Brasserie Gainsbourg hails from Gatineau, Quebec just on the border of Ontario and Quebec across from Ottawa. It started out in March of 2013 as a bistro and began it’s adventures into brewing a little under a year later in January of 2014. A fairly young bistro brasserie, but I am very excited to be exploring their beers as they hit the shelves of Montreal. Thus far I have only consumed three of their contraptions but I look forward to the consumption of other offerings they may produce in the future. They have made a great name for themselves within the Quebec craft beer community and their beers are buzzing all over town. Most certainly gained my interest and their beers are very enjoyable and superbly well crafted. Can’t wait to see more from these guys!

Orange Tie Wrap Saison IPA
Saison / IPA || ABV: 7.5% || IBU: 25

This IPA is one of the first monsters I’ve seen attempt to smash an IPA with a saison in Quebec. In general I have not heard of many apart from this and Dogfish head’s Ardent. I’m sure there are some others in the market if one were to seek them out. This beer is executed with some great perfection. You can really feel the sense of the IPA with the nice hop notes, minor bitterness followed by a very wonderful saison feel with tropical fruit aromas. Very similar to the Beyond the Pale Saison Tropicale. However it falls a bit short in comparison in terms of hop tropical intensity, it has a little bit more bitterness but the perfect amount of lemon and orange zest that makes this a beer to stand the test of time! I truly enjoyed drinking this one and will snag many off the shelf as they come to Montreal. It isn’t considered a standard shelf beer in Montreal, but it does come around very often, and stays around for sometime so don’t worry these beers don’t run off the shelf like Auval, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t world class! Next time you come across this beer I would highly suggest picking it up, but make sure you snag it fresh!

4/5

Road Trip Cote Ouest IPA
IPA || ABV: 7% || IBU: 45

Inspired by the West Coast styling of an IPA, this IPA contains an insane amount of Simcoe hops during its boil and then it’s dry hopped several times with Citra, Centennial and Amarillo hops.

It has amazing tropical aromatics and the flavour really takes the torch. Not a tropical hop explosion but starts with very nice serene hop notes. This IPA creates a great balanced dynamic whilst maintaining its flavour and is very light and smooth. The balance between the hops and bitterness has been attacked very perfectly. One of the better IPAs out of Quebec. It’s so smooth you don’t realize how fast it goes down even though it sits at 7% abv.

4/5

Wee Heavy Scotch Ale
Scotch Ale || ABV: 7% || IBU: 25

Aroma is really quiet nice with some roasted malts and raisin notes. The taste starts off really well, but kind of dies really fast and gets a bit strange as time wears on. And then starts to burn as it goes down with a bit of a strong flavour. The after taste is surprisingly pleasing however. It is definitely nicer than some of the other scotch ales I’ve had, but doesn’t really float my boat too much.

3.75/5

This is a brewery I am going to be looking at very closely and hopefully in the near future a visit to the brewery.

An Article by Hopcitizen. Photography by Hopcitizen.