**Waterloo Brewing Co.** served up the best pilsner at *Toronto’s Festival of Beer*, but the competition was strong.
TFB Waterloo tent
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- The Moosehead tent. One of the first tents we walked past, but, according to my notes, I totally forgot to sample a Moosehead beer.
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- Molson had a new wheat beer that was pretty good.
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- The rain kept the revelers running back under the tent, which really wasn’t a problem, since we all wanted to be under there anyway.
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- We got twenty tokens for $20 Canadian, which gave us twenty 4oz. samples. Mrs. Ferment tried three ciders, leaving me with 17 tokens.
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- I’m enjoying the Molson Canadian Wheat beer in the special glass mug that all attendees receive at Toronto’s Festival of Beer.
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- I have to drink how many more of these? Life can be hard for poor Fervere.
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- I got to try the River Walker Summer Ale by Lake of Bays Brewing Company, my first local Canadian beer at the Festival of Beer.
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- I love Samuel Adams, and was happy to see them at the Festival of Beers, but they were pouring Boston Lager, Summer Ale, and Latitude 48 IPA, all of which I’ve had, so with a tiny bit of regret, I didn’t purchase any samples.
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- Krombacher had less of a tent than a food truck. Accidentally, I ordered a “large” which meant two tokens. Luckily, the Krombacher Dark was worth it, nutty and rich.
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- On the Krombacher menu: Pils, Weizen, and Dark. Krombacher was the first European beer I came across at the festival.
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- A couple of sips into my Krombacher Dark in my nice glass mug. There was so much, I sat down to savor it.
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- My absolute favorite company name at the Festival, Fidel Gastro. I didn’t eat during the event, because who wants to fill up on food?
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- Local boys! (Local to me, that is.) But I’ve had those beers before, so I passed up Brooklyn Brewery at this event.
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- Operating out of Niagara, Silversmith offered a great craft black lager. If it can break through to the New York side, I’ll be buying its beers.
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- Snowman Brewing Co. offered a gluten-free beer, Pail Ale. It was one of the more unusual beers I tasted that day. “Fresh forest” was indeed one way to describe it.
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- Mill St. Brewery is popular in Toronto from what I understand. Although, I am not sure how the mermaid ties into any of this.
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- This cheeky gentleman from Beau’s All Natural Brewing Co. poured me the uniquely named Rudolphus VI, a Belgian ale—yet another beer that I hope crosses the border.
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- I would not try a beer from this brewery, because I’m extremely against using the typeface, Chicago, for anything but menus on an old Macintosh computer. My type-geek is stronger than my beer-geek.
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- Old Credit Brewing Co.’s booth was unusual in that it offered corn chips for palate-cleansing and was entirely staffed by women. This is clearly a company that knows how to move beer.
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- Creemore Springs was the first local Canadian beer I tried on my visit to Ontario a couple years back. I got to taste a couple more of its styles at the Festival, including my first zwickelbier.
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- I couldn’t resist the blue Día de Muertos skull at the Hop City booth. Turns out it poured a nicely rounded black lager called 8th Sin.
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- Maybe this image is blurry, but I didn’t notice as I took my last beer at the King Brewery booth. They had a nice malty Vienna lager that was a great way to end my sampling at Toronto’s Festival of Beers.
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- Slightly soaked and slightly sloshed, I supported my home town brews by sporting a Greenport Harbor Brewing t-shirt. Thank you, Toronto, for showing me a thoroughly enjoyable time at Toronto’s Festival of Beer 2013.