Squeezing a little in here between phone interviews...
I was at Mondial last year, and I said I was disappointed by the quality of the beer. That was different this year. I thought things had come up significantly this year. There were still a fair number of somewhat bland offerings, and beers-with-stuff, but you see that at American festivals too. There were no nastily infected beers this year -- well, one, but that was at a brewpub (a very sour brown at Le Saint Bock) -- and the beers seemed more solid, with more quality. I was pleased. The beer dinner Friday night was very nice; excellent food, good beer pairings, a pleasant time indeed, even though we were only in a screened-off area of the festival hall. A much better experience this year, and an interesting paradigm for a festival. More on that later.
4 comments:
No, we talked about that, too: the "rousse" beers are definitely a different thing, and not Kilkenny-like at all.
I was also at the Mondial, my first time. I must say I was impressed with the variety of Quebec microbreweries and that there weren't too many big beer conglomorates there. My only beef was the poor planning in terms of layout/space (e.g. ticket booths, traffic flow).
What I want to know, and maybe you have the answer is this: do the Canadians have a different definition of "red/rousse"? When I ordered some reds, I was expecting the flavors akin to Kilkenny or Killians, but instead thought I was drinking a more Trappist style brew...
All in all though, I was pleasantly satiated and loved the friendly and welcoming Quebecers!
(Beer Girl edited her initial comment, so I've deleted it and put the new one up...but my initial comment is in answer to her comment...which is below it. Got that?)
Sorry about that! I'm having technical difficulties at the moment! Thank you for your comment Lew. I thought I was going a bit mad for a moment on the reds or that my tastebuds were deceiving me! Glad to know I wasn't alone in that thought...
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