I’ve written a number of articles about the evolution of established local breweries in the wake of increased competition. Another interesting case is Mayflower Brewing Company in Plymouth, MA. For years Mayflower was known for a solid lineup of no-nonsense, traditional British beer styles, led by their outstanding Mayflower Porter. Over the last few years they have expanded their seasonal line-up, with strong showings from […]
Author: ryanbrawn
Brewery Overview: Jack’s Abby Brewing
Location: Jack’s Abby has a tasting room at the brewery, located at 81 Morton Street in Framingham, MA. The tasting room sells full pours and tasting flights along with bottles and growlers to go. They tap a specialty cask every week, usually with dry-hopped variants of some of their hop-forward beers. While they bottle most […]
Jack’s Abby Maibock Hurts Like Helles
I am a frequent participant in a craft beer chat on twitter that takes place most Thursday nights at 9 PM EST. Everyone is welcome, you can follow along/participate in the chat using the #beerchat hashtag. Last week one of the questions was about potential emerging trends in the beer industry, and I opined that […]
HoppyBoston Best Beers: Spring 2015
This winter I launched the “My Favorite Beers” tab as a way to keep track of all of the highest rated beers that I’ve reviewed on the blog (you can find the complete list HERE). I observed a few trends as I compiled the list. First, it was very IPA/DIPA heavy. This isn’t a huge surprise, I […]
Brewmaster Jack Ambrewsia
This beer review is blog post #300 on Hoppy Boston. I am proud to be almost two years into writing this blog and going strong. I am still having a blast tasting beer, writing reviews and trying to mix in other types of posts to keep things fresh. Thank you all for reading and for your […]
Otter Creek Backseat Berner
The local beer scene continues to evolve. It seems like a new brewery opens in the area every month. This brings increased competition along with innovation, many of the new breweries are producing unique and flavorful brews. It also puts the onus on established breweries to continue to evolve in order to stay relevant. One of the most extreme examples of this […]
Cape Ann Dead-Eye DIPA
I don’t make it up to Gloucester, MA very often, but I have had a couple of fun afternoons in this quintessential harborside New England fishing village. Most of these treks have been in the spring for St. Peter’s Fiesta, the Gloucester fisherman’s festival. The Italian American community in the area hosts the festival every year in honor […]
Is it time to retire the term “craft beer”?
When I first started drinking beer the smaller, non-corporate breweries were called “microbrews”, a term you rarely hear anymore. I imagine that the growth of breweries like Sam Adams and Sierra Nevada made the “micro” designation inappropriate. This was replaced by the term “craft beer”, and eventually the Brewer’s Association (a trade group representing independent brewers) defined […]
Singlecut Billy Half-Stack IPA
As a brewery grows and their capacity expands, eventually they are presented with the opportunity to begin or expand distribution outside of their home state. Unfortunately each state has their own series of regulations, laws, licensing and other bureaucratic BS, so it’s important for a brewery to be strategic in regards to when and how they grow. As […]
Ballast Point Grapefruit Sculpin
Last summer saw a huge rise in availability/popularity of the shandy and radler beer styles, which are beers mixed with citrusy fruit juice or fruit flavored soda. This trend has met a mixed response from beer enthusiasts. Radler fans have started the twitter hashtag #teamradler to try and raise awareness and excitement about fun new examples of the style. Others have opined that commercial […]
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