Beer With No Name primed for the patio

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 10/06/2016 (2486 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Last week, the second edition of Coast to Coaster launched at select Liquor Marts and beer vendors to show off some of the best beers Canada has to offer — especially beers never before seen in Manitoba.

Last year, they did a large advertising blitz, making sure that everyone knew about the event. This year, the MLCC kept it fairly quiet for the most part, not really promoting it before it even began.

As well, they expanded the program from one month to spreading the event out over the course of two months. Instead of a huge influx of beers arriving all at once, eight beers will be featured for two weeks straight.

This year’s retail participants for Coast to Coaster are the Liquor Marts at 10th and Victoria and South End, the beer vendors at the Keystone Motor Inn and Victoria Inn, B&D Hardware in Onanole, Spud City Family Foods in Carberry and Kim’s Family Mart in Austin.

I’m glad to see a good variety of locations promoting the event this year.

Kenora’s Lake of the Woods is one of the participants in this year’s edition of Coast to Coaster. To me, they are Manitoba’s first brewpub post-2003 because they’re so close to Manitoba that they might as well be part of our province.

Last year Lake of the Woods expanded big time by bringing in a canning line, allowing them to sell their beer in convenient 473 ml cans, rather than just selling 50 litre kegs or 1.89 litre growlers.

The biggest upside is the canned product doesn’t spoil as quickly as a growler does. The shelf life of a growler is up to a month tops — and that’s if it’s refrigerated the entire time. For cans, depending on the style, they can stay fresh for as long as six to 12 months.

I previously reviewed and raved about Lake of the Woods’ Forgotten Lake Blueberry Ale and now they have a raspberry ginger beer called The Beer With No Name Raspberry Ginger Wheat Ale.

To me, raspberry and ginger are two flavours that scream “summer” so I’m excited to see how Lake of the Woods did.

The Beer With No Name pours a heavy, cloudy, grapefruit pink, with half a finger of creamy white head. For me, this is exactly what I expect in a fruit beer — the more unfiltered, the better.

The aroma actually reminds me a great deal of Unibroue’s Éphémère Framboise as it’s a bready, yeasty beer with a good deal of raspberry sweetness to it. There’s a light grassy aroma but for the most part, it’s fruity.

The flavour starts out with a large amount of sweetness from the puréed raspberries, followed by a hint of lemon, and a lacklustre hint of ginger.

The more I drink the beer, I start to get a bit of a tingling sensation on the tongue — I’m just not certain if that’s due to the ginger or the hops. Either way, it’s certainly not a bitter aftertaste, just tingling … if that makes any sense to you.

As an unfiltered raspberry wheat ale, it’s pretty decent and surprisingly reminiscent of Unibroue’s Framboise. But the ginger aspect was lacking completely — I was hoping for a bit of heat from the ginger or even more than just a passing hint.

It’s a fair bit tart, but easily a patio-worthy beer that’s considerably more natural than any Shock Top will ever be.

It sells for $3.85 per 473 ml can and packs six per cent ABV. You’d best buy quickly as stock is very limited.