{"id":30832,"date":"2022-07-27T01:00:06","date_gmt":"2022-07-27T08:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bcaletrail.ca\/?p=30832"},"modified":"2022-07-28T15:56:26","modified_gmt":"2022-07-28T22:56:26","slug":"bcs-cream-ales-then-and-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bcaletrail.ca\/bcs-cream-ales-then-and-now\/","title":{"rendered":"Do You Take Cream With That? BC\u2019s Cream Ales, Then and Now"},"content":{"rendered":"

With milkshake IPAs everywhere these days, beer drinkers might be forgiven for thinking that a \u201ccream ale\u201d is the same kind of thing. An older American style that was popular in the 1980s, cream ales are starting to appear on BC breweries\u2019 taplists again. But cream ale has no dairy in it, nor is it creamy in texture like a nitrogenized beer. So what <\/span>is <\/span><\/i>a cream ale, and where can you try one?<\/span><\/p>\n

What is a cream ale?<\/h3>\n

Beer writer Michael Jackson includes cream ale among American ales, defining it as \u201ca very mild, sweetish, golden style of ale made in the United States. A sociable brew.\u201d Elsewhere he says a cream ale is \u201cas pale and sparkling as a Pilsner\u201d but with a sweet and \u201cmildly hopped\u201d character. Jackson connects the development of cream ale, which is somewhere between an ale and a lager, to American brewers\u2019 desire to distinguish themselves from the popular dark lagers of Germany and the light lagers of the US. The American cream ale was America\u2019s version of a K\u00f6lsch, sometimes with corn or wheat in the grain bill.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Despite the style\u2019s American origins, the cream ale most BC drinkers recognize is a Canadian one \u2014 Sleeman\u2019s Cream Ale, a longstanding and popular beer first sold in 1988. However, a west coast version of the cream ale was emerging at about the same time.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Shaftebury Cream Ale (from facebook)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In 1987, Vancouver\u2019s Shaftebury Brewing made a splash with its hugely popular Coastal Cream Ale. However, it wasn\u2019t technically a cream ale at all; it was a British mild, according to Michael Jackson, and it was created by the very Brit who helped build BC craft beer<\/a> \u2014 John Mitchell<\/a>. Jackson admired Shaftebury\u2019s Cream Ale but was confused at its name: \u201cit\u2019s a malty, nutty brew curiously launched as a Cream Ale.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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Barry Benson with a glass of Raven Cream Ale at R&B Brewing in Vancouver, BC<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Barry Benson, brewer for Shaftebury and later a co-founder of R&B Brewing<\/a>, agrees with Jackson. The Shaftebury Cream was a dark mild. However, at the time, marketing a beer as \u201cdark\u201d was a sure way to lose customers. \u201cCream\u201d made the beer sound sweet, light, and approachable \u2014 exactly what drinkers wanted. Shaftebury\u2019s marketing-savvy owners, Tim Wittig and Paul Beaton, may not have known the style guidelines for a cream ale, but they <\/span>did <\/span><\/i>know that \u201ccream\u201d sounded good.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Their choice to call Shaftebury\u2019s dark mild a cream ale was overwhelmingly successful, not just for Shaftebury but for BC’s nascent microbrewing industry in general. Cream ale became associated with craft beer more generally (although in those days everyone still called it “microbrew” for lack of a better name), and since people loved cream ale they wanted more “microbrew.”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n