An Ontario town has created an award-winning butter tart-flavoured beer that is set to hit regional liquor store shelves in the province this fall.
The town of Midland, Ont., located 160 kilometres north of Toronto, came up with the idea after organizers of a craft beer festival invited municipalities to brew up an idea for a beer that represents their community.
"We've had this successful butter tart festival, and everyone is starting to equate Midland with butter tarts," communications coordinator for the town of Midland Scott Cooper told CTV Barrie. "We thought, 'Butter tarts make everything better, why not in a beer form?'"
So the town known as the butter tart capital of Ontario worked with brewmaster Sam Corbeil of Sawdust City Brewing Co. to create the rich recipe.
"To bring all those flavours together and to make people think that they're actually drinking a butter tart was very exciting," Corbeil said.
Their unique vision paid off. The SESSION Muskoka Beer Festival awarded its top honour to the Midland maple butter tart beer. Besides the accolade, the grand prize means the beer will be brewed, bottled and distributed in regional LCBO stores.
"We're going to work with that township to come up with a unique label, a unique bottle and we're going to come up with a story that's going to be on that bottle in collaboration with the township," said Jed Corbeil, the organizer for the Muskoka Beer Festival.
The win wasn't a surprise for Midland mayor Gord McKay, who said the beer perfectly captures the flavour of the community's famous treat.
"There's sort of a rich, deep flavour to butter tarts," McKay said. "If you can capture that in a beer and make it refreshing, it's everything that Midland is."
With a report from CTV Barrie's Katherine Ward
