Session Toronto Craft Beer Festival 2016, Toronto, ON

Gord and I went to the seventh annual Session Toronto Craft Beer Festival this evening (from 5pm to 9pm) ... we've been to all seven.  It was held downtown at Yonge Dundas Square.  We were there with our pals Bruce, Christine, Darlene, Denyse and Jennifer.

A regular ticket was $40 (plus tax) which included a glass and five tasting tokens. Tasting tokens were $1.  Like last year, we'd bought Princess Passes ($100 + tax) which gave us the added benefit of a separate entrance, private bathrooms, 30 tasting tokens, access to the Princess area which was supposed to feature snacks, unique beer and private music/entertainment (there was no private music or entertainment).

Here is the Princess area ... it was nice to have a place to sit.  The last two years the Princess lounge was on the stage, which was nice because we could see what was going on.  Tonight we couldn't see what was going on on the stage because we were to the left of it.  And the last two years there were celebrities (Olympian Jon Montgomery was there last year with his gold medal) ... I'm not sure if there were any there tonight.

Here are my sampling glass and tokens.

There was a good turnout and it got really busy as the night went on.

The band, Bad Luck Woman and Her Misfortunes, was good ... they were bluesy.

Here are the beer I had (and I enjoyed them all!) ...

Beer Runner Blonde from New Ontario Brewing Co.

Against the Grain Lager from High Park Brewery

Sweetgrass Golden Ale served by princesses ... I stuck with this for most
of the night because it was easy to get to since it was in the Princess area
(I've had it before and like it)

My cousin's daughter, Shannon, works for one of the breweries that had a collaboration and here she is on stage talking about it.

Here are some pictures of us ...

Gord, me, Jennifer and Denyse

Gord and I ... aren't we cute?!

The only complaint I would make is that the "snacks" weren't very plentiful.  I counted five small trays that came out for 50+ people.  When the trays were brought out, everyone swarmed around them and the food was gone in seconds (so you had to be quick).  The food tables were empty most of the night ... it was like that last year too.  Two years ago there was tons of food ... this year hardly any.

Every year I come home with tokens ... 30 is too many for me.  It would be better to lower the cost of the pass and let me buy the amount of tokens I'll use.  Between Gord and I, we had 30 tokens at the end of the night.  You can't cash them in or use them for food.  The Society of Beer Drinking Ladies (I've gone to some of their events) was selling merchandise and would take tokens so I bought three glasses just to use the tokens.