Excellent pils! 4/5 stars.
Steam Whistle Brewing does one beer. Well, at the time of writing they do five beers, including the two they contract brew for New Belgium, but when I visited in 2015 they only made the Pilsner. What a refreshing change from the dominant trend in craft beer where the order of the day is to have twenty taps available (a quarter of which must rotate into new styles every few weeks). Much better to do a handful of things well than a lot of things only moderately well (or poorly).
The beer was good. The brewery experience was better. I know that brewery tours have gone out of vogue, and then disappeared entirely with COVID, but for this particular brewery it was amazing. Start off with the surroundings: a defunct roundhouse for the Canadian Pacific Rail company. The city preserved much of the look and history of the roundhouse, including a rail museum! All in downtown Toronto, ON, at the base of the CN Tower. There is red brick everywhere, and I was instantly transported to an earlier time in history when steam engines were the primary locomotors. Cue fond memories of stop-motion Thomas the Tank Engine episodes.
The brewery tour itself is entertaining too. We were escorted through the viewing areas above the brewery floor and given a fairly typical explanation about how beer is made. Steam Whistle prides itself on its imported brewhouse equipment and traditional methods (decoction, lagering, no pasteurization), so all were thoroughly highlighted. It’s not riveting stuff, especially if you’ve ever made a beer before, but I enjoyed the visuals while we meandered across the balcony walkway. It was a bottling day, so it was especially fun to watch the green bottles whizzing through the filling line. The tour ended with a tasting of some fresh product (both filtered and unfiltered varieties). They served the beer slightly warm, straight out of the tanks (or so they said). Overall, the beer was good. Not world-class, but the quality of the craft came through in the end product. I’ve tasted a lot of Pilsners and pale-colored lagers. I couldn’t tell you the name of most of them. Why, then, do I remember this particular Pilsner?
This brewery makes a great case for creating memorable experiences over pushing product. How many really great beers can you easily remember? One? Two? A half-dozen? How many really great experiences can you remember? I’d bet many times more than that. Take note, current and future craft beer purveyors: people want experiences, not an overwhelming tap list! If I can remember a straight-laced lager from Canada after more than six years, what does that say about the bourbon barrel stout with figs, chillies, and 2 tons of pancakes that I forget after a month?
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