National Beer Day goes international

By Danielle Gagnier

Owners of a local brewery are celebrating American National Beer Day.

Walkerville Brewery invited Windsorites to the brewery for the release of their Easy Stout 365 beer that was available on tap only on April 7. They were also selling the aged beer in 500 millilitre bottles and one litre bottles.

National Beer Day is celebrated annually in the United States. It marks the day, in 1933, people could legally buy, sell, and drink beer after the prohibition. #NationalBeerDay was trending on Twitter.

Although Canadian Beer Day is actually celebrated Nov. 28, this didn’t stop the Walkerville Brewery from enjoying the American holiday. According to Troy Drayton, tour guide at the Walkerville Brewery, they are doing their best to expose craft beers to Windsorites which is why they chose to showcase their bourbon barrel-aged stout on National Beer Day.

“You can barrel age your beers in a number of different types of barrels, whether it’s wine or vodka, but we’re doing it with bourbon,” said Drayton. “We’ve been doing a lot of different barrel-aged series in the past. This beer has been sitting in a bourbon barrel for about a year so that’s where the Easy Stout 365 name comes from.”

Blayne Caron, one of the brewers at the Walkerville Brewery, said what makes this barrel-aged bourbon special is its unique taste.

“Our Easy Stout, regularly, is very sweet and rounded on the palate,” said Caron, one of the brewers. “After aging in the barrels, a lot of the time the bourbon can overpower a lot of beers, but the bourbon compliments with the sweetness really well.”

During prohibition, Windsor was a major site for alcohol smuggling and gang activity. Being just across the border easily allowed the illegal transportation of alcohol from Windsor to the United States. Drayton said many of the tours they host at the brewery outline Windsor’s contribution during prohibition.

“We want to do our best through the branding of our beers, the names of our beers, through our logos, all that type of stuff, to really kind of enhance people’s knowledge about the impact that this area had,” said Drayton.  

The Walkerville Brewery arranged free tours for those involved in the Canadian Adult Recreational Hockey Association tournament on April 9 to further promote their craft beers.