Boundary Bay

Every once in a while, we are blessed with a visitor from the West Coast. And no visit from a "west coaster" is complete without sumptuous tales of delicious locally roasted coffee, micro-breweries a-plenty, weekends in wine country, exotic cuisine, the miraculous lack of mosquitoes, black flies, and bad attitudes. So, when Mr. Chops's friend from Bellingham came to stay last weekend, we were not surprised that he came with tales of the totally hip beer scene in Washington. However, being a consummate excellent house guest- he also brought some samples! And yes, these two beers were truly delicious.


Usually, I object to showing off photos of beer I've sampled and most of my local readers can't find anywhere, but in this case, I made an exception. These beers were really tasty and they came from brew pub. Being from CT, when I hear "brew pub", I think of insipid beers and lackluster food in a buffed up over-priced bar/restaurant. There's usually an unused brewing set up in the middle of the dining room for "atmosphere". I thought perhaps some of these CT brew pubs might like to go and take notes from Boundary Bay on how it's really done. I hear the place has a nice atmosphere, beer garden, decent food, live music, and of course, really good beer. Judging from the two samples we had, I believe this is true. The IPA was clean, refreshing, nicely hopped and pretty much everything an IPA should be. The scotch ale was surprisingly balanced with a malty nose, subtle sweetness, and pleasantly dry hoppy finish. According to their website, Boundary Bay also just brought home a silver medal from the 2008 World Beer Cup for their brew "Cabin Fever". At any rate, they must be doing something right because Boundary has also just been crowned "largest brew pub" selling over 5300 barrels of beer in 2007. That's a lot of beer. But, in Bellingham, "the City of Subdued Excitement", one would expect nothing less.