This article is part of a guide to Vancouver from FT Globetrotter. Follow along as we publish a new article every day this week.
As a Canadian living abroad, when most people ask me about Canadian beer, the same joke usually follows: “Molson, eh?” Molson, one of the world’s largest beer producers, spent the greater part of a decade marketing its signature lager, Canadian, with an ad campaign aimed at stamping out stereotypes about Canada and firing up the home team with some light nationalism. Initially released in the mid 1990s, “I Am Canadian” was probably one of the first adverts to go viral online, and was so successful it was mimicked and parodied around the world. Throw in the conglomerate’s sponsorship of nearly every professional sports league in North America since forever, and thus, beer in Canada has long been associated with Molson Canadian beer.
This is a near-criminal misconception, however, especially in British Columbia, home of Canada’s microbrewing revolution and where the past decade has seen about 250 craft breweries open. East Vancouver, in particular, boasts so many artisanal hophouses that it has been nicknamed “Yeast Van”, while locals speak passionately about craft beer the same way that the French and Italians do about wine. Craft beer is now so ingrained in the local culture that British Columbia’s government declared the month of October to be BC Craft Beer Month, and over the year it’s nearly impossible to find a week without a beer-related event on the calendar.
“I’ve been saying the same thing for years now, but this mantra remains true,” writes Joe Wiebe, author of Craft Beer Revolution: The Insider’s Guide to BC Breweries. “There has never been a better time to drink beer in British Columbia.”
While what’s regularly referred to as the “beer renaissance” is more recent history, Vancouver, out in Canada’s wild west, has always had an independent streak, so it’s no surprise that the dawn of craft brewing in the country happened here — the handiwork of an entrepreneurial Brit.
In the years following the first world war and repeal of prohibition, the majority of Canada’s breweries were consolidated under three major producers, Molson, Labatt and Carling O’Keefe, whose beers were largely the same in style: mass-produced lager lacking in flavour. Consumers weren’t especially well served, and in the late 1970s a series of long labour strikes among brewery workers meant that they regularly weren’t served at all.
But leave it to a Briton to solve a booze problem. John Mitchell, a British expat and publican in West Vancouver, frustrated with the shortages, contacted a writer called Frank Appleton, who had penned a revelatory article about home-brewing. With the blessing of local authorities, who had also become exasperated by Big Beer, the pair opened Canada’s first microbrewery in 1982.
Brewer Ben Owens of Superflux, one of the 100+ craft breweries in Vancouver © Jennilee Marigomen
Just some of the beers made by Vancouver’s 33 Acres Brewing Company © Jennilee Marigomen
In the decades that followed, microbrewing grew in popularity across the province, particularly in Vancouver, coinciding with a boom in tap houses and private beer-and-wine stores that sought beer from independent producers who championed quality ingredients, craftsmanship and nuanced flavour profiles. (The majority of alcohol in British Columbia is still sold at government-run liquor stores.) “The arrival of American craft beer from places like Seattle, Portland and California, as well as unique beers from Belgium and Germany, also inspired BC brewers to up their game,” writes Wiebe.
But it was not until 2013 that the provincial government announced a change in licensing laws that would allow craft breweries to operate their own tasting rooms. “For a brewery to sustain itself just on wholesale and packaging, you need to be massive,” says Mauricio Lozano, co-founder of Faculty Brewing, which opened in 2016. “But a small brewery that can have a bar attached to it is a viable business.”
Since then, craft brewing has exploded around British Columbia, a province that yields a bounty of produce that can be used for beer, from hops and honey to seasonal berries and stone fruit. Vancouver itself is now home to more than 100 craft breweries, the majority of which are clustered in the city’s east. While it could take a lifetime to try them all, the following are good places to start.
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33 Acres Brewing Company
15 West eighth Avenue, Vancouver, BC V5Y 1M8
Good for: The best of both worlds, offering classic styles and progressive takes in two distinct but harmonious operations
Not so good for: Anything too wild
FYI: Go on Thursdays, when the place fills up with revellers for a menu of tacos, nachos and ceviches, accompanied by a father-and-son mariachi band (who have been playing at 33 Acre’s taco night since it started 10 years ago)
Opening times: Monday–Friday, 4pm–11pm; Saturday, 2pm–11pm; Sunday, noon–9pm
Website; Directions
The bar room at 33 Acres Brewing Company
You might think you’ve arrived at a wellness retreat when opening the doors to 33 Acres — clean and modern with white walls, polished concrete and monochrome branding — if it weren’t for all the alcohol. Its founders, Josh and Kleah Michnik, come from creative backgrounds (Josh in graphic design and photography, and Kleah in fashion — she runs the popular Vancouver womenswear boutique Charlie & Lee) and at 33 Acres, they sought to combine their professional experience and love of craft beer into a new project that they opened in 2013. The result is a neighbourhood space that offers everything from artisanal coffee to tacos and ceviches, great beer and a vibrant weekend brunch — and in the heart of Mount Pleasant, an area that in the past decade has become a hub for tech and film companies and other young professionals, they have a very receptive audience indeed.
33 Acres Brewing Company president Kyle Munroe: ‘A lot of [breweries] were going a bit crazy and progressive on their styles, and we decided to be quite modest’ As well as brewing classic styles, 33 Acres has a lab that creates a small number of more experimental beers
“At the beginning [of the craft-beer renaissance], everyone was trying to find their place,” says Kyle Munroe, company president. “And a lot of [breweries] were going a bit crazy and progressive on their styles, and we decided to be quite modest”, instead opting for more tried-and-tested classic styles, including a California common (33 Acres of Life, a medium- to full-bodied ale with a crisp finish), a Schwarzbier (33 Acres of Darkness, a German-style black lager) and, at 9.2%, a punchy Belgian tripel called 33 Acres of Euphoria that has twice won awards at the World Beer Cup. Its bestselling beer since it opened, however, is 33 Acres of Sunshine, a silky, smooth and sessionable French blanche spiced with orange peel, coriander and aniseed.
That’s not to say 33 Acres doesn’t try anything new. In 2018, it acquired the space next door, and rather than expand its already popular operation, opened 33 Acres Brewing Experiment, which does exactly what it says on the tin. “Experiment is kind of on the other side where we have a small number of core beers — just two, which are the Fluffy Cloud hazy IPA and our Mezcal Gose,” says Munroe. “But we also have new beers coming out every month that are more on the experimental or progressive side of brewing, and that’s really fun and keeps our creative juices flowing.”
Faculty Brewing Co
1830 Ontario Street, Vancouver, BC V5T 2W6
Good for: An education in craft beer, for all taste and experience levels
Not so good for: Big groups. The space is rather small
FYI: Faculty takes an open source approach to beer and encourages people to try making them at home
Opening times: Monday–Thursday, 2pm–11pm; Friday–Saturday, noon–11pm; Sunday, 1pm–8pm
Website; Directions
‘An education in craft beer’: Faculty Brewing Co
It’s one thing to take a scientific approach to one’s craft, it’s another to be an actual scientist — and therein lies the story of Faculty Brewing, a small brewery in the Mount Pleasant neighbourhood that was co-founded by Mauricio Lozano, a food-science graduate and an instructor at the British Columbia Institute of Technology.
In the Noughties, Lozano, as a home-brewer, realised that among his friends…
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