Lunch
Maine Beer Company

This is a delicious beer. You can have lunch for Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, whenever.

Stumbled onto this on a trip to Boston and hooked from then on! Went to the Brewery last summer for a tasting and brought as many bottles as I could reasonably carry back to CA. Gave bottles out to friends and teceived same exceptional feedback from them. It's a great Tasting IPA and needs more and better distribution in CA, especially San Diego!

Pours a nice golden color with a slight haze which settles to present a nice white head. Notes of citrus and pine dominate, with some subtle malt aromas. Flavors are a blend of citrus (lemon, orange, grapefruit) with a fair amount of pine. A surprisingly low bitterness to such a hoppy beer. Refreshingly different from your typical West Coast IPA. As with all Maine Beer offerings, Lunch is prohibitively expensive, which relegates this brew to special treat status.

Goes down easy. In my opinion this is the best tasting India pale ale. Not too heavy but maintains a moderately strong ABV at 7%. This is a hoppy beer that’s refreshing and tasteful. And it’s for a good cause! I am lucky to live in Maine and have such easy access to this beer!

 

 

Sunset colored with a foamy sticky white head. Excellent retention, Smells like a pine forest or a Christmas tree farm. I love how this beer has a heavy pine aroma, it kind of sets it apart from other IPAs. Pine in the flavor too, but it's much more subtle. Grapefruit and Pineapple. This beer packs a lot of flavor without being overwhelming. Perfectly balanced with malt sweetness. The lighter than expected mouthfeel adds to the balance and drinkability, and it leaves a little tingle on the tongue enticing another sip. My first Maine brewery beer and damn it's excellent.

From a 1 pt. 0.9 oz bottle dated 03 Mar 2026. Poured into a Spiegelau beer tulip.

Bright golden color, very slight haze, with about an inch of white head. The head settles to a foam ring, thin patches on the surface and a good amount of lacing on the glass.

Bright floral notes up front, also some citrus and pine, some subtle malt sweetness pops up in the background.

Flavors are a blend of citrus - lemon, orange, grapefruit pith - along with a bit of pine, maybe a touch of floral notes. There is a malt sweetness balanced by moderate hop bitterness. A bit of residual bitterness and grapefruit flavor lasts well into the finish.

Medium body. There is a refreshing, I don't want to call it watery, but a lightness to the body while swallowing that makes it a pleasure to drink.

One of the most delicious American IPAs I have had, and one that has remained consistently good over the years. This one tastes much like I remember it over the past decade or more.

 

 

 

Great local ipa. I would highly recommend it. Tends to be a dit overpriced compared to similar beers.

 

An exceptionally crisp clean ipa, nothing super weird or mind bending, just hoppy and classic, if it was cheaper I would drink ot all the time. Its worth a try.

 

 

January 2026, given a fresh bottle of Maine Lunch. I poured out half the bottle at about 45-50F into a glass. Moderate head falls fairly quickly and leaves no lacing. Big hoppy flavor overwhelms the moderate malt and any residual bitterness. This is fine, but not really to my taste. The beer is designed to showcase the hop flavor. I prefer Harpoon IPA, which has slightly maltier body and a nice bitterish aftertase. And it's quite a bit cheaper. I stoppered the rest of the bottle and refrigerated it for a few days. It's much better cold and partly flat. The hop bitterness comes forward and improves the beer (for me at least).

16.9 oz bottle into a pint glass. Hazy orange color with a voluminously fluffy white head. Intense but not overwhelming orange citrus and floral hop aroma. Flavor has the orange/tropical citrus but also much more hop bitterness than I was expecting. Medium feel, well-carbonated (despite the bottle being a few months past the best-by date).