Whitby Craft Brewery Invasion: The Big Guns!

Well, here's a crew that a church group wouldn't want to see up close
and personal. But lemme tell you, if you're a Whitby Craft Brewery,
we were a welcome sight. In this Hago photo, from left, that's me, Big
Joe, Josh, Candice and Glenn all packed into a supposed 20-person
limousine. Seven of us fit in there just fine but 20? Not a damn chance!

Last time, I regaled you with the tale of how seven people came together to mount the Whitby Craft Brewery Invasion 2017 on December 9 - or as some of you might call it, last Saturday.

It was a story that was both epic and biblical in size and scope... but only if those words were seriously redefined in the last few days. But what it actually was in this case? Loud. Rowdy. Ridiculous. Very drink-y. And a whole lotta fun packed into one day.

Okay, a quick recap: Hago, Joe, Candice, Glenn, Paul, Josh and myself all hopped into a limo to visit Whitby's four craft breweries one sunny day.

What did our dude Hago think of our first (well, second)
brewery stop? I believe that's a two thumbs-up rating and it
doesn't go higher than that. Because that's all the thumbs we
have. Seriously, look at your hands. I'm not lying about this.

We had fun. The End. Oh, hang on. Lemme check my notes. Okay, there's more.

Now when we last left off, we were standing at the site of the NEW Brock Street Brewing on the corner of Brock and Dunlop Streets in downtown Whitby. Had a great chat with the builders, looked over the plans, froze our arses off and I had to use the porta-potty. I gave it three stars on RateACrapper.com - didn't wow me but I'd use it again. (Now I'm afraid to check and see if that's a real website. It could distract me for a few minutes... or six hours.)

So where do we go from the new Brock Street Brewing? Well, we went to the OLD Brock Street Brewing on Hopkins Street. Now Hago had a bone to pick and he wasn't shy about voicing it. "Is this is on Hopkins Street, why aren't we calling it Hopkins Street Brewing?" When I pointed out that it was probably because it was jammed full of tasty Brock Street Brewing beers, he paused and shrugged, "Good enough."

And so it began. The drinking portion of the day. Not that we're big on that or anything.

Yeah, I could have had any one of us pose with Brock
Street Brewing co-owner Mark Woitzik but I asked
Candice to, thinking that I'd get an even better smile
from him. Frankly, it looks like my evil plan worked.

Well now, this was a hell of a start. Already, brewer co-owner Mark Woitzik had set up the site visit and was happily on hand to greet us at the brewery. Also, right there, another co-owner, Victor Leone, was working the bar and front foyer with happy greetings to us (and many others, as he was really hustling his buttocks up front.)

The place was jumping. They had the two-person band, Soulbound, in for the day, playing in the back with the vats and it was a crowded scene, lemme tell you. But except for a couple of shared beers along the way, it was finally time to jump feet-first into some seriously good craft beer and no one in my wrecking crew seemed opposed.

I have enjoyed many of their beers, mostly their core brands (their Irish Red is one of the best traditional red ales in the GTA) but when I saw their 3:10 To Yakima West Coast IPA on tap (a newbie! Or so I thought...), I felt like hit the jackpot in Vegas, baby! Well, if someone invented a Beer-Related Jackpot.

Reviews towards the end but yeah, pretty damn good. When I caught up to Mark near the vats, he asked what I was sampling. When I told him, his face lit up.

In this poignant and beautiful moment, photographer
Josh Beaven captures the image of some obviously
homeless man at the bar in Brock Street Brewing.
I think it's very community-minded to let the needy
into your establishment, especially as the weather
turns colder. Wait a minute. Never mind. That's me.

"What did you think of the new branding?" he asked. While all their core beers have remained faithful to their traditional branding, with four new/old ones - the 3:10 to Yakima, the Premium Bohemian Pilsner, the Pumpkin Spiced Harvest Lagered Ale and the Munich Dunkel Lager - they finally branched out and enlisted artist Spencer Afonso to draw them some unique and very colourful cartoon labels.

So I was brutally honest. "I love them, man. They look great!" Okay, perhaps not that brutal. Maybe the opposite. I'm still not that familiar with your Earth customs. But they're colourful, fun, well-drawn and hey, breaking from tradition can be a good thing. A growth thing. A some... thing. Okay, I just like rebranding and jazzing things up.

But the thing is one of our Group of Seven, everyone's favourite carpenter, Josh, has ties so strong to the brewery that we walked out with tons of swag. Now don't get me wrong. A large part of me is big on paying for what I walk out with as these people are craft brewers trying to make a buck. And you should pay for that. They make a great product so you pay for it. Simple, decent and fair equation, right? I will always stand by that. But you see, apparently, co-owners Mark and Victor didn't want us going thirsty in the limo.

My man, Josh, wore his Brock Street Brewing pride on
him all day long. Due to his gifted woodworking skills,
he has helped them with finishing touches on many
projects, including the retail outlet in the new Brock
Street Brewing coming to craft beer lovers in June! I,
on the other hand, had a gnarly Spider-Man shirt on.

They seemed so genuinely happy to see us that turning down a gift, however generous, would be pretty rude. So when they gifted each one of us with their delicious (and outstanding) Signature Series Red Leader Oatmeal Stout, I was thrilled. And when Victor waved off our bar charges, it was, like, whoa sweet! And when Josh walked out with a 12-pack of their Blonde Lagered Ale and 20 taster glasses on the guys for the limo ride, well, it was beyond generosity. Oddly, in all the confusion, I forgot to buy a Brock Street beer glass but somehow managed to end up with eight little tasters at home. I can see those coming in handy when friends visit in the Summer. (I could make eight friends by then. You don't know.)

But this has always been indicative of Brock Street Brewing. I have been there many times with my son and staffers didn't know me from Adam but we have always been treated like gold. The young ladies are always so sweet to my son so you can imagine the weight that carries with me. Beyond that, the fact that Josh has found lots of work with them and they are so supportive of his side-projects that they actually sell them... well, that all makes me pretty happy. That's what community is all about and no one does community like Brock Street Brewing.

Dammit, Josh takes some pretty great photos with that
phone of his! Here's Glenn on the right, Hago on the
left (who appears to be feeling a large pain in his neck
because of Glenn on the right) and 5 Paddles co-owner
Spencer McCormack at the bar in the background.

That they are literally around the corner from my life-long friend, Johnny and his wife, Trish, who I visit a couple of times a year... well, let's just call that a happy quirk of serendipity. If you're in Durham Region, visit them. Just tell them Don sent you. If that results in confused looks, well, hey, who cares? They have beer.

Okay, from Brock Street, let's move to Hago's favourite Whitby brewery - 5 Paddles Brewing. Although if I'm being honest, I love these guys, too. Their Juice Campbell is one of the best Vermont-style IPAs ever and don't even get me started on their Skull Pucker Sour IPA, a dynamite sour that Hago got me hooked on.

Once again, we got the royal treatment. Co-owner Spencer McCormack made sure he was there that day to show us a good time. Hell, he even try to educate us so you have to admire his gritty pluck there. And Spencer did not disappoint. In what must have been a feat similar to herding feral farm kittens, he got us all in the back to check out the real deal back there.

He walked us through the brewing process, the history of the company... well, pretty much whatever we asked. When I asked him where the washroom was, the dude totally nailed the directions with military-like precision - something our favourite soldier Hago really appreciates.

Aside from the Elvis sideburns, which are really very
sweet burns, co-owner Spencer took us all in the back
and kicked the shit out of us. With knowledge, I mean.
A brewery guide who helped build the place from a
dream to the reality it is today. Great guy, great place!

Since they opened in June 2013, the five owners, Spencer, Mike Bray, Ian Mills, JP Tibensky and Ed Woods - all of whom initially met at the Durham Homebrewers Club -  have released over 160 beers in every style. Hell, this past October, they had five different pumpkin style beers alone - one each week - in an annual event they've come to call Pumpkinpalooza. I'm the opposite of a pumpkin beer guy, believing as I do that pumpkins belong in pies, not ales, but if they made a good porter or stout one, count me in.

Okay, then, why don't we investigate some of these new beers from the two established Whitby breweries? (Brock Street opened its doors in April 2015 so that will give you an idea of how recent the newbies are when I'm calling Brock Street established.)

But since that was our first stop, let's start with their Red Leader Oatmeal Stout from the brewery's Signature Series. We all shared a couple of bottles of this black magic in the limo after they landed in our hands.

Veering wildly from their traditional branding, you
can see cartoonist Spencer Afonso is having some
fun with the new-look labels, including their new-old
3:10 To Yakima West Coast IPA. So far, Brock St
has seen four of Afonso's labels - with more to come.

At a low 4.7%, this was one smooth, silky stout. Big hints of chocolate and coffee ran wild with the oatmeal malt background quite prominent. This was a little beauty that Brock, Newcomer of the Year in the 2016 Ontario Brewing Awards, was probably wise to separate into the specialty line. But maybe if we ask nicely, they'll start to can it and include it in their regular line-up. It would be a treat to see this warming brew in their retail fridge on an ongoing basis.

The 3:10 To Yakima West Coast IPA is, at 5.5% and just 55 IBUs (international bitterness units), an easy-going IPA. It's not gonna blow the top off your head with hoppiness but that said, I actually slightly preferred it to their Double Vision Imperial IPA. (This actually happens often - the flavour of a brewery's single IPA edging out their Double IPA in my mind.) It has a strong citrus nose and some light pine and orange on the tongue. I had unwittingly picked a very nice, somewhat low ABV (for an IPA) beer to start my adventure. Solid enough that I'll always grab some of this whenever I'm there. As well as their Irish Red. And their Porter. And anything new with a Spencer Afonso label.

When this picture popped up on their Facebook
page two days before we all hit Whitby, Hago
alerted me immediately! 5 Paddles has always
been crazy and creative with their labels and as
you can see, they've done a Dr Seuss take-off with
their Dr. Juice! Double IPA. This may surprise you
but I picked up several bottles of this. Crazy, eh?

And here's the thing about that crazy fun art by Alfonso. According to my Newmarket Beer Store Bro Paul, it's a shiny new suit on the same fellow. "The art for that one (3:10 to Yakima) got crazy. It used to be a train station sign." Here I thought it was a new beer but it turned out I just never saw the old label. (The magic of rebranding, people!)

Before we leave Brock Street here, let's give some well-deserved credit to their master brewer, Blayne Caron, who attended the prestigious VLB (Versuchs und Lehranstalt fur Braurei) in Berlin, Germany and is cranking out some phenomenal brews with his team. (In case you're curious what VLB's name translates to, it's "Research and Training Institute Brewery.") Blayne and his team have created 126 separate beers in every style since they opened two years ago. Great job, gang.

Moving up the street to 5 Paddles Brewing where the owners are the brewers, well, they had a few beauties in the fridge for us on this fine day. And the most anticipated by most of us was their Dr. Juice! Double IPA. In fact, when we all got home and enjoyed it, some of our gang was feeling a little inspired by the Dr Seuss-style label that they tweeted about it.

Okay, the interesting thing about the 5 Paddles V Bines
Wet Hopped IPA is that the hops were grown in the
backyards of the five owners. Thus they were proud to
announce: "This is as fresh as an IPA can be!" Kewl...

First on deck was Barrie Beer Brother Hago: "I would drink it in a bar, not allowed to in a car!
I would drink it in a glass, I would drink it off my wife's ass!
This rhyme just got loose, it's time to enjoy my Dr. Juice!"

Okay, his poor wife Aimee's soaked butt aside, not to be outdone, Beer Bro Glenn instantly replied: "I would drink it in a pub and I would drink it in a tub!
I would drink it with Hago-I-Am and I would drink it by the kilogram!
But I wouldn't drink it with a goose because I want to drink my Dr. Juice!"

Well, I couldn't let this go unchallenged, could I? "Hago, you better have your wife's consent unless you want to be paying rent!
Glenn, for liquids, we use litres, not grams, which makes your rhyme a total sham!
But for now, boys, let's just call a truce because I wanna drink my Dr. Juice!"

If you're thinking of opening a Twitter account, be warned! This is the crap we think is clever. And compared to most of what you'll find on there, it actually is! (Scary.)

Well, if I show Brock Street's sign, I gotta do the
same for our friends at 5 Paddles! This picture was
my first visit in August 2016! As you can well see,
my wardrobe has not improved since that point!

So what were we talking about again? Oh right, the beer!!! Okay, so how was this Dr. Juice! Double IPA that it inspired that much bad poetry? As Crocodile Dundee would say, "It was noice!" At 7.5% and a low low 45 IBUs (really?), it had some nice grapefruit on the nose with a wee touch of pineapple while the tongue was citrus-packed. I would buy it once again... but I would not buy it from a hen... because you should really stick with the authorized licenced seller and that's 5 Paddles.

Which brings us to their V Bines Wet Hopped IPA. As you know, wet-hopped IPAs use actual hop buds rather than the traditional pellet form and traditionally come out in September. As the label explains, it involves: "... picking hops off the vine and putting them straight into the kettle." Thus earning the subsequent claim: "This is as fresh as an IPA can be!" But this one had an additional twist. The five brewery owners grew these hop vines in their backyards. It doesn't get more personal than that. And was it fresh? Well, let's just say the Prince of Bel Air called and he wants his title back. So yeah, pretty damn fresh! At 6.2% and around 55-60 IBUs, it was orange and citrus on the nose with some sly pine on the back-end.

Okay, you thugs and slugs, that's all for the first half of the Whitby Craft Brewery Invasion 2017 but I'll be back tomorrow to wind this all up with the new guns in town - Little Beasts Brewing and Town Brewing. Not to mention, special guest appearances from craft beer legend Paul The Beer Guy and Matt Allott, co-owner of Manantler Craft Brewing Co. in Bowmanville. Keep in mind, we've already been to two breweries at this point so shit gets a little cray-cray for the second half of the limo ride. If you want a sneak peek from another set of eyes, as blurry as they were, here's Beer Bro Glenn's account of the day called simply: I Can't Believe No Charges Were Pressed!!! But guys and dolls, that's it, that's all and I am outta here! Until tomorrow, I remain...