Link Up - Series 1 Roundup
2021 saw the creation of Link Up, a non-profit organization working to bring talented and passionate individuals from under-represented communities into every aspect of the craft beer industry. They do this by connecting BIPOC applicants with apprenticeships at breweries, hop farms or yeast labs, education funding for a Cicerone® certification, partnerships to get involved with beer media or marketing, even getting them started on the path to own their own brewery. Ultimately, Link Up is working to make the craft beer industry look more like the world around it.
Link Up works with a network of brewery partners that are committed to being part of the solution. When partner breweries brew a Link Up beer, they are committing to taking on a BIPOC co-op student or apprenticeship applicant from the program, and sharing their open job opportunities on Link Up’s The Plug job board.
Over the summer and fall of 2021, six partner breweries across Ontario and Québec launched Link Up beers, and the program has already connected five applicants with apprenticeships or education financing. With Series 2 just getting underway, during which six more breweries will launch Link Up beers and join the cause, let’s take a look back at the six beers from Series 1 and the breweries that were first to join the cause.
Dominion City Brewing Company
Ottawa, ON
Pale Ale - 5%
Dominion City’s Link Up beer is a 5% Pale Ale brewed with Eclipse hops. It pours with thick haze and a nose that’s grassy, piney, and overflowing with citrus aromatics. The palate is citrus-forward with flavours of clementine juice and orange zest, an earthy background, and a nice kick of pine. It’s got a pillowy soft malt body which dampens the sharpness of the citrus, making it delightfully easy on the palate. There’s just a touch of pithy bitterness and a lingering taste of orange pulp. It’s a spectacular beer, supporting a critically important cause for this industry.
Town Brewery
Whitby, ON
IPA - 6%
The second beer to be released in partnership with Link Up comes from Whitby’s Town Brewery. It’s a 6% IPA brewed with Citra, Mosaic and Vic Secret. It pours bright yellow and hazy, and drinks real smooth, well attenuated, and fairly dry with a nice medium body and fuzzy carbonation. The palate boasts juicy pineapple with only a touch of acidity, some passion fruit and a nice kick of citrus zest. The bitterness is quite low making it eminently drinkable.
BreWskey
Montreal, QC
Double IPA - 8.5%
Montreal’s BreWskey went big and brewed an 8.5% DIPA with Strata, Galaxy, and Citra. It pours a gorgeous, hazy orangey-yellow, has a creamy texture and a medium-thick body. The palate is rich with overripe peach with a slight dusty, fuzzy feel, and mango and pineapple with a bit of musty dankness. There’s a bit of grape and kiwi hiding in there too. There’s barely any residual sweetness, which is pretty impressive for a heavily hopped, hazy Double IPA. It’s fantastic!
Third Moon Brewing Company
Milton, ON
IPA - 6.5%
Third Moon brewed a 6.5% IPA with oats, and hopped with a trio of M hops: Mosaic, Motueka, and Mistral. It has a huge fruity nose, full of grape, red berries, kiwi, and mango. The same fruit salad carries through to the palate. By Third Moon standards, the mouthfeel is on the restrained side. It’s creamy and smooth, but with a nice medium body, and more carbonation coming through than in a lot of their IPAs. It’s also lower in sweetness overall, drinking real nice and easy. In my opinion, it’s one of the most refined IPAs they’ve put out to date!
5e Baron Microbrasserie
Gatineau, QC
Cascadian Dark Ale - 6%
Link Up co-founders 5e Baron went in a different direction than the hazy joints that were put up by the other partner breweries, and brewed a 6% Cascadian Dark Ale for their Link Up beer. It pours a colour that appears black indoors, but in the sunlight is a hazy dark brown. In either light, it has a tall, rich head the colour of espresso crema. The aroma is clean and thick with roasted malts. At first sip, it drinks creamy without being thick or heavy. It’s wickedly dry on the palate; the roasted malts giving off flavours of espresso, pairing beautifully with the creamy texture; the hops giving subtle notes of berries. There’s decent bitterness but nothing that’s punching you in the face. It’s all very balanced. A subtle note of citrus zest helps to lighten the palate and has it drinking mighty easy. This has got some depth to it!
Brasserie du Bas Canada
Gatineau, QC
Double IPA - 8%
Finally, 5e Baron’s Gatineau neighbours, Brasserie du Bas Canada put up a big 8% DIPA hopped with Nelson Sauvin, Mosaic, Simcoe, and Amarillo, and brewed with a different yeast and brewing method than they usually do with their haze. The nose is dank and musty with aromatics of white grape and pine. It’s smooth in texture and much drier than is typical for Bas Canada haze. Nelson comes in strong with flavours of white grape and gooseberry for a vinous and slightly tart character. There’s pineapple acidity to it along with some pine, dankness, earthy hop spice, and a dry, dusty finish. It’s got a notably different feel for a Bas Canada DIPA, and it’s still beautifully executed.
There you have Link Up, Series 1! Series 2 is just kicking off with it’s first beer recently announced from Montreal’s OverHop Canada. Stay tuned to Link Up’s social channels to see the next set of breweries across Ontario and Québec that have made the commitment to work towards a better craft beer scene for all.
Article and photography by Nathan Lefebvre.
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Nathan
Nathan is a craft beer enthusiast from Ottawa, ON. He is the Co-Founder of @TeamLactose, he’s passionate about travelling for beer and he loves talking about beer from Ontario, Quebec and beyond.