Beer in Canada

Major brewers like Molson produce popular brands of Canadian beer, such as Molson Dry.

Canada has a rich tradition of beer brewing. While the Canadian beer industry is massive and plays an important role in Canadian identity, globalization of the brewing industry has seen the major players in Canada acquired by or merged with foreign companies, notably its three largest beer producers, Labatt, Molson and Sleeman. The result is that Moosehead has become the largest fully-Canadian-owned brewer.

History

Beer was first introduced to Canada by European settlers in the seventeenth century, as Canada had an ideal climate for making beer before refrigeration was introduced. The first commercial brewery was built by Jean Talon in Quebec City, in the year 1668. Over a century later a number of commercial brewers thrived, including some that became the staple of the Canadian industry: John Molson founded a brewery in Montreal in 1786, Alexander Keith in Halifax in 1820, Thomas Carling in London in 1840, John Kinder Labatt in 1847, also in London, Susannah Oland in Halifax in 1867, and Eugene O'Keefe in Toronto in 1891. The very first patent to be issued by the Canadian government on July 6, 1842, was to one G. Riley for "an improved method of brewing ale, beer, porter, and other maltliquors."

Prohibition in Canada did not last as long as in the U.S. and was largely over by the mid 1920s (apart from Prince Edward Island, where it ran from 1901 to 1948). Nevertheless, it had a similar effect of leaving very few brewers, and it was only in the late twentieth century that there has been a revival and microbreweries have started. Brewpubs are still illegal in some provinces, however.

Economy

With the purchase of Sleeman Breweries in 2006 by the Japanese owned Sapporo Brewery, Canada’s beer production has been mainly under the control of foreign multinationals. By the end of 2006, nearly 90% of beer sales was of product brewed domestically under licence from non-domestic corporations.^[1]

Regulations

Government regulations require that all beer sold in Canada show the alcohol by volume on the label. A standard bottle of beer (12 imperial fl oz/341 mL and five percent alcohol by volume) contains 17.05 millilitres of alcohol. In most nations, the labelled alcohol percentage is either the average or maximum percentage allowed. However, as of 1927, most Canadian provinces require the minimum alcohol percentage to be labelled rather than the average. This move was meant to eliminate inaccurate nonalcoholic labelling as well as fraudulent advertisement.^[2]

The rationale for standardizing alcohol content (since loosened and disproved) is that consumers would tend to select only high alcohol beers and the breweries would have a war with ever escalating alcohol content.^{[citation needed]}

Industrial Megabreweries

The market in Canada for domestic beer is dominated by Labatt, Molson and Sleeman, all foreign-owned companies. Labatt and Molson aggressively market their flagship brands (Labatt Blue and Molson Canadian, respectively) as well as produce niche brands and market American and other imports, and accordingly these are popular in many American markets. The largest Canadian-owned brewer, Moosehead breweries, controls about 5.5% of the Canadian market.^[3]

Types

In English Canada the most popular types are lager like Molson Canadian and pilsners like Labatt Blue, although ales are also consumed. In Quebec ales such as La Fin Du Monde, Molson Export and Labatt 50 are also popular. Foreign and more exotic types of beers are becoming increasingly popular.

Ice beer

Ice beer (in name) originated in Canada, though it is essentially based on the German Eisbock style of beer. The first ice beer marketed in North America was Molson Ice ^[4] which was introduced in April 1993, although the process was patented earlier by Labatt, instigating the so-called "Ice Beer Wars" of the 1990s.^[5]

The process of icing beer is done by bringing the temperature of a batch of beer down to or just below the freezing point of water (32°F or 0°C), the greatest constituent of beer. Because water freezes at a higher temperature than does alcohol, the water becomes frozen and the alcohol stays a liquid. Because of this, a layer of ice can be skimmed from the surface of beer (hence the name "ice" beer). This creates a concoction with a higher volume ratio of alcohol to water and therefore creating a beer with a higher alcohol content by volume.

Labatt patented a process where beer is pumped through a tank of ice crystals before filtration. The freezing of beer allowed the removal of protein-polyphenol compounds, creating a smoother, more colloidally stable beer, and avoiding long aging time.

Magazines

Canadian beer has become a growing part of the national culture with the addition of a number of microbreweries and craft brewers. Canadian beer is becoming more recognized as a standard of quality on a world wide level. As part of this recognition, Taps Magazine was launched first as a beer and wine magazine, but in 2007 focused solely on beer.

Microbreweries

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Microbrewers produce beers that satisfy the connoisseur's eclectic tastes, like this cask ale.

As with the United States, a microbrewery industry has arisen in Canada, satisfying niche tastes and providing localized offerings. However, most microbreweries only supply local markets and nationally, generally only beer produced by large breweries is available. This is compounded by the fact that the larger brewers like Molson have ownership stakes in the many retail outlets such as Brewers Retail in Ontario. The microbrewery explosion that has occurred in the United States has not been duplicated in Canadian markets.

In British Columbia, craft brewers such as Spinnaker's Brew Pub, Swan's Brew Pub, Vancouver Island Brewery, Phillips, Lighthouse, Tree, Nelson, Raven, Storm, R+B and Howe Sound, amongst others, provide a wide variety of craft brews in various styles.

In Eastern Canada, brewers like MacAuslan, Unibroue, Cameron's Brewing Company, and Wellington do the same.

Garrison and Propeller are highly acclaimed^{[citation needed]} microbreweries in Halifax, Nova Scotia. In the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, just outside the City of St. John's lies their most popular micro brewery, Quidi Vidi, whose most poular ale is 1892. At the moment, Quidi Vidi is in the midst of producing an ale called IceBerg beer which will be formulated from IceBerg water.

The Canadian Prairies have a number of craft brewers such as Amber's Brewing and Alley Kat in Edmonton, Wild Rose Brewing and Big Rock Brewery in Calgary, and Half Pints Brewing in Winnipeg.

However, there are quality brew pubs and a few microbrewers to be found, like Saskatoon's Paddock Wood, who produce risky, high gravity IPAs and ales.

Many Canadian craft brews are high quality products, in terms of their ingredients and preparation. Of the Canadian craft brewers, Unibroue in the East (a Sleeman's owned brewery specializing in Belgian style ales) and Phillips in the West (a true micro whose beer most resembles that being produced by the innovative West Coast American craft brewers like Stone, Lagunitas, Sierra Nevada, Bear Republic and North Coast) are the most acclaimed.

The stubby bottle

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Prior to 1961, Canadian beer was sold, and served, in two sizes, colloquially known as "quarts" and "pints," or, more accurately, "large" and "small." In fact, the larger bottle held less than twice the capacity of the "small" and was just 10% larger than an actual "pint." They were 22 and 12 Imperial fluid ounces (625 and 341 mL), respectively, whereas a true Imperial quart was 40 fluid ounces. Over the years, some provinces banned the sale of beer in the larger bottle. For example, in Ontario in the 1950s only the pint could be sold, but in Quebec both sizes were about equally common. In 1961, both sizes were replaced, nationwide, by the standardized bottle, equal in volume to the "small" and affectionately known as the "stubby."

Stubbies are a type of bottle which is shorter and with a slightly larger diameter than the now predominant longneck bottle. Starting in 1962 almost all beer in Canada was sold in stubbies until the beer companies chose to switch to the American-style longneck bottle, between 1982 and 1986. The last major label to be available in the stubby was Labatt's Crystal which switched to the longneck in the summer of 1986. The reason for the switch was because surveys showed that women did not like the stubby bottle, and to attract more female beer drinkers a bottle that appealed to them was developed. Proponents of "the stubby" note that its smaller shape (while retaining the same volume) means that it is easier to ship and store, and is less likely to break. Waterloo, Ontario's Brick Brewing Company and Phillips Brewing Company of Esquimalt, BC, have revived the use of the stubby as a marketing strategy, though they face higher production costs as a result. Brewers (manufacturing facilities) in general prefer the stubby bottle because the lower center of gravity makes the filling and handling of the bottle easier.

Breweries and brewpubs

• See: Category: Beer and breweries in Canada

See also

• American beer
• Quebec beer

References

Notes

External links

• Ontario Craft Brewers
• The Canadian Beer Index - at the Real Beer Page
• History of Beer in Canada - at the Beer Store
• Stubby.ca - The history and images of the Stubby beer bottle
• CBC Digital Archives - Selling Suds: The Beer Industry in Canada
• Alcohol labelling variations between the U.S. and Canada
• TAPS Magazine - Celebrating The World of Canadian Beer and Beyond
• [1]- Beer History Canada

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