Future brewers study 'field to foam' at Niagara College teaching brewery

If you're planning to drink a beer this long weekend, you're not alone.

And perhaps you're one of a growing number of beer drinkers who reach for an Ontario craft beer when you're sitting around a campfire, on the dock or just while grilling in your backyard.

Craft beer booming across Canada, and Waterloo region is part of the industry growth as another brewery is set to open. 

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Jon Downing of Welland, Ont., has opened breweries around the world – including Ontario's first brew-pub, The Atlas Hotel in Welland – and he watched as more and more breweries popped up in Ontario. He knew there was a need to properly train those who wanted to make beer for a living. So he approached Niagara College.

"When I saw the college had done the teaching winery in the early 2000s, I thought, well, maybe they should be doing beer too," Downing, who is now the teaching brewery's brewmaster, said.

The school, however, did not immediately jump at the suggestion.

"We're in wine country, why would we want to make beer?" college administrators asked him.

School convinced

But after talking to brewers in Toronto, and the Ontario Craft Beer Association, the college was persuaded to open a teaching brewery. The competition to get into the program has been fierce ever since. In the first year, there were 300 applicants for 24 spots.

The college even added a summer session – the only courses offered in the warmer months at the college – to accommodate all the students who want to attend the teaching brewery.

"I knew the demand was out there for trained people. I did not expect it to be as huge as it was," Downing told CBC Radio's The Morning Edition.

'Any taste, any flavour'

New craft breweries open in Ontario each month. The Ontario Beverage Network – which tracks new breweries, cideries and artisan spirit producers – reported there was one new brewery that opened in Strathroy, Ont., in April, one contract brewer (meaning they brew out of an existing brewery but under their own name) and three more breweries were added to the list of those in the planning stages. Already in May, there are three more planned breweries.

A report from Beer Canada, a voluntary trade association, reported that in 2014, the number of licensed breweries in the country had risen 70 per cent in just five years, half of them located in Ontario and Quebec.

In Waterloo region, co-operative brewery Together We're Bitter in Kitchener opened their doors in February, Descendants Beer and Beverage Co. in Kitchener opened in April and Barncat Artisan Ales in Cambridge also opened last month.

They are added to the list of existing breweries, including Innocente in Waterloo, Abe Erb in Waterloo, Block Three in St. Jacob's, Grand River in Cambridge, Brick Brewing in Waterloo, and Lion Brewing in Waterloo's Huether Hotel.

And there are a couple of planned breweries: Bitte Schon Brauhaus in New Hamburg and WT BrewCo in Cambridge, as well as Short Finger Brewing Co., which is a homebrewing supply store, but will also have a nano-brewery on site to help teach people how to make their own beer.

There are even more craft breweries outside the region in Elora, Stratford, Guelph and Hamilton. 

"People don't want a beer that's made by a company owned in Belgium or South Africa, they want something that's [made] by a company in Ontario," Downing said.

In the 1970s and 80s, there were essentially two beers on the market that were basically the same beer, he said. 

"Now there's hundreds, thousands of different beers out there," he said. "We can brew a beer to any taste, any flavour."

Hands-on work

Students who attend the teaching brewery are at the school for four semesters. They take hands-on, practical brewing courses for the entire time, and other classes include chemistry and microbiology, industry and regulatory oversight (such as the LCBO and AGCO), equipment courses, sensory courses to help them assess how their beer should taste and how to fix it, as well as marketing courses.

In the final semester, the students design their own brewery from "field to foam," Downing said.

"It brings all of their courses together in one bottle," he said. "When they graduate, they get a diploma, but they get the best resume ever: they can put a bottle of beer in front of an employer and say, 'Hey, I made this.'"

Students find work

The college says about 96 per cent of graduates find work in the field, but Downing said he thinks it's closer to 100 per cent.

"I know that every single one of our graduates … they all had jobs in the industry at some point," he said.

And those students are going all over the world. He knows of graduates who work in Turks and Caicos, South Korea and the United States.

They also have students this semester from Brazil, Colombia and the U.S.

He said applicants who aren't serious about being in the industry are weeded out and only those who are keen to learn every aspect of brewing are allowed into the program.

"It's a lot to do with attitude. If you're just coming to take this course to drink beer, it's not for you. If you're coming to take this course to work hard and learn, then that's what it's all about," he said. "Working in a brewery is a lot of fun, but it's a lot of hard work."

On Monday, May 23 CBC Radio will air a special Ontario holiday program from 6:00 a.m. - 8:30 a.m. featuring stories and interviews all about beer.You can listen to it live on your radio at 89.1 FM, using the CBC Radio app (On Apple or Android) on your phone, or online at cbc.ca/kw. CBC Kitchener-Waterloo's The Morning Edition will return on Tuesday, May 24.