A different Rib Eye Jack's Beer Fest

I put a lot of pressure on Chris from Sleemans. He was
my first pour of the day with the Unibroue Ephemere
Bluet (blueberry) Wheat. Chris told me that drinkers
could expect the wheat on bar taps within two weeks.

It's not easy being Steve, the general manager of Rib Eye Jack's Ale House in Burlington. Oh, never mind the burden of responsibility being the boss over one of the best best crews I've ever known (and I have known many over the years.) Never mind the long hours and far too infrequent days off that come with responsibility. Never mind being a fan of the last-place Toronto Maple Leafs as I share that burden, too, and it's ridiculously easy being me.

No, it was April 24th, a day that would truly put Steve's patience to the test. He was our designated driver for the Streetsville Rib Eye Jack's Beer Fest. In reality, it's a 25 minute drive from Burlington. So what's the big deal, you may ask? Well, Steve was responsible for safely delivering and returning back with me (that's really bad), coworker Jay-Dawg (not as bad), sweetheart Cara (the nice one) and our buddy Scott (on par with me for being a royal pain in the ass) to the Streetsville Rib Eye Jack's for their Beer Fest that day. Just like Burlington's version last October, the day was also for a great cause with all proceeds going to the Trillium Health Partners Foundation at the Credit Valley Hospital. Once again, we would find ourselves happily sampling beers (in a sophisticated manner, of course... *cough*) for a noble charitable cause.

You want to put a smile on my and Jay-Dawg's
face? Step One: Be James from Great Lakes
Brewing. Step Two: Bring Octopus Wants To Fight
IPA. Step Three: Actually, that's pretty much it.

So anyway, we made it there in one piece but I have to say it was a familiar ride. Whereas the others were wondering where the hell we were, I knew these streets well. At first, I wasn't sure why. I mean, way outside my home turf. Then it dawned on me as I looked at the street that there is or used to be a Keg Steakhouse down the same street. I dated a Mississauga woman (wonderful lady) about eight or nine years ago and that Keg was our place for birthdays, anniversaries, whatever. Ahh, memories. Okay, who cares? Back to the beer fest. As it turned out, Steve had also managed this Rib Eye Jack's some time ago and as such, he was getting lots of hugs from the sweet young wait staff who remembered him fondly. (Please note, I didn't insert "Really?" there. I want full marks for that.) I mulled over opening my arms wide and saying to them, "I, too, know Steve!" in hopes of getting a warm hug but the high-risk odds of getting repeatedly shot down would have put a damper on my charitable efforts.

So let's turn our attention to the real star of this particular show. That would be Caitlin VanBallegooie, the general manager of the Streetsville Rib Eye Jack's, who pulled this awesome bash all together. Wanna know how to pronounce her last name? Yeah, me too, homey. Not even gonna try.

So how's my man Shayn doing at Niagara Brewing
College? So far, so good, he assured me. Remember
man, when you brew your first IPA, I have about
150 cheesy hop-pun names you can choose from... 

So keeping in mind that this is a charity event and the breweries not only donate their people but also their beer, who did Caitlin entice to attend? Oh, a few... like Great Lakes, Waterloo, Nickel Brook, Collective Arts, Innocente, Sleeman, Barnstormer, Mill Street, (my Scottish favourite) Innis and Gunn, Flying Monkeys, Big Rock, Side Launch, Amsterdam, Muskoka, Creemore, Central City's Red Racer, as well as cider houses Pommies and Brickworks. On top of that was so much tasty food, I could barely keep count. But I did. Turns out I can eat 17 grilled chicken sliders in one afternoon plus far too many desserts to count. Why? Because I'm a guy and it's free food. But also for charity. I'm all about charity. Ask anyone, "What's Donny all about?" and yeah, first they'll say "beer" and then my son, David, but after about 35 or 40 or 80 guesses later, someone might accidentally say "charity." That's me. I'm So Raven when it comes to charity.

While the Burlington edition tops out at about 180 people, I would say with their much larger size bar and humongous beautiful patio, the Streetsville capacity is closer to 400. So anyway off the top, congrats to Caitlyn and her dedicated squad of servers because that's one helluva turnout.

I'm not sure Catherine from Innis and Gunn brewery
is a Scottish lassie but damn, she did pour me a tasty
Toasted Oak IPA from my favourite Scottish brewery.

And Caitlin told me it was sold out six days before the event so the bar is well supported by the local community so that's pretty sweet.

But let's get to the brewers, shall we? I started my day with Chris from Sleeman. Now this poor guy had a small disaster before the doors even opened. With no one near it, his table, filled with product, fell over, dumping the entire cargo-load. Clean-up efforts began instantly (Caitlyn's staff were there within milliseconds) and in the end, he lost about a case of beer. Fortunately, he brought plenty so I made him my first stop as he brought Unibroue's (the Sleeman-owned Quebec craft outfit) Ephemere Bluet, their blueberry wheat, and a nice light start to my day. Also we have a Unibroue mixed pack in my store with the cherry version so I wanted a head-start. They also brew an apple, cranberry and pear Ephemere. It was the perfect choice to start a great day - light, fruity and summery. Of course, I told Chris that since he was my first server that everyone subsequent would be measured against him. He was the bar that was set. "Oh no," he smiled. "Too much pressure!" Actually, looking back at the pics, I had already met Chris at the Burlington Rib Eye Beer Fest, as was also the case with Barnstormer's Allie and Adam from Flying Monkey. These poor people have seen far too much of me in a short time. I hope there's a victims support group for them.

Brett from Mill Street Brewing brought their
much-anticipated West Coast Style IPA to the beer
fest. Tough to judge on a sample but it seems that
the brewery may have hit a homer in the IPA game

One of my favourite stops is always Innocente out of Waterloo and their travelling server, Shayn. That makes three straight beer fests where I've seen him, making him a natural leader for the We Had To Serve Don Victims Support Group. But Shayn, formerly the brewery's GTA sales rep, has taken a career turn, enrolling in Niagara Brewing College. Just one semester in, he is settling in. "It's alright. It's taken me a while to get used to being back in school, instead of being on the road and working all the time." But hey, it's brewing, not something dull like accounting or Calculus (although chemistry is about to become very important to him.) "Yeah, it makes it a little easier when you get to go to class and drink beer all day."

When I caught up with Andre at the Nickel Brook booth, I was stunned at the selection - their 9% Immodest Imperial IPA and their 9.5% Malevolent Black Imperial IPA. Usually breweries bring lighter fares to these. "Dude," I asked plaintively, "Are you trying to kill us?" Turns out the very weary Andre had worked a Food and Drink show all weekend (either Hamilton's or Waterloo's where they won best brewery) and grinned, "If I go down, I'm taking some of you with me!" Challenge accepted!

"We don't need no stinkin' session beers!"  barked
Andre, holding up Nickel Brook's 9% Immodest
Imperial IPA. Actually, he didn't say that. It's from
some cowboy movie and it was "badges", not beer...

Granted, I may have made a tactical error when I showed him the neighbouring Junction Craft Brewing had bigger sample glasses than his (probably for our safety). Reaching behind his cooler, he pulled a 12-ounce cup and filled it with Immodest. "Here you go," he laughed, "Good luck with that!"

Okay, after a brain cell zapper like Immodest, it's best to retreat to lighter fares so I sought out Sean at the Side Launch Brewing booth to sample their brand new Mountain Lager. Which is ironic as Sean was roughly the same size as The Mountain on Game of Thrones. The lager is the latest commercially-available addition to the Side Launch family after their Pale Ale, Dark Lager and Wheat (the last two being the former Dennison Dunkel and Weissbier - long story.) At 4.7%, it's a crisp, clean lager with some real flavour. "Yeah, it's a style the brewery figured we should have," he told me. And just in time for Summer sippin' on the patio.

Another light offering that got some praise from both me and Jay-Dawg was Innocente's 4.3% Purgatory Black Cream Ale. Not a favourite style for either of us, the darkness gives it some roasted malts on the nose and deeper caramel on the tongue. Nice job!

What do you drink when Side Launch's Sean is your
server at a beer fest? Whatever the hell he hands you.
Part man-part wall, this happy dude was bloody huge!

A couple of nice Kolsch beers on hand with Junction Brewing's Track Layers Koslch and Big Rock's Rhinestone Cowboy Kolsch making the scene. At 5% and 4.6% respectively, these two ales that wanna be lagers, were easy-sipping brews with nice malt on the nose and faint fruitiness on the tongue.

And session ales were plentiful as Junction brought its 2014 Canadian Brewing Awards silver-medal winning 4.5% Brakeman's Session Ale while Collective Arts had their newer 5% Stash Session Ale. Comparing notes, Junction server Jamie told me that the Brakeman was a big favourite of his while I noted that thus far, their Engineer's IPA, a nice British-west coast mash-up was my head-of-the-class.

Meanwhile over at Collective Arts, server Graham said their Stash was "meant to be a gateway beer. It's got some good flavour but it won't be too over-powering to anyone trying to cross into craft beers." However, when it comes to the brewery's next Collective Project beer, that one's still a mystery. As their first one out of the gate was the fantastic Black IPA, what would be their next direction?

Graham holds up their big seller from the day, the
Ransack the Universe Hemispheric IPA. The crowd's
tastes were very much in line with what's in my fridge

"My guess is it's going to be the complete opposite of the Black IPA so a real summer beer like a Saison or a Hefe-Weizen."

But what was their big seller of the day? The thing is he had, as well as the Stash, both the brewery's first beer, the Rhyme and Reason Extra Pale Ale, the gold medalist at the 2014 Canadian Brewing Awards and the more recent Ransack the Universe IPA, a personal favourite. You see the way the craft beer shelves are set up at my Beer Store, beers have a six case spot on the bottom shelf, a four case hole in the middle shelf or an eight six-pack spot on the top shelf. Jay always reserved a bottom shelf spot which he has coined "Donny's Swing Hole", meaning simply when he orders our craft stock he has to anticipate which IPA that I will be taking home the most over the next two weeks. Previous occupants have included Flying Monkey's Smashbomb Atomic and Muskoka's Mad Tom. But the current occupant of Donny's Swing Hole is Ransack the Universe, based solely on my recent buying patterns. They're both outstanding beers so who was the big winner at the Beer Fest? "Oh, the fan favourite today was the Ransack," grinned Graham. "Crazy different but still super drinkable for a strong IPA."

The Burlington Rib Eye Jack's Beer Mafia splashed down
into Streetsville Beer Fest on Sunday and had a blast. That's
wee Cara under my ugly mug on the left while everyone's
favourite beer technician Kylie is on the right. Not sure who
some of the others are but that's Smilin' Scott in the ball cap

But man, we had fun up there in Streetsville. The Burlington crew showed up large and did some damage to the supplies. I had a chance meeting with Great Lakes social media manager Troy, outside the washroom and he got a big laugh because, of course, I was posting on Instagram... or was it Twitter? Maybe Facebook? (Does it matter? They're kinda all the same.) Another chap I'd never met walked up to me and said, "Keep up the great work with the blog. You're pretty funny." Seeing I was very puzzled (by the recognition, actually), he asked, "You are Don Redmond, right?" There you go - my Fan Club has a member. It's a start. At one point, Jay had enough variety and declared, "I'm drinking (GLB) Octopus (Wants To Fight) for the rest of he day!" And I think he just may have. While I still had a few more to try, let's just say Andre at Nickel Brook was probably getting pretty tired of my face by the end. As it was, we drank him out of Malevolent. Might be time to hook Andre up with that support group, too. And, of course, poor Steve had to drive the school bus home and listen to us bicker like children over the radio station. Cara wanted dance music, the four guys wanted not-dance music. Take a guess who won? Every guy reading this knows we listened to dance music. But big thanks to Caitlyn and the Streetsville Squadron for a great day. As Ah-nuld would say, "We'll be bach!" But guys and dolls, that's it, that's all and I am outta here! Until next time, I remain...