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Sea Level will be releasing it's next seasonal beer The first days of Sept.; Heather Ale!
Randy is making this for the first time with all Maritime Malts , local Nova Scotia Heather and fresh hops from his Sea Level Hop Farm.
Should be an interesting brew.

So will this be available to people in the Halifax general area?
If it is, I'll get my buddy to pick up a bottle or three and send it to me.

I thought last year or the year before they advertised this as 100% local ingredients?

This should be avalible in Halifax in bottles at Bishop's and Crystal & Lucket.
BobbyOK, your right, it was all local last year , but it's the first time with all "his" own hops, from his farm.

The Heather Ale is now on tap and hopefully be avalible in Halifax for the long weekend. Also avalible in growler here at the pub.

I might get down to the valley and try some. I'm not too keen on the supply we get in the city. The last selection of bottles from Bishop's were equivalent to Picaroon's diacetyl level...

Yeah, I got a couple I wasn't happy with, too. I'm batting... er... drinking about .500 or .650 with Sea Level. Great for baseball, but for beer, not so much.

OK... my in-laws just visited the Port Pub today, bought a bottle of Heather Ale, kept it cold in a cooler the whole way back, and hand-delivered it... still chilled. I popped it open right away. Butterbomb. Again. So disappointed.
I can report it does have some nice (albeit a bit masked) heather / honey aromas and bitterness, and if you happen to get a good bottle, it should be even more pronounced... let me know what it's like if you get one!

PEIBeerGuy wrote:Butterbomb. Again. So disappointed.

mr x wrote:The last selection of bottles from Bishop's were equivalent to Picaroon's diacetyl level...

Uh, oh. DiaSeatyl Level Brewing?

lmfao

Maybe a few of those remarks will get some focus back to the beer.

Or... maybe they'll win Brewery of the Year at the CBA's next year? (just FYI, never had a bad bottle from Picaroons)
In all seriousness, this drops my Sea Level bottling average to at least .500.

That can't be a bottling issue though in that time frame. That's a brewery issue.

True enough. Let me rephrase that to "bottled Sea Level" average.

Interesting... I tried 2 growlers of it this past weekend with my roommate and neither of us really noticed anything off. I can usually pick out diacetyl, but maybe my flavour threshold is higher?

I dunno... possible, I'm sure. It just seemed too slick to me in conjunction with the butterscotch-y flavour. It wasn't the worst / strongest I've had (I've had worse from them and Storm in Newfoundland), but it was enough to effectively ruin it and force me to not even finish it.

LD and I bought a couple of the Heather Ale, and we just cracked one now. Unless Heather smells like butter, this beer is fucked. So disappointing!

mr x wrote:That can't be a bottling issue though in that time frame. That's a brewery issue.

What if they've got something living in the bottling line? The beers on tap are great, but the bottles and growlers are less than stellar.

Got the Heather Ale a couple weeks ago and had the exact same experience. Butter city, it was pretty unpleasant. FWIW had a bitter the same night and it was the same thing, which was unusual for a normally tasty beer.

chalmers wrote:

mr x wrote:That can't be a bottling issue though in that time frame. That's a brewery issue.

What if they've got something living in the bottling line? The beers on tap are great, but the bottles and growlers are less than stellar.

I was just referring to the one growler that went to PEI. I don't think it's possible to get that much infection in a cold beer in that timeframe just from the bottle. But overall, issues could be anywhere, bottling, fermentation, etc...

I was there Saturday night to pick up a few growlers and there were 0 left of everything. I'm wondering if the problem isn't the bottling line and Randy shut it down to fix the problem..? Although I think they use two different setups. A larger filler for the capped bottles and a Melvico for the growlers. Did you guys have this experience with just growlers or bottles too?

I've had bad bottles from Bishop's. Don't have the courage to drop the $$$ on a growler yet.

The Melvico is the only bottling device that he uses. I don't know for sure, but I suspect that the butter bombs are a product of Randy's success this year. He is working his way through his most successful year, and will be in the midst of an expansion shortly. I don't think he is used to this level of production and is pushing his yeast as hard as he pushes himself. When I was there we couldn't keep up with demand, and that was 1.5 years ago. Things have gotten busier since then.

Most successful breweries in the region have gone through the exact same thing - Garrison, Picaroons, Granite, Gahan. I think that when the micros start to ramp it up, QC is the first thing to suffer.

I'll try to get these comments to him, from a distance ( ) to help him improve his system.

wortly wrote:The Melvico is the only bottling device that he uses.

There is a second bottling 'device' that I cannot name by looking at it, but it's got multiple outputs and looks like it would be at least semi automated. My roommate has been there and saw it being used. He asked about the Melvico as we have one that has yet been put to use (no instructions with it) and whoever was working said they only use it for filling growlers. Maybe that's been added since you worked there?

I suspect your suspicion of pushing the yeast too hard is the most likely answer though.

It is a Seitz filler. I hope that it is being used, but you're right, we weren't using it when I was there.

Sea Level-Propeler collabertive beer, Alpha Dog is on tap now here at the pub and is avalible in bottles here and at Propeller, as well bishops too.