Flavours in beer: Malt

Style Snapshot: A guide to the roasty, robust Porter

The Growler 2.0

  Howdy! Two years ago this week, unapologetic beer nerd Stephen Smysnuik birthed The Growler column, which he soon raised into a quarterly magazine that’s now BC’s most trusted craft-beer guide. Like any parent, he should be proud of what […]

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Old people like craft beer too, y'know

The craft beer revolution is in full force across this great province. Clearly, Big Beer companies consider it a battleground by now, as numbers show a steady decline in sales of their products and an increase in sales of the craft beer industry as a […]

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10 Best Breweries in BC, Ranked

The Growler turns two this coming Monday, birthed the day I published my first weekly column for Westender. A lot has changed in the beer world since then. The local industry has grown rapidly. The quality has improved drastically. The […]

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The Oktoberfest Survival Guide

I’ve been writing about beer for almost two years now, in an effort to grasp and define what makes BC beer culture so special. What I’ve learned boils down to this: People in this province love a good piss-up. And in […]

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Breaking the seal is a myth

“Don’t break the seal!” someone shouts. By now, we’re all familiar with the concept: urine begets more urine, and once you’ve unleashed the fury, you’ll be returning to the bathroom every 10 minutes. The theories as to why it happens are endless – your […]

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Why is beer so male and white?

The men at Vancouver Craft Beer Week have a word for Leah Heneghan, the festival’s co-founder and events director. “The guys I work with, they call me boss,” she said. Beyond growing a festival that sold just 100 tickets for a single afternoon event […]

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