CHEERS TO BEERTOWN
The Charcoal Group has four Beertown locations in southwestern Ontario and all of them show a frothy commitment to local brews and food made in-house.
It was crowded when we got to the Burlington Beertown that opened last fall on Appleby Line, a few blocks north of Upper Middle, but we found a standalone table behind the bar and started the process of ordering suds.
And what a process. With so many selections (the alcohol menu is nine pages), we felt compelled to tackle a flight of four beers. Their pre-selected flights, called “paddles,” have themed names like “local crafts,” “sweet and wheat,” and “big and bold.” This highlighted, in a nutshell, what is delightful about Beertown: the diversity of interesting beers available.
After we settled on our choices, I took some time to look around. The room is large yet inviting with swanky copper ceilings in the dining room and over the bar. The more casual bar tables are lit by ceiling fixtures made from hollowed out kegs. The bar TVs were tuned to the Olympics; the beer taps, lit from above, resembled shiny beacons of liquid gold. Underneath, stacks of coasters, one for each type of beer.
Another big design feature: a very tall wall embedded with enticingly stocked display fridges. The other locations are in Cambridge, London and Waterloo, and avid beer drinkers can visit beertown.ca to see what’s pouring at each one.
Our flights came out on wooden paddles, a coaster identifying each beer set behind each glass. For me, a gose from Burlingtonbased Nickel Brook to start: puckery sour, like a margarita without the tequila, tinted with cucumber. Contrasting that, three darker beers: Young’s Double Chocolate Stout from the U.K., Eephus Oatmeal Brown Ale from Left Field in Toronto, and County Durham’s Blak Katt stout. The chocolate stout had a milkshake feel, with a round caramel flavour tailing into bitterness. The Blak Katt was dark and round; the Eephus smooth and light.
The winner was on my companion’s plank: Cloud Piercer, an American style pale ale from High Road in Niagara-on-theLake. Fresh, with a hint of pine — delicious.
The menu is fairly wide ranging and includes everything from snacky shareables like poutine, flatbread, nachos and wings to soups, salads, burgers and sandwiches served with fresh cut fries. As we sipped, a team of servers laid out our food — all of it at once. I would have preferred to have appetizers split from entrées, especially since most of them were hot items but we managed to squeeze all of the plates onto the table.
As a starter, I tried the sea salt and pepper calamari. Coated in light batter, almost a crunchy tempura, served with chipotle aioli, a slice of lemon and a side of thick sliced fried pickles, these were nicely-balanced bites.
Three crunchy tuna tacos emerged from the kitchen on another plank, accompanied by pungent gochujang sauce (a sweet condiment made from red chile paste) for an Asian touch. Another well-executed bit of fusion I thoroughly enjoyed: the
friendly but we had to flag down a server at one point to move past the entrées.
Our dessert flight also arrived on, you guessed it, a plank. The brownie was OK but unexceptional. Lacking in depth, it was easily outshone by the white chocolate cheesecake slice: soft and creamy, covered in tangy raspberry coulis.
We tried twice to get the Nickel Brook root beer float but after first receiving plain root beer, and then getting a different drink altogether, we gave up. However, when a hint of misgiving flared up, I simply doused it with the remains of those interesting and delicious beers.