Oak-aged Vidal pale ale “Iron Shirt” released for third week of feBREWary

Beau’s Brewing Co.’s month-long winter beer celebration feBREWary is now onto its third week with the Thursday, Feb. 16 release of Iron Shirt, a unique oak-aged Vidal pale ale brewed in collaboration with Montréal’s Brasserie et Distillerie Oshlag.

In creating this interesting take on the pale ale style, the brewers from Beau’s and Oshlag fermented the beer using 300 kilograms of hand-picked Ontario-grown organic Vidal ice wine grapes that were soaked for two weeks in Oshlag’s hopped vodka. The resulting beer is unlike anything Beau’s has done before.

“Our goal at Brasserie Oshlag is to do research and development, and running experiments,” says Gabriel Charbonneau, head brewer at Oshlag. “For the collaboration, we tried to mix Beau’s expertise with ours.”

Iron Shirt is hazy yellow in colour with fruity, citrus and grape notes on the nose. Its flavour balances bitterness with clean malt notes. This 6.8% alc/vol pale ale finishes dry with mild grain alcohol warmth. Iron Shirt will be released at more than 250 restaurants and pubs in Ontario and Québec as part of the 6th annual feBREWary series, in which Beau’s releases one new beer every week in the winter month. It will also be available on tap and in bottles at the Vankleek Hill, Ont.-based brewery’s tasting room, and by the bottle at approximately 75 Québec retailers.

Based in the Hochelaga-Maisonneuve district of Montréal, Brasserie et Distillerie Oshlag brews beer and distills spirits under one roof. Oshlag’s primary spirit is its hopped vodka, which lends its flavour to Iron Shirt. Aside from being the third release for the feBREWary 2017 series, this collaboration also marks Beau’s second release for Ottawa 2017, the nation’s capital’s official celebration of Canada’s 150th. A portion of the sales from each beer in the Ottawa 2017 series goes to charity, in this case the Montréal community organization Je Passe Partout will benefit. Je Passe Partout works with schools in the Hochelaga-Maisonneuve area, helping children through academic and family support programs. jepassepartout.org.

FeBREWary will continue next week with Beau’s fourth installment in the series, the cacao + blood orange witbier Blood Simple, a chocolate-orange riff on the citrus-and-spice character of the Belgian-style wheat beer. To learn more about feBREWary, including a full list of participants, visit beaus.ca/febrewary.