On Apr 5, 2005 7:13 PM, John Forbes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Frank, this is all very sad. You need to hop on a cheap flight and come > on over to the London PDML. We may not be any great shakes at car-making > these days but by God we've still got good beer.
There are some fine beers made here, just as there are in the US. They just aren't made by the mainstream breweries, is all. Canada basically has two brewers, Labatt and Molson. They bought out pretty much every other large brewer in Canada, and now they themselves are owned by foreign interestes (Labatt was owned by Interbrew, who was looking to sell off Labatt, but I'm not sure if they've found a buyer yet). Molson has recently "merged" with Coors. I think we can safely call it a purchase (but Molson didn't want to use that nasty word). The thing is, those two make beer for profit, to make shareholders happy. Sales is what it's all about. They don't market taste anymore, they market lifestyle. In the last decade or 15 years, a number of smaller micro-breweries have popped up, and have taken a surprising share of the market - something like 6%, which is huge. Most of those beers are only sold locally, or in a smaller market, not nation-wide, and some are good. Amsterdam Brewery in Toronto makes some good beers, as does Wellington in Guelph (a nice bitters). Lots of local pubs brew their own - C'est What Pub, the unofficial hangout of TOPDML is one such place, with a lovely coffee porter, rye ale, raspberry lager (not my taste, but some like it), and others. So, we do have some wonderful beers here. Just not in bottles labelled Molson or Labatt. It would be like going down the the US, ordering a Bud, and expecting something smooth, with body and a nice creamy head <vbg> cheers, frank -- "Sharpness is a bourgeois concept." -Henri Cartier-Bresson
