Niagara College wins silver for Bock beer
Pandemic allowed brew to age longer, enabling win of national award
Niagara College’s teaching brewery has whipped up another winner.
The brewery’s Beer 101 series won silver at the 18th annual Canadian Brewing Awards, in the bock traditional German style category.
The Beer 101 Bock was brewed by students at the college's teaching brewery, and was designed by college brewmaster Jon Downing.
This is the first time one of its bocks has won at the awards, considered to be one of the most prestigious brewing competitions in the country.
Downing describes the bock beer itself as a lager brewed in the traditional German style, but with a Canadian twist.
“Our version is based on a traditional Bavarian bock style. It's actually a dark bock. We do use German hops in it and Bavarian malts, and Canadian malts.
“Ours has the toasted, maltyrich flavour from the German malts used in it. It has fairly good body because it is stronger, but it has a light crispness that a lager would have as well.”
The beer itself was actually brewed before the pandemic hit and the college was forced to close for the semester. Downing said the timing might have contributed to the beer’s success.
“It was actually brewed right at the start of March, so literally the week before everything shut down,” he said.
“So we basically left it in the fermenter, and bock beers normally would actually be brewed and aged or stored for several months, so because of COVID we actually got to do that.
“Normally we would do around eight weeks, but we actually did about 12 or 14 weeks of aging on this beer which obviously helped because it allowed it to win.”
This isn’t the first time Niagara College’s brewery program has experienced success at the Canadian Brewing Awards.
In 2019, the college's Beer 101 Bitter and Beer 101 Strong both won bronze in their categories, while in 2018 Beer 101 Strong won silver.
Outside of its Beer 101 series, in 2013 the college’s Butler’s Bitter took home gold.
All the beers in the brewery’s Beer 101 series are brewed by students in the brewmaster and brewery operations management program at the college’s teaching brewery in Niagaraon-the-Lake.
Downing said students have been back in the brewery this fall developing new flavours he hopes will be on shelves in the coming months.
“Obviously we had a little bit of a break there, but right now they are back at it, and coming up in a month or two we will have dozens more varieties of beer available for sale that the students have actually designed and made.”
The Beer 101 Bock, along with other blends in the Beer 101 series, can be purchased online at the wine visitor education centre website.
Bryan Levesque is a Local Journalism Initiative reporter for Niagara This Week covering municipal affairs. A Niagara native and a graduate of Brock University he reports on issues in West Niagara. His reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative.
ACROSS
1 Tranquilize
5 Req. for some IKEA purchases
9 Icy coating 13 Convenience 14 Construction __ 15 Planning to, informally
16 “Is there a problem here?”
18 Peyton Manning's alma mater, for short 19 Outerwear in the bush 21 Tiffs
24 Feminist author Wolf 25 Rhyming hair-loss metaphor
28 __ vu
32 Metal in Montana's motto
33 What snobs put on 34 Descartes et al. 35 Film critic Kael 37 Brother of Ophelia 39 City on the Ruhr 40 Draws a bead on, with “at”
41 “We ___ the World” 42 Grasps
43 Large urban areas just outside of a central business district 46 Goggle 48 Decorates superficially 49 Reply to a salesperson ... or a hint to the start of 19-, 25- and 43-Across 54 Top dog
55 At risk of running aground, perhaps 59 Get fuzzy 60 Glamour rival 61 Breakfast-in-bed aid 62 Cut with a tool 63 Place to see runners 64 Kind of terrier
DOWN
1 Morning coat? 2 “Yay, team!”
3 G7 member
4 Bugs
5 “In your dreams!” 6 The Destroyer, in Hinduism
7 Cans under dishes 8 Emphatic confirmation 9 Drink on a chilly fall day 10 Fun run dist. 11 Elizabeth I's mother
12 Sound off 15 Island east of Manila 17 Utility pipe
20 Java
21 Checks (out)
22 Part of a sentence 23 Stimulate 26 Article in Der Spiegel 27 Dr. with Grammys 29 Involve by necessity 30 Rode from the stands 31 Take stock of 34 Formally steps down 36 <
37 Fish story
38 “Mad Men” network 40 Look 35 at 45, say 43 Keen perception 44 Unmanned fliers 45 Common circus wear 47 Skier's aid 49 Setups for knockout punches
50 Uma's role in “The Producers” 51 Gush forth 52 Pitcher's goal 53 Teed off
56 TV planet
57 Bit of hope 58 Watch