The Roundhouse Craft Beer Festival

Since arriving in Toronto, I have been trying to find my favourite Canadian beer. My go-to order for a pint...but have struggled because of the large spectrum, and the never-ending variety stocked by different bars. Instead, my tactic is to ask about the most local beer, and try that. The longer I am here, the more craft breweries I am aware of!

The Roundhouse Craft Beer Festival was perfect to try beers made here in Ontario, and the set up of this first time festival made access to each one all too easy.

The festival was set up at Roundhouse Park, alongside the Steamwhistle Brewrey, and across the road from the Rogers Centre and just under the CN Tower. Both iconic Toronto views!

Gina and I picked up our special Fest glasses and beer tokens, and entered the space in the park - here each brewery had a tent set up, there was a free water tent (very responsible, and a great idea!), a band playing, and then a couple of food trucks adding to the atmosphere.

One beer token, which was $1, gave you a half fill of the glass, which made the only tough decisions of the afternoon being which tent to target first, and then which of the two, sometimes four, beers to try first.

The Flying Monkeys impressed with the Stereovision brew. Loved the boots atop of the taps at the Wellington Brewery tent, and I loved the in depth discussions at each tent to help with our selections.

We tried Nickel Brook Green Apple Pilsner on a recommendation from Kieran, mainly due to our ongoing quest to find a good cider here in Canada. At the Great Lakes I chose the Green Tea Ale, cos it sounded so different I had to try it, but taking a sip of Gina's Crazy Canuck Pale Ale I had clearly made a silly choice! Green Tea beer is a little weird, but the Canuck was great!

The menu envy was reversed when we had our much needed linner (lunch and dinner combined) from the food trucks. Gina's lobster roll from Tide & Vine was disappointingly tiny, for the price. Whereas my Lumberjack toastie from Gorilla Cheese - the Canadians do like to add slices of fruit to the most unexpected dish, with delicious results!

For a first time festival, it was small and easy to access. The crowd filled up after the end of the baseball across the street, which validated the awesome location. I can see this gathering of brews from the province getting bigger with word of mouth and some more promotion for next Summer.

I was a guest of the Craft Beer Festival, but thoughts and opinions in this post are entirely my own.