Special Brews
To celebrate the Mondial de la Bière's 16th edition, three brewers concocted special brews just for the beer fest:
- Brasseurs de Montréal's Rooibos Wheat Beer
- Dieu du Ciel's 16th edition brew
- Hopfenstark's Berliner Weiss
Become a beerologist: learn how to smell, taste and know your beer. Teachers from Montreal beer school the École de Biérologie MBière will be at the festival offering workshops and to answer any questions on professional beer certification. Call (514) 722-9640 for more information.
Purchase Tasting Coupons
While admission to the Montreal Beer Fest is free, tasting a brew -- offered in three to four ounce servings -- requires coupons sold near the front entrance. Each serving usually costs anywhere from one to five coupons. Expect twenty to thirty coupons to last about two hours at $1 a coupon in 2009.
Beat the Beer Fest Lineups
The Windsor station during the Beer Fest gets packed. Really packed. There's not any way around that unless you start festivities before the crowd picks up, which is generally the case by 6 p.m during weekdays and earlier on the weekend of the fest. And then there's that tedious lineup to purchase tasting coupons. One way around the wait is to purchase tasting tickets online, which are delivered in the mail. Each beer sample costs about 1 to 5 coupons so pre-purchasing 30 to 60 tickets should be enough to cover an evening at the beer fest.
Time
11 a.m. to 10 p.m.; Wednesday, June 3rd to Saturday, June 6th
11 a.m. to 8 p.m.; Sunday, June 7th
Where
Windsor Station, 1160 de la Gauchetière (between Peel and de la Montagne)
Getting There
Bonaventure Metro
Getting Home
One should definitely consider opting for a cab or Montreal's public transit system instead of driving to the Montreal beer fest. But if for whatever reason, you intend to have your car with you (calculate how much you can drink and still drive with this tool), then consider signing up for Point Zero 8, a fabulous designated driver service available year-round. Once you sign up, the service is cheaper than a Montreal cab and they'll drive your car home for you, hassle-free!
Admission
Free entrance. The Beer Fest tasting glass costs $8 but is optional, though some festival goers (your humble guide included) swear by it over disposable plastic cups littering festival grounds. And beer just tastes better in a glass! Remember to purchase tasting coupons for $1 a piece.
Learn more about the Mondial de La Bière, Montreal's primo beer fest.
Visit the Montreal Beer Festival Mondial de la bière website for a complete listing of workshops and activities.
