Never noticed (bet on this one). Never been a small-print guy. Okay, remember last blog when I wound it down by saying next time I would be talking about Collective Art's Rhyme & Reason Pale Ale, Founder's Pale Ale, Amsterdam's Autumn Hop, Anchor's Liberty Ale, Brewery Ommegang's Hennipen Saison, Double Trouble's Fire in the Rye RPA, Young's Double Chocolate Stout and anything else, I can shoe-horn in??? And the blog before that, saying the same thing? Yeah, David's birthday tour bounced you all. Soon.

So thank you, Tony at Nickel Brook, for giving my boy his first brewery tour. I have always loved going there. Now, even a little more. Certainly an important step towards manhood. (Shhh, listen... Mommy's eyeballs rolling...)

Okay, gang at Cheers, that's it, that's all... and I am outta here!!!! Until next time, I remain, as always...