Raise a glass: the brewers, winemakers and distillers of British Columbia

One thing’s for certain – craft beer in B.C. is huge. The UK’s certainly in the midst of an ale obsession right now, but it’s clear the Canadians have been developing their own beer scene for longer than we have (it also helps that B.C. produces some of the best hops in North America). Drinks menus don’t just have the country of origin next to the brewery name; they let you know what part of B.C. they’re from. And there are usually more than a dozen to choose from.

There are over 130 breweries in B.C., many of which are based in and around Vancouver – Canada’s craft beer capital. One that’s always been at the forefront of the scene is Central City, which over the past fourteen years has grown from a brewpub in Surrey (a suburb of the city) to a nationally acclaimed brewery with its own restaurant and bar in downtown Vancouver. I went along to see what brewmaster Gary Lohin is doing to celebrate Canada 150, a year-long celebration commemorating the country’s 150th birthday.

‘We thought it would be a cool idea to collaborate with a different brewery in each of Canada’s provinces and territories, except for Nunavut as we couldn’t find a brewery there,’ he tells me as we taste some of his signature brews, including a kettle-soured blackcurrant ale and his most popular, the Red Racer IPA. ‘We came up with twelve different beers which were all made at our brewery in Surrey but were conceived by different brewers across Canada to represent their local area.’

The beers are now available as a twelve-pack, which includes some of the most interesting brews I’ve ever tasted. Manitoba’s Half Pints Brewing Company created a saison flavoured with wild rice and wildflower honey, paying homage to the region’s rich farmland. Beau’s Brewing Company in Ontario used local peaches and white spruce tips (which can only be picked for a few weeks every spring) to create a completely unique pale ale. Garrison Brewing Company of Nova Scotia paid tribute to the province’s Scottish roots with a lightly peated Scottish ale. You get the idea – these are some seriously inventive brews that go way beyond the hop-heavy IPAs that are everywhere in the UK.

Central City’s beers – whether special collaboration brews or part of its core range – are available across Canada and in certain bars in the US, but it’s unlikely we’ll ever see them on the shelf in the UK. ‘I’d be too worried about how far they’d have to travel,’ says Gary. ‘Being in transit for that long would change the flavour.’ It goes to show that while the bigger North American breweries are keen to break into overseas markets whatever the cost, true craft brewers like Central City simply won’t compromise. And that means the only way you’ll get to taste their beer at its very best is by visiting their brewpub in downtown Vancouver.

centralcitybrewing.com

The most inspiring story of anyone I met during my trip to B.C. came from Rebekah Crowley, who with her partner Rob Rindt did what we all dream of doing – pack in the day job and follow our dreams. After visiting, I seriously looked into how I could emigrate to Canada and set up my own drinks business! Rebekah and Rob’s dream was to set-up their own micro-distillery, and rather than umming and ahhing over the risks and logistics, they went for it, setting up Roots and Wings Distillery in February 2017; the first of its kind in Langley, a largely agricultural region east of Vancouver.

The business was just a few months old when I visited, and the wooden walls of the new tasting room still smelled strongly of cedar. It’s a small operation, with just one building containing a tiny thirty-gallon copper kettle still, a basic bottling machine and lots of big plastic vats containing Roots and Wings’ flagship spirit, Vital Vodka.

The entire process takes place on the couple’s thirty-acre farm, which has been in Rob’s family for five generations. ‘He really liked potato vodka, I really liked corn vodka, and we knew we could grow both of them, so we decided to create a potato-corn vodka,’ says Rebekah. ‘I went on a week-long course that taught me the basics of distilling, and after I came back we started turning the old barn into a distillery and converted an old rental trailer into a tasting room. I read a bunch of books, left my job in IT sales, did a few practice distillation runs and then our first batch of Vital Vodka was ready.’

Being able to control the whole process – from growing the right variety of potatoes and corn to creating the mash and bottling on-site – Rebekah and Rob have the right to call their vodka ‘craft’. In the UK there’s no real regulations on what ‘craft’ means, but in B.C. it’s a whole different story. ‘To be able to call ourselves a craft distillery, all of our ingredients have to be from B.C. and we can’t produce more than 50,000 litres a year,’ explains Rebekah. ‘We also have to grow at least half of the potatoes and corn we plan to use ourselves.’ This might cause a headache for some artisan producers, but it worked perfectly for Rebekah and Rob – they set about planting six acres each of potato and corn in the field right outside the stillroom.

Roots and Wings is the definition of a craft distillery, producing a spirit that’s so small-batch and artisan it’s only available from the farm itself and a few bars and liquor stores around Langley. Rebekah is already moving into infusions, corn whiskey and gin, and has a larger still already on order from the US, but everything she produces is always going to be an expression of Langley’s agricultural landscape. For the time being at least, this is one spirit you’re only going to be able to taste in B.C.

rootsandwingsdistillery.ca

It’s a shame that Canadian wine doesn't enjoy the same global recognition as wines from, say, New Zealand or California. It probably doesn’t help that only a small percentage is exported, which means finding a bottle in the UK can be tough – but that’s just testament to how good it can be. Ice wine (a type of dessert wine produced from naturally frozen grapes) is by far the most well-known, but more and more winemakers are using berries to create a quintessentially Canadian tipple that’s earning its place on wine lists across the country.

LuLu Island Winery is one such producer. As the biggest and newest winery in Richmond (a city just twenty minutes’ drive outside Vancouver) it creates fantastic wines of all kinds, including ice wines, reds and whites. But it was the fruit wines that really caught my attention. Made with blueberries from a farm literally over the road or raspberries from nearby Abbotsford, they’re nothing like the sugary liqueurs I thought they’d be. Instead, head winemaker John Chang (who emigrated to Canada from Taiwan in 1995) combines traditional eastern winemaking techniques with cutting-edge winemaking equipment from the west to create something very special.

Being based in Richmond (which was originally known as Lulu Island, hence the name) means the winery gets plenty of visitors to its tasting room, where you can try the different varieties for yourself. While the blueberry and raspberry wines are best served chilled as an aperitif, their delicate flavour and fruity, juicy taste means they can be served with food, too. A glass of blueberry wine served alongside some rich game, or even braising chicken in a splash of raspberry wine sounds delicious, and an incredibly local way of preparing a dish.

For me, however, the main reason to visit the winery, learn about the processes and (most importantly) taste the fruit wine is because it’s the perfect example of a business taking what’s on their doorstep and creating a wonderful product. You’d be hard put to find one of LuLu Island’s wines in the UK (although they’re quite popular in Asia), but I’m sure their blueberry wine can only be truly enjoyed when you’re sipping on it surrounded by giant wooden vats of the stuff and looking out onto the blueberry fields of Richmond.

luluislandwinery.com