Thursday, August 2, 2012

Surprising Cultural Variation

A month into my new life in Ottawa/Ontario, and one key difference stands out (actually many, but this one is where QC seems better): beer is sold mostly in cans in the places that sell beer. Of course, that is the other difference--you can get beer in the grocery stores in Quebec but not Ontario.  Anyway, the beer distributors in Ontario (having flashbacks to growing up in Pennsylvania) sell mostly canned beer, not bottled.  There are even a few microbrews that sell in cans.

This brings back bad memories, growing up with swill in cans.  As it turns out, it may not be that cans are inherently inferior as this article discusses (H/T to Pete Trumbore).  But a key point would be this: if no glasses are available to distance the beer from the icky smell of aluminum (and I like to pronounce aluminum in my head the way the British do), then a bottle > can.  Still, at home, I guess cans would be better, but on the frisbee field, I would stick with bottles if I can (oops).

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Next time I'm in Ottawa, I'll bring you beer in a bottle...Of course, you already know that you can cross to Gatineau to a Dep, in case of emergency! :)

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