Dubbel Date: The beer that almost didn’t brew

Dates, caramel, and a rich malt flavour. It’s not a candy bar — it’s a beer.

Kwantlen Polytechnic University’s brewing and brewery operations program is known for many things — most of all, its student-crafted beers.

Paul Virtue, a recent graduate from the brewing program, crafted a Belgian dubbel beer called Dubbel Date for his capstone project. It is a part of KPU brewing’s student Signature Series for 2025.

“Dubbel” meaning “double” is a Belgian beer style, recognizable for its distinctive herbal, fruit, and phenol notes. These beers tend to be dry and sometimes taste slightly sweet.

Dubbel Date is “a unique twist on the medieval monk classic,” KPU brewing’s website reads. Its sweetness is from the Medjool date syrup, and the flavour is a blend of rich malt and subtle hints of caramel. 

Dubbel Date placed second in the Belgian Strong Ale category at the annual BC Beer Awards in October.

“I definitely didn’t realize that I had actually won at first,” Virtue wrote in a statement to The Runner. “I was hopeful that my beer would maybe get third place, and I only felt that because it scored quite well during the judging that all of our student beers went through in our beer judging class.”

Dageraad Brewing won first and third in the category for its beers Blonde and Antigoon respectively. It is a small-batch brewery based in Burnaby that takes its name from a neighbourhood square in Antwerp, Belgium called Dageraadplaats.

“It was pretty surreal. I love Dageraad and their beers, so being ranked at their level definitely had me … feeling some serious imposter syndrome, but in the best way,” Virtue wrote.

Virtue attended the awards, alongside some KPU brewing faculty and students, including instructor Dominic Bernard. 

“We’ve had students that join our program having never brewed before, and two years later, they’re winning awards with the beers they’re crafting,” Bernard says. “We’re proud of our students.”

Bernard adds the award is a testament to the quality of beer students are making and learning in the program.

“I remember seeing the names of the winning beers pop up on the slideshow and seeing Dubbel Date and going, ‘Hey, I know that one,’ before my classmates around me went completely ballistic,” Virtue wrote.

Despite taking home silver, Virtue noted the process of creating Dubbel Date was a “bumpy ride.”

“Dubbel Date was a right proper learning experience,” he wrote. 

Dubbel Date was supposed to be a 7.4 per cent beer but after Virtue’s fermentation window, the beer was sitting at just 6.1 per cent. Belgian dubbels are typically between 6.3 to 7.6 per cent alcohol by volume.

“This was a big issue, as we had very strict timelines to follow as part of the Brewing 4 [course],” Virtue wrote.

Bernard says the Brewing 4 course has students do everything from start to finish. 

“It’s an experiential learning opportunity for them, where they are applying everything that we’ve taught them to a tangible project and they’ve got a product that they’re proud to showcase at the end,” he adds.

Virtue added table sugar to raise the alcohol spec of Dubbel Date — and it worked. But now the beer, with time and heat, would turn into diacetyl.

“[It’s] that fake-butter flavouring that you can find in popcorn bags and the worst flavoured jelly beans,” Virtue wrote. “There was a period of time I was quite bummed with how my beer had turned out.”

In a last ditch “why not” effort, Virtue set up a homebrew system to attempt some can-conditioning and clean the beer. While it worked, the home setup wasn’t big enough.

“My classmate recommended carting all of my beer into the brewery’s boiler room. This sounded crazy at the time but desperate times called for desperate measures,” Virtue wrote. 

The plan worked, he wrote, and the beer had enough time to condition and was diacetyl free after the release date was moved.

Just months later, Virtue was standing in New Westminster’s Anvil Centre holding a second-place trophy for the beer that almost didn’t brew.

“Brewing has been very rewarding. I haven’t been in the industry very long but even with what I’ve seen I can feel that this is quite a special industry to work in.”