Category: Beer

Now that I’ve got your attention let me tell you about a new website called Portland Taps. Portland Taps is a guide to beer and bars in Portland. What makes the site notable is that they’ve gathered together into one location the price lists for beer taps at bars all across the city. If your goal is to drink the absolute cheapest beer in the city, you can quickly learn that for for $1.50 you can get Genessee Cream Ale at Mathews, a PBR at Shack’s, or a Busch at Ernie’s or The Frosty Pint. If you just want to see the full beer menu at the venues they list you can do that too. The site can also help you find the bars where a particular brew is available.

Shipyard Brewing‘s Imperial Porter won 2nd place at the 10th West Coast Beer Fest earlier this month.

A Blog About Beer has a report about the new Maine Beer Trail and some suggestions (be more complete, give participants a fun incentive to make the rounds) on how to improve it.

While I think the Maine Beer Trail is a great idea (I’ve been calling for its creation forever), and a tourist-driven, Maine-brewing-community-collaborative is exactly what the state needs, the initial version of the Trail the Guild has rolled out leaves a little something to be desired.

A Blog About Beer has the scoop on Gargamel, the new a Belgian Style sour ale that Allagash is releasing on Thursday morning.

BeerBloggers.com has a report on the vertical tasting of Ola Dubh held last night at Novare Res.

The differences among these beers are subtle but noticeable. The 12 tasted the most like a traditional stout. The 18 showed a bit of tar and was lovely. The 30 was my favorite, very smooth…The 40 was round and mellow, and offered more of a beer-whiskey synthesis on the palate.

Blog About Beer has a report on the new IPA from Peak Organic. “Portland’s own Peak Organic Brewing has released their own IPA and I have to say, it’s the single best Peak beer yet! After trying a pint myself at $3 Dewey’s a few days ago”.
In a post earlier this month, Beer Locavore drew attention to the recent spate of IPA launches. IPAs from Gritty’s Sebago and Peak are now all available.

In anticipation of St. Patrick’s Day, The Maine Switch has published a primer on drinking Guinness.

Being that it’s a glass full of black, it has to be bitter with an aftertaste that hangs on for days. No thanks, was always my answer. I’d rather settle for a Coors Light than go down that road.

But since we’re closing in on that annual celebration of St. Patrick, the day when the Guinness flows non-stop at places like Ri Ra, Bull Feeney’s and Brian Boru, I figured it was high time I actually gave the old Irish favorite a try.

Beer Examiner has done a statistical survey to answer the question “Where is Beertown, USA?” Their measure is the number of breweries per capita. Portland is now #7 on the list (1 brewery for every 15,706 people) but they continue to update it as new data comes in. (via Portland Psst!).

There’s a “brew review” in the latest issue of the USM Free Press extolling the virtues of Belgian witbiers.