Henderson's Best
Henderson Brewing Company

At my lady Pamela's house; canned and chilled, 473mL in a pint glass. From my favourite LCBO at Tecumseh Mall in nearby Windsor. Lot number L250912141. My 8th beer from the Toronto, Ontario brewery, and 5th for 2025. Greatly appreciated by Gracie the cat...

Well balanced and approachable.
Dark copper, clear, little head. Smells like fruit salad, jam, liquor, maybe coffee. The taste follows, but with a sharp bitterness that keeps the malt flavours well in check. Complex enough, but still light and easy on the palate.

 

From Notes

Appearance: A thumb's worth of head that offers solid retention, a medium amount of lace. The body is an outright cloudy brown, so cloudy only shadows of your hand can be seen through it. Low carbonation.

Smell: Earth, toffee and dry yeast that gives mild plum and berry vibes. The issue is the potency just isn't there even after substantial warming.

Taste: Hazelnut Toffee that turns to an odd-fruity yeast note of mild bitter orange pith and berries before ending with an unpleasant, muddy hop end.

Mouthfeel: The muddiness ruins what was a well nuanced beer, both in terms of the sudsy carbonation and the ok transitioning. It was building up to something, and that something was disappointment as dominates the aftertaste and turns things far too dry.

Drinkability: Medium body, but frustrating to drink. It's amazing how one bad note can ruing things. Because of that muddy end, it kills this beer being a more refreshing easy drinker AND any chance of it being complex enough to be a sipper.

Final Thoughts: I don't normally give specific critiques of how the brewer should do their job. I've never brewed before, so it seems out of line. This is a rare case where I think a change of hops could only improve this beer.

5.5%

Pours a dark ruby with fine head.

Smell is malty, bready and a bit sweet. Notes of brown bread, caramel, dried fruit and some wood.

Taste is malty, bready and a bit roasted. Moderate bitterness and notes of brown bread, dried fruit, caramel and some yeasty phenols.

Mouthfeel is medium, smooth and well carbonated.

Overal, a very nice amber ale/bitter, taken down a notch by the yeastiness.

 

Excellent Best Bitter. Was an absolute favorite until more brewers picked up the style and have kind of out done them… I still love a can now and again though!

Dark coppper good foam and lingering lacing, fairly balance but the bitterness does leave a distinct and remarkable aftertaste- a bit too pronounced bite IMHO.

Price has shot up (now high end of most crafts at ~$3.4/can and the fact they charge more from their own brewery (than say LCBO or the beer store) is irritating.

Ps not sure why a number of other brewers who do this style don’t market it as such - look to ‘ambers’ or even EPA and you may be pleasantly surprised.

Pours an amber-brown colour with one finger of loose head, that recedes into a swampy spotty cap.

Pleasant bitter aromas with grassiness and mild diacetyl, caramel malt with a hint of toastiness on the grainy notes.

Quite a delightful amber ale, nothing too powerful or mind blowing, but smooth and delicious with the right notes. Both the maltiness and bitter qualities are mild but intermingle pleasantly, you’d call it bittersweet but the beer is more mild that that. Leaving nice remains of caramel malt and toast on the finish, the bitterness opens up front leaning mostly into that bitter oily taste you’d get from citrus peels.

Light medium bodied with moderate-light carbonation, only the slightest razing of the palate with the tiny bubbles, fairly smooth, subtle bittersweet finish that leaves the leafy grassy hops bitterness to linger with lightly caramelized, toffee-esque malt.

Nothing too insane for the style, but subtle and pleasant all the way through. I really enjoy all of Henderson’s fares. I wouldn’t consider them as specialized/intense as some maybe smaller, more niche/hyper focused breweries, but they have a pleasant range with some fun beers that always please.

 

Look: Ruddy brown with hints of amber. Fairly clear, with a slight opacity. Pours with a 1 1/2 finger off white tight bubbleed head. The head disapates leaving strong lacing at 5 minutes.

Smell: Short bread cookies, and caramel. Lots of malt.

Taste: Initial taste follows the smell with a sweet front end featuring candied fruit and sugar. Hints of light rye bread in the middle. Orange pekoe tea and a slight bitter snap at the end.

Feel: Medium creamy body with noticable bitters on the end.

The can calls this an amber ale. I was expecting something more hoppy, but I was happy with what I got. This beer is a fantasic English style ale. Drinking it made me long to be in a pub watching a game of footie. This earns a strong B+

 

L: Deep copper and clear, leaning into brown, with a big pillowy cream-colour head that sticks around. Good lacing while consuming.

S: Fresh grass trimmings and citrus peel, mainly lemon and orange, dominate the nose, along with a hint of fresh herbs, like basil.

T: Caramel and dark bread like pumpernickel greet the palate. From there, this brightens up with a tea-and-lemon quality, with floral undertones. Some minerality surfaces at the end, leaving a slightly chalky, lingering finish with grippy tannins.

F: Medium bodied with a pleasant amount of carbonation to give it a boost. There's also a bit of a tang at the edges to keep things interesting.

O: This is a well-balanced beer. With all the malt characteristics, it could veer into something deeper, but it has enough brightness to stay refreshing and encourage another sip. Give it a few minutes to open up and you will be rewarded. A very nice bitter.

Bought can at lcbo the brew date was February 12th so I month old it tasted very fresh as my 3 finger creamy head lasted long drinking it out of my glass. It looked very frothy the head of the beer. It's a good beer well balanced flavor and enjoyable to drink
Cheers

 

 

 

Great ESB - truly the "best" of the Toronto beer scene.

473 mL can from the LCBO; canned Sept 6 2018 and served slightly chilled. Listed at 5.5% and reviewed from notes.

Pours clear copper-amber, with one centimetre of loose, bubbly, beige-tinted froth that disintegrates within a minute or two. A messy ring of seafoam lace is splattered about in the process, with only a paper thin collar and a few wisps upon the surface lingering there any longer. It smells of lightly toasted bread and toffee maltiness, with suggestions of dried fruit (specifically, date) and leafy, floral hops which are highly apropos for this style.

This is a quality bitter, and a deftly balanced one, too - a virtual necessity in subtler British style fare such as this. It tastes malt forward at the front, with notes of caramel and sponge toffee combining with those bready, lightly toasted malts. There's a hint of nuttiness, too, with maybe a touch of date fruit coming through before a leafy, floral, mildly spicy hop note at the finish. Vaguely malty-sweet aftertaste that fades within a moment or two, leaving only suggestions of leafy hops. Medium-light in body, with low carbonation levels that limply agitate the palate; feels smooth and a little soft in the mouth, with fantastic drinkability for 5.5%.

Final Grade: 3.94, a B+. Henderson's Best would have been a wonderful addition to the Ontario beer scene back in the mid 2000's (or even earlier), but these days, you can only drum up so much fanfare for an ESB - an excellent domestic example of one, mind you. No, it won't shake up your taste buds or blow you away, but I could drink this all night without ever tiring of it - and for a bitter, I'd say that's a pretty strong endorsement. Drink with confidence if you enjoy British 'real ales'.