What Is a Gruit? The word “gruit” describes an herb mixture originally used to enrich the flavour of beer before the widespread use of hops. The earliest known reference to gruit dates back to the 10th century from an area now in the Netherlands, Belgium, and northwestern Germany. Historically, a gruit mix was primarily comprised...

What are Finings? Finings are processing aids used to clarify beverages including beer, wine and non-alcoholic fruit-based beverages. Clarity is a desired quality for many beer styles, including most lagers and cask ales, where fining techniques are required to remove protein and yeast haze. Other beer styles like hazy IPAs are intentionally cloudy, as they...

What is A Side Pour? The early 20th century marked a shift away from hand-pulled cask engines to draught beer served in pressurized kegs. Originating in Czech Republic, side-pull faucets, also known as side pours, provided a novel approach to pouring from pressurized kegs, allowing for increased control over the flow of beer and level...

Water in Brewing For most beer styles, water accounts for more than 90% of the brew, though its contribution is largely overshadowed by more exciting ingredients like barley, hops and yeast. Water not only impacts the flavour and aroma of a beer, it also affects the bitterness, acidity, and mouthfeel. The five primary minerals in...

History of Schwarzbier Schwarzbier, or “black beer,” refers to a dark lager that originated in Germany. Although it is certainly not the first beer ever brewed, it is quite possibly the oldest continuously brewed beer style in the world. Historically, the term Schwarzbier was likely a generic name attributed to any dark German beer, making...

What does it mean to be a Canadian craft brewery? Although provincial guidelines vary slightly, craft brewers across Canada follow the same operating principles: Craft breweries are independently owned and operated, where a large beverage company cannot be a controlling shareholder The brewery is small, producing no more than 400,000 hectolitres of beer per year,...

What are Cryo Hops?  Before diving right into the swirling whirlpool of Cryo Hops, let’s first look at how hops are used in brewing.  Hops are one of the 4 essential ingredients in beer, along with water, yeast and barley. Brewers may use either whole cone or pelletized hops, where whole cones are kept intact,...

What is a Hefeweizen? Hefeweizens are a type of weissbier or white beer, also commonly referred to as weizenbier, or wheat beer. Translated from German, hefeweizen means “yeast wheat,” an apt description as they are the two defining ingredients for the style. Malted wheat contains higher levels of protein, contributing to hefeweizen’s trademark cloudy appearance,...

What is Zoigl Beer?  Brewed for over 500 years, Zoigl is a style of beer made in accordance with traditional methods in five towns in the Oberpfalz, a region in eastern Bavaria that borders Czech Republic. Traditional Zoigl beer bottom-fermented beer, unpasteurized and unfiltered, brewed in the community brewhouse in the small towns of Eslarn, Falkenberg,...

History of Grisette  In the late 1800s, Southern Belgium’s Hainaut province became an industrial mecca, moving away from agriculture, into coal and stone mining. With industrialization on the rise, local brewers began producing beer for growing population of local miners. Saison was the brew of farmhands, and grisette became the brew of miners. The term...