ottawa foodies

Does anybody have an opinion as to the best place in Ottawa where you can brew beer on the premises and return to bottle it once it's ready? I know there are several wine places, but I've only ever gone to the Brewing Station on Bank St for beer and they no longer offer this service.

The best place bar none is Brewers' Delight on Bently just off Merivale south of Hunt Club. To the best of my knowledge, it's the only place in town that does the all-grain mash right on site. In fact, I just got back from there after work with 3 full kegs. I can't brew at home for 3 or 4 months during the winter so I go there instead. There Cream Ale is certainly as good as my own I can tell you that!

They do the mash and if you like the boil as well, and you just come at the end of the day to pitch your yeast. Then 2 weeks later you come back to bottle (or in my case, pick up your kegs). Some people like to do the boil themselves and they let you do that too if you want. They also have a canner for an extra charge.

They also have a temperature controlled fermentation room (extremely important) as well as a separate conditioning room (even lower temperature). I don't know of any other place in town that has either of those (outside of the regular store air conditioning)

It's $110-$130 per batch. 1 batch is 58 litres - a normal sized beer store keg.

Today I bade them farewell until the late fall, since brewing season is about to begin! Just wiring up my new 85L electric kettle and will be putting it into operation next weekend! Woo-hoo!

More info on Brewers' Delight on our club website : barleyment.wort.ca/biz/?biz=80

And of course brewing in general on my website : www.bodensatz.com

I've been going to Brewer's Delight for about 4 years now, and they're fantastic. In the last year, they got a canning machine, so you can put your beer in cans if you prefer. It costs a bit more, but it gives the beer a bit longer shelf life.

www.brewersdelight.com/

One thing I'll warn you about is that the method they use for bottling leads to shorter shelf-life. Their method is known in the homebrew community as CBBF - Cheap Bastard Bottle Filler. If you can't put back the beer in 2-3 months it starts to oxydize, sometimes seriously. This is not an issue at all for me kegging, but my buddy goes there and bottles, and I really notice his beers going off if he has them around too long. I have not tried the canned beer but since it's a professional canning machine I would guess that it would not have this issue.

That's great, thanks for the info! I'll definitely be checking them out. The dark English ale sounds like it would be exactly what I'm looking for.

one further thing i forgot to mention is that their bottling method also requires a beer that is far less carbonated than your average molson or labatt. I don't have that problem in kegs since i set my own carb level

From the management at Brewers Delight:

Under new management (over 2 years now) we now make the best craft all grain beer in the city. we have upgraded our bottling system and now have well carbonated beer which can be stored as long as any commercial beer, and easily bottled.

We also offer canning as an option for bringing home your beer.

Come in and try our products and we will show you why we are Ottawa's oldest and best brewery.

Daniel, Brewmaster, Brewer's Delight.

Hey thanks for bumping the thread - I actually heard from some friends that it is under new management now, and things have been improved. It was always a good place, but did have room for improvement.

What I'd love is if the cans were the olde-style ones that you had to open with a church key. That'd be keen.

I'd make a few batches like that... no one at hunt camp would be sneaking my beers!
(most are younger and wouldn't likely know what the hell to do!)

There's a brewery in Seattle that still uses steel cans apparently. I've never seen one though. If I ever come across one it'll more than likely go up on our wall of fame here at the brewery.

MichaelGA that is a great idea. I have a used can sealer I bought off ebay a few years back for fun. You can buy cans still for it and would make great prezzies or as you say hunt camp. most of the guys i have met at hunt camp would not appreciate good home brew anyways!

I saw that a company called Churchkey was making beer in cans like this a few years ago which is what gave me the idea.

I'll second Brewer's Delight (or third? Or fourth?) My dad brews his own there and the results are really good. You can tell the quality and selection has improved since Daniel and crew took over. A++++ will drink free beer at my parents' again.