Eventually I will hit a point in my life when I can plan weekends around trips to breweries again, but between a demanding job and the crazy life of parenting two young boys my road trips are limited right now. Breweries in Western Massachusetts that involve long travel are the toughest, it’s rare that my errands bring me out that way and it’s hard to find the time to make a special trip. In many cases I don’t try beers from these breweries until they start to distribute. A good example is Honest Weight Beer out of Orange, MA. I have heard tons of great things about Honest Weight but haven’t made the journey out to the brewery yet. Fortunately their beers are starting to pop up on tap lists in metro Boston and a few bottles of their beer have even been sighted on store shelves. I found a bottle of Roman Mars, a biere de Mars (March beer) inspired by French saisons and aged with Brettanomyces in oak wine barrels.
Honest Weight Roman Mars pours hazy red-orange with a massive off-white head. The aroma highlights the fermentation, lots of Brett along with fruity and spicy yeast. The yeast leads the flavor too, notes of barnyard funk, peppercorn and apricot. The barrels add touches of oak, vanilla and white grape. The beer has minimal hop character and some bready malts to round out the flavor. Roman Mars is medium bodied and a complex sipper, but not too boozy at 6.0% ABV. The finish is dry with some lingering flavors from the fermentation and aging. This is a really nice beer, lots of layers and very flavorful but still approachable. Great to see some Honest Weight beers around and I hope to try more soon! Hoppy Boston score: 4.25/5.
Hoppy Boston 
