Trendy Seacoast Microbreweries, Part 1

by Rich Collins, Blogger, Thirst Productions

Let’s face it, Beer is the new wine. With craft beer skyrocketing in popularity and new microbrews appearing on the horizon at breakneck speeds all around us, the transition to a beer culture just can’t be ignored. The Seacoast (NH) Beer Group on Facebook has over 2000 members and is one of the most prolific producers of facebook content in my feed. People are just plain into the craft beer thing around here. Passionate lush’s like myself now have terrific excuses for drinking before 5PM – and can now say things like:

“Brewery Tour, Bub, it’s OK…. I’m collecting Growler fills to trade….. I had to take off work this morning before they ran out of Amoprhic Hop Pils King Gose, you understand.”

And much to the chagrin of my significant other, most of these Seacoast Breweries are really into Ales, Pale Ales, IPA’s and DIPAs. I wouldn’t want it any other way. I will drop kudos to Throwback Brewery in Hampton for their focus on the darker shades of beer, and to be fair, most local micros make a mean porter or stout. But the IPA craze is on and I for one, am loving it. Also new to the scene are some beers that I can’t be sure classify as beers – the experimental brews – Gose, Berliner Weisse, Gruits – I can go on and on. Even better, the brewmasters have begun collaborating and making some amazing concoctions. I think of Tributary’s Sweet Fern Gose made with Earth Eagle’s assistance, that is an amazing little beer, and I am not just saying that because Tod Mott is to local craft brewing as Donald Trump is to arrogance. Others like East Coast Common which was a Smuttynose, Stoneface and Great Rhythm concoction have begun to appear bringing in not one but two local craft masters into collaboration.

So allow me to offer a brief rundown of some of my current favorites, in no particular order, and any I have left out were most likely because I have not visited first hand or haven’t been since they upped into new digs (Smutty and Throwback). I haven’t been much up Maine (aside from Kittery, which really isn’t Maine anymore, right?) primarily because I don’t like traffic on I95 in the Summertime. That will come, my friends. But for now I have enough Seacoast NH spots to keep me occupied for quite some time.

So for now lets look at some of the new kids on the block near my home in New Hampshire and some of my initial impressions. Opinions are my own, and what’s great about the beer scene is that no one really cares if opinions differ. I recall from my wine tasting days that if you didn’t recognize a ‘good’ wine you had a bad or uneducated palate. If you like boxed wine (please god tell me you don’t) you were not to be taken seriously. But with beer, if you like it, that’s really it. There are new batches constantly being produced and the selection grows rapidly. Breweries up in Vermont and Maine (Maine Beer Co, Hill Farmstead) have lines of folks waiting before the doors open which is unheard of for nearly any local products save for Walmart junk on Black Friday. As I say, these people are really into it. Social Media has fueled the fire because it is so easy to share and notify other hop heads what’s hot and what’s not, what’s new, and what restaurants have just tapped what keg. It’s amazing how fast word travels and the impact of the beer community online, and in real life. There are various apps to track such things that I particularly don’t use (I don’t really need to) and Beer Advocate hosts reviews of nearly everything ever produced (if you are into that type of thing) and the Insurance Beer Guy does intensive reviews on individual brews. I’ll try to keep this up to date as I go, so many new places to see and try, the fun never stops (until the market becomes oversaturated with crafts to the point no one can make money, or the big beer guys start buying out and destroying the smaller craft brews – think Magic Hat.) And here we go.

Stoneface Brewing, Newington NH

(I say they are a Portsmouth beer because I just want to. Same with Smuttynose, deal with it).

I said there would be no order to these but I lied. Stoneface gets top billing because their beer is just freaking amazing. Almost all are perfect: clean, crisp, hopped up but not astringent or too rich to session. They do a few dark beers and an imperial IPA as well but the sweet spot is their Pale Ale’s – IPA’s. It’s not really a secret, Stoneface has been in quite a few major news outlets as one of the hottest up and coming breweries in the country. In my opinion, they win based on consistency, availability, and managing a similar style to their production. They aren’t all over the place (which is great for some breweries) but instead seem to have a sort of focus to what they produce, often on the lighter and crisper side in what has become a world of heavy high alcohol bombers. And it’s all damn good suds.

The tasting room is small and very friendly, samples are free and flow freely (they give the impression that they really want you to try their beers – all of them) they have a gas controlled growler fill contraption to help preserve your tankards a bit longer in the fridge. They also sell Bomber bottles that you’ll also find out on the streets in beer and wine shops and restaurants. I prefer their brew straight from the keg and places like the Coat of Arms really do their drafts justice. Bottles are good but lack a particular sharpness that the draft imparts.

Also of note – this isn’t a tiny brewery. They have a nice stack of big time tanks and a warehouse that looks ready to scale up in growth. I expect really great things from the Stoneface.

Deciduous Brewing, Newmarket NH.

I’d try to say this too is a Portsmouth Beer too if I could, but Newmarket has made such an amazing transformation over the past few years they really deserve their own identity. The downtown used to be a great place to park for people to get drugs, but these days it’s a booming little city center, revitalized and refreshed and now graced with brewpubs, restaurants, the stone church, and now a brewery. A really, really good brewery.

I don’t get too deep into politics but I believe one of the owners cut their teeth at Blue Lobster, the first major death in the local brew scene (I think it’s important to know that the scene will have turnover and the better breweries will shake themselves out). There was some bad blood apparently and the brewing talent left, only to reemerge as part of Deciduous. If I have any of that wrong, forgive me – it’s heresay – but Blue Lobster was doing some really good stuff….in the beginning….and now are gone. Karma?

So leaving that behind us, Deciduous only opened to the public a couple weeks into the Summer – they still are on limited hours. They built a beauty of a tasting room out of reclaimed wood and industrial modern accessories (plumbing pipes, live wood, barn wood, turned wood) and have what amounts to one of the cleanest and most refined tasting rooms around at a small scale. Not bad for a first effort. They currently have but 4 beers, a American Pale, A Dry Hopped Wheat, A Smoky Porter, and a Berliner Weisse (pictured) as first sampled at Row 34 in Portsmouth in a great tulip glass. If you haven’t been, check out Row34 then go immediately. This style of beer is relatively new to me. Tasting notes describe this beer, named Auroral, as ‘made with

Deciduous’ Tasting Room. Note the amazing wood accents on the fireplace.

acidulated malts, lychee and blood orange.’ It’s super light, low alcohol and wikkid tart. Beer Advocate describes the style as “a top-fermented, bottle conditioned wheat beer made with both traditional warm-fermenting yeasts and lactobacillus culture. They have a rapidly vanishing head and a clear, pale golden straw-coloured appearance. The taste is refreshing, tart, sour and acidic, with a lemony-citric fruit sharpness and almost no hop bitterness.” Yup. That’s it. If you like a light, crushable but very tart/sour beer, this really hits the spot. Not my favorite style, but beats the tar out of the mainstream “Summer Beers” that usually don’t make much sense on the palate unless really cold or you just don’t care what you’re drinking.

My first Deciduous was at Franklin Oyster House in Portsmouth

Renasense is a heavily piped up porter with a good hoppy finish. Not heavy or cloying, maintaining that crisp drinkability that I admire from both Deciduous and Stoneface but way smoky with an 8.1% ABV. This is not Guinness. It has a lot of body without being sweet or sickly, rich and smooth but not too ‘coffee’ like.

The Dry Hopped Wheat IPA (Agricultural) was a winner for me, slammable yet really thick with nice bitter hops, a medium style body, and loads of yummy beer flavors, this beer is a standalone that I expect will be quote popular among the hopheads. The Arose is a dry hopped Pale, the Standard Faire brewhouse selection, but this one is spot on. The only detractor is that the other beers are also really, really solid on tap, and if you are like me you just have to choose favorites. But this is a slammin, light, under 5% session ale that would be perfect in any situation and is a shining example of that style. I’d say it reminds me of a lighter Heady Topper but the Heady’s would have my head on a platter. Check out Franklin Oyster House, one of the first to offer Deciduous, though the taps often rotate. It may be too late!

The tasting room has couches, seating at homemade live wood picnic tables, a glass viewing area into the brewery and offers $1.50 tastes of their brews. 750ML growler fills were also available on my visit but no true Growlers made their way there just yet. They just opened after all. One to watch.

Part 2 Coming soon! Or check out the full article on www.thirstproductions.com or click here.