L'AMERE À BOIRE - MICROBREWERY

L'AMERE A BOIRE - 

LOTS OF GREAT MICROBREWED BEER

...PLUS RABBIT BURGER!

Their website (in French only): 
http://www.amereaboire.com/index.php?page=home&hl=fr_FR
2049 St Denis St, Montreal, H2X 3K8  Telephone:(514) 282-7448  
Price Range:  ~$15-$30 per person including one drink, meal, tax, and tip 

*This restaurant is a Mouthwatering Favorite!


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Let me tell you about my first experience with drinking beer. So, as a child, I was endlessly curious. I used to drive my father crazy with questions. To his credit, he did his damndest to answer all my questions, no matter how inane or crazy they may have been. My father is also a bonafide, diehard, hardcore manly MAN. So, when the time came for me to ask about beer - specifically, the one he was having over supper, y'know what my father did? 

He let me have some.

Oof. Me, age seven - first sip of beer. Lemme tell ya, that was my LAST sip of beer for well over TEN YEARS. My child's tongue didn't know what precisely to think about beer, except that it was profoundly AWFUL. 

That was probably the smartest bit of parenting my father ever did - in my adolescence, while all the rest of my contemporaries were getting powerfully drunk in isolated parks or while their parents were away, I abstained. The memory of my first sip of beer was just. That. Visceral.

Well, those days have long since passed. And now, I do enjoy a pint with friends every week. Which brings us to my currently-favorite pub in Montreal:  L'Amère à Boire. This is evident from the fact that L'Amère à Boire is the first pub listed on my favorites list of pubs (http://mouthwateringmontreal.blogspot.ca/2013/08/favorites-pubs-and-bars-part-1-update.html). This is a microbrewery on St-Denis, and it makes TONS of awesome beers. There's only one beer here that I find truly disappointing - everything else, I keep on comin' back for. So, let's begin, shall we? To properly describe their beers to all of y'all, I went and got me sample glasses of ALL of their beers:

Even at small sizes, this is enough beer to pack a wallop!

One of the great things about L'Amère à Boire is the variety of serving sizes. You can get pitchers, pints, glasses, and sample glasses. They are all good deals:

And the sample glasses cost... er, about $2.50? $2.75? In that neck of the woods. With that, away we go:


Cerna:

Faaaaaavorite beer here. Try it! Try it! Try it!

A blonde beer, and my absolute favorite beer at this pub. It's a light, refreshing beer. According to the description, it has hints of caramel - I dunno, to me to tastes more like a hint of citrus. It doesn't matter; this beer is ALWAYS on my drink list whenever I visit.


Elephant 10:

The only disappointing beer here. Oh well, no place is perfect...

So, some time ago, when they said they were introducing a new beer, I was excited. Then, I tried it. And it just doesn't stack up. It tastes like an inferior version of Cerna - basically, a knockoff of it. On its own, it's mildly bitter and has a heavy aftertaste. I only got this beer to describe it to you guys - be grateful, damn it!



Hefe Weizen:

Can't pronounce this name, ever.

Nice and refreshing, it's mildly bitter and has almost no aftertaste. A very solid bet!


Amber ale:

English style! ... I have no idea what that means, to be honest.

 This is a subtle-tasting beer - slightly sweet, slightly bitter, almost no aftertaste.

 
Vollbier:

The description says "Gout suave" - never thought to describe anything that way. EVER.

 An overall mild-tasting beer. Nice and light!


Fin de Siecle:

I'm still not sure how they came up with the name. Of course, I'm not so sure I care too much since I do like this beer quite some bit...

Slightly fruity, very nice!


Odense porter:

Mmm...tasty!

I typically have a greater love of dark beers - it says something about how good Cerna is that it's my favorite beer at this bar. That said, Odense porter does NOT disappoint. It's thick, it's rich, it's bitter, and it's flavorful. Hm. I want one now...


Boucanier:

Mmm...chocolatey...

This beer has more of a chocolatey accent than a coffee one, and it always makes for a nice drink in winter. My mouth is literally salivating as I'm typing this :).


Stout imperial:

Mmm...coffee-y (Okay, I'm straining the gag, I know).

My OTHER favorite beer at L'Amere à Boire. I mean, what's not to like? You take two of my favorite beverages, beer and coffee, and mix them together! How is that NOT a recipe for success? I really can't taste the chocolate accent that is supposedly there, but really, I don't need it. It's just great!


And what do they have in the way of food? The pub has a fair bit actually, but one of the most consistent things I get is the rabbit burger:

The rabbit meat here tastes different from the rabbit meat I've had before. I don't know if it's just the way it's cooked or if it's a different grade of rabbit, but it matters little, really. It just tastes good. It has a much lighter and more subtle flavour to it relative to beef burgers, and the burger hits the spot. It IS a bit small, but hey, we can't always have it all!


And that's it for now. I'm done writing, you're done reading, now go out and try the awesome beers!

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Mouthwatering Montreal - L'Amère à Boire is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.