Portland Beerfest!

Jenn and I had decided a month ago to spend Labor Day weekend in NH, and when I saw that the Portland Beer Festival (not to be confused with the Portland Brewer’s Festival) was going on, I got permission from Jenn to go and asked my buddy Wayne to join me. It was their first event, and relatively small, so I didn’t have much hope on finding something new.  Boy was I surprised.

We got there early and decided to get a bite to eat (best way to prepare for sampling), and went to the new Sebago brewpub located in the Hampton Inn (I guess I know where I’m staying the next time I’m in Portland).  We split an order of potato nachos (waffle fries covered in nacho toppings) and I took the liberty of ordering two beers, mostly because there were only two available that I hadn’t tried.  I got the Hoppy Homunculus, an Imperial IPA that did a nice job of balancing the hops and the alcohol, while Wayne enjoyed their Citra IPA on cask.  Citra is a relatively new hop, and was being pushed hard when I was in the UK last May. 

We walked down the street (and past Shipyard brewing) to the festival, located in a sort of warehouse down by the water.  We got a passport going in, and 24 coupons to redeem for different beers.  I was pleased to see Shipyard brewing represented, and tried this year’s version of their Pumpkinhead Ale.  I was even excited to see that they plan to offer Applehead Ale next year, since I love Unibroue’s Ephemere and I’m assuming that it will be similar.  We then went down the row, sampling as we went from beers, ciders, and meads.

I was able to find a few notable new ales in my trip, and I did use all of my coupons.  I sampled the two imports present, Palm and Rodenbach Red Ale, and was pleased to find that they both were new to me on draft.  Sierra Nevada did a collaboration beer with Avery/DFH/Lost Abbey/Allagash called Reporter Roir which was tasty, but I couldn’t find any mention of it on the web.  I got to try a Narragasett Fest, an unusual offering from this old time NE lager maker.  And I was able to try a new Atlantic Brewing Manly Men New Guy IPA, apparently going to be released later this year.  The ciders were a nice alternative, but the meads (mostly at 12.5% ABV) were dangerous to sample.  The crowd was the right size to avoid lines that get to long, and as always it was fun to people watch.  Wayne bumped into several friends from the shipyard, and I got to show off my beer book.

Before you knew it, 3 hours had past so we went to get a bite to eat at the Thirsty Pig, a recommendation of Wayne’s daughter.  I got a hot sausage, and a bottle of Manly Men Blackstrapped Molasses to go.  We had planned to hang out at Novare Res, but work called for Wayne and we needed to get going.  I did get a sample of Dogfish Head Saison du Buff and Birra Del Borgo My Antonia on draft, the latter being the Italien version of the collaboration with DFH. 

We had a great day.  The experience reassured me that you can ALWAYS find a new beer at the festivals.  It just goes to show that I’ll need to plan more in the future. – 5805/11403

"Well you see, Norm, it’s like this… A herd of buffalo can only move as fast as the slowest buffalo.  And when the herd is hunted, it’s the slowest and weakest ones at the back that are killed first.  This natural selection is good for the herd as a whole because the general speed and health of the whole herd keeps improving by the regular killing of the weakest members.  In much the same way the human brain can only operate as fast as the slowest brain cells.  Excessive intake of alcohol, as we know, kills brain cells.  But naturally it takes the slowest and weakest brain cells first.  In this way the regular consumption of beer eliminates the weaker brain cells making the brain a faster and more efficient machine.  That’s why you always feel smarter after a few beers." – Cliff Claven of Cheers