Beer Inspiration in our Backyard: Vermont Beer Week

Northern Vermont, specifically the area around Montpelier and Burlington is about a three hour drive from the North Shore. It may be a stretch to call it "our backyard", but we will go with it. If you can make it a day trip, it counts for me.

Heady Topper versus Sip of Sunshie.

I had been meaning to make a beer pilgrimage to Vermont for a long time. When two of my Tweeps @HopSnobbery and @LipstickNLager organized the first Vermont Beer Week, it seemed like a perfect time to finally make the drive. I wasn't sure if we would be able to make it, until Newburyport Brewing asked my girlfriend and I to work at the Claremont Brewfest in Claremont, NH. Claremont is located right on the Vermont border. Since we were already part of the way there, it only made sense to continue on.

New England Homebrewers Jamboree

This year I have rejoined and have been more active with the Northshore Brewers. This year was also my first year attending the New England Homebrewers Jamboree. The club brought an astounding 100 beers to the event. I brought a keg of the Galaxy IPA, and several other members brought their single hop beers.

That's my beer!

In hindsight I wish I had planned ahead and brought some of my better beers like Curly's Milk Stout, Camp Randall Red IPA, or Walk-Off White. The club had a series of randalls set up including a coconut porter randalled through fresh coconut, fruit beers randalled through fresh fruit. A fresh batch of Walk-Off White randalled through fresh orange peel would be awesome.

Beer Inspiration in our Backyard: Maine Beer Company AHA Rally

Regular readers of this space know how big of a fan I am of Maine Beer Company. They make some of the best contemporary hoppy New England ales. I finally made it to the brewery last week for an American Homebrewers Association (AHA) Rally.

The stretch of Route 1 where Maine Beer Company is located looks like it is straight out of American Pickers.

While I have always wanted to visit the brewery, ideally it would not have been on a Wednesday night. The last time I drove two hours each way in one night would have been when my buddies and I used to make the trip to Foxwoods. We were so broke we would occasionally pool our money just to have enough to gamble with. An over-priced hotel room down there was out of the question.