Home of the BrewNosers

For anybody that has been looking for Citra hops, I found a place in the States that delivers to Canada. The only have them in whole leaf, but with the difficulty that I have had finding Citras at all, I can't complain too much. I ordered 10 lbs of them. and at 22.95/lb it wasn't cheap. That said, it has set me up for a few batches of American Pale and Wheat beer for the summer. They also have Amarillo in pellets if anybody is interested:

http://stores.mdhb.com/StoreFront.bok" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

- Ian Competent

Man that's dear pricing.

I found a bag of Citra at Noble Grape in Clayton Park the other day. Snapped that up. Other stores may have some as well.

I was at the Burnside NG earlier this month and they had lots of Citra leaf hops.

I'll just note that they have Citra (pellets) at Brewer's Pantry http://brewerspantry.com/index.php?rout ... uct_id=198, which might have more reasonable shipping rates than the US place. That really sounds like an ad... not intended to be so! I just thought it might save you some $.

I've also seen Citra (leaf) at the Burnside NG.

The big questions are what year is it and how has it been stored? If the stuff is last year's crop that has been stored in a fridge (as opposed to a freezer) for 12 months...

I've ordered citra from Nikobrew.com before and I like dealing with him. They weren't super cheap, but there are some decent deals. Plus, they were pellets so a bit better for storage.

I went in to the new Noble Grape in Sackville looking for citra, or even amarillo. The guy working there thought they were wine kits. I looked around and didn't see anything beer related other than festabrews and gear. I liked the old place a lot better.

KMcK wrote:I went in to the new Noble Grape in Sackville looking for citra, or even amarillo. The guy working there thought they were wine kits. I looked around and didn't see anything beer related other than festabrews and gear. I liked the old place a lot better.

KMcK wrote:I went in to the new Noble Grape in Sackville looking for citra, or even amarillo. The guy working there thought they were wine kits. I looked around and didn't see anything beer related other than festabrews and gear. I liked the old place a lot better.

The Sackville store is brutal. The guys that work there are pretty decent, but I was shocked to stop in there a few weeks ago and discovered that they didn't sell any bulk secondary malts at all. I'm not really sure how a "homebrewing supply store" could not have any Crystal malt in stock, but they told me that they weren't carrying any bulk malts any more. And they wonder why we've turned to outside shipments for our supplies...

The old Sackville store was awesome. The people there were knowledgeable, the place was bigger, and it had plenty of partial mash and all grain supplies. The new one is just a wine making shop. What's the point?

KMcK wrote:The old Sackville store was awesome. The people there were knowledgeable, the place was bigger, and it had plenty of partial mash and all grain supplies. The new one is just a wine making shop. What's the point?

Winemaking, I expect. Lots of people like that

I'd say about 80% of their business is wine. I honestly never saw the point in maintaining that many stores with beer stuff. The cost just gets passed on to the customer.

mr x wrote:I'd say about 80% of their business is wine.

I'd think so - I think wine-making is actually a better fit for most such stores. Most people taste some of their friend's kit wines and say "that's good enough for me". If they taste their friend's beers, they say "I'd rather drink Coors Light". Sad, but I'm sure it's true.

My question was rhetorical but I guess it needs to be said that N.G.'s focus is wine. As for only having beer stuff in some stores and not others, that undermines the brand if customers can't expect to get the same stuff in all stores, but it's clear that the brand is wine, not beer.

mr x wrote:I'd say about 80% of their business is wine. I honestly never saw the point in maintaining that many stores with beer stuff. The cost just gets passed on to the customer.

By your reasoning 80% of those costs are getting passed on to wine customers; the rest to us. I'm okay with that.

Part of my gripe is that's now the only brewing store, that I know of, serving an area of 70 000 - 100 000 people and it has no proper beer ingredients. That's a serious detriment to growing our hobby. How many stores in the Dartmouth area carry beer ingredients?

Burnside NG has had everything we've needed for our first several all-grain batches. They have a couple of really knowledgeable guys... and some less so.

It's just a matter of farming out what is needed from a central location. The satellite stores get what you order within 3 days.

mr x wrote:It's just a matter of farming out what is needed from a central location. The satellite stores get what you order within 3 days.

Yeah, that's what the guy tried to do for me once he understood I was looking for brewing supplies but I had no intention of being back to that store any time soon. The problem with that model is the sales guy doesn't deal in beer stuff so he's completely clueless. You need to tell him exactly what you want. If you have any questions you're SoL. Newbies won't get anywhere learning the hobby if they depend on that store (and I seriously doubt he would know to direct them to us).