New England Beer Scene

and on top of this (imo) I think a lot of what Trillium has produced outside of IPA's frankly is not that great. I think their IPA's are every bit as good as the VT IPA's - but other styles don't come close. Treehouse dark stuff is much better, but again they don't have the breadth that HF does.

 

'Throughout?' Well. Maybe mostly throughout? I'm in southwest NH which is sort of a godforsaken desert isle surrounded by a vasty ocean of great beer. Henniker, Elm City, um...? Of course, another way of looking at it is that, no matter what direction I point my car, I'm no more than an hour, hour and a half from something tasty.

So, to answer the OP's question, I usually point my car south. Treehouse, Jacks Abby, Trillium, in order of how far I have to travel. (Fortunately, I have an excellent bottle shop in town that satisfies my jones for Stoneface and westward breweries).

 

I think our IPAs are unbeatable but we need more world-class saisons/sours, especially MA.

 

Agreed, but CBC already produces some stellar sours, and I can only imagine that with the recently unveiled CBC/Mystic project, this will only get better.

 

Could not agree more.

I'm gonna have to disagree here, while trillium certainly excels at hoppy beers, I think they do really good job with their stouts and porters. It's the saisons and wilds that I'd really like to see improvement.

 

We here in Albany definitely consider our selves New Englanders...without the goofy accents

 

For hoppy beers, yes. Treehouse and trillium are on par with Vermont breweries IMO, but if i would have to pick a state, just for IPAs, i would still have to go with Vermont. Probably because of a little more variety. To me treehouse and trillium both make plenty of beer better than heady or SOS. Treehouse's stout game is strong though, i think they still have tons of potential and could one day compete with hill for best all around brewery in new england...or i hope they do, because they are about 3 hours closer to me haha.

FTFY

 

After traveling to Albany for work for the last 3 years.....No, Just no. Maybe you personally feel that way. It's like saying Western Connecticut are New Yorkers.

 

LOL!

 

Depends what you like to drink. If we're talking only hoppy beers and coffee stouts, yes they have caught up. If you're interested in other styles, it's a different answer. HF is still #1 in my book for stellar offerings across more styles including pilsner, brown ale, porter, and of course those ridiculously good saisons and wilds.

 

Glad someone finally posted this.

There’s more to beer than the popular styles. And the huge elephant in the room with these breweries (yes, even Hill Harmstead) is that they have the distinct advantage of both heavily relying on popular styles AND that their beer is not widely distributed. To have the majority of your beers being consumed/rated from the source, when they’re as fresh as possible, is a HUGE advantage. Not to mention, the more you scale up, the more that can go wrong.

Producing small batches of world class hoppy beer and handing out growlers is one thing. Producing world class lagers and distributing them to other states is another.

Even a small distribution range like Nightshift, who has an entire line-up on the shelves vs. a brewery like Treehouse is completely different. Therefore, I’d place a brewery like Jack’s Abby above most of these breweries, including the highly touted Vermont breweries. This isn’t to say Treehouse/Trillium…etc. do not produce great beer. You’d be foolish to say they haven’t nailed the popular beers people go nuts over (I love them too!). But let’s have a bit of perspective here.

 

Stuff like Bees and Stonington were exceptional beers. Seems like they are only getting better with their wild ales.

PM Dawn and Night and day (Italian roast, especially) were good beers you can actually finish by yourself unlike the thick saccharine bombs that other brewers make.

 

With very few wild releases so far, I think Trillium has shown a lot of promise when it comes to funky sour beers. I opened an Apricot Stonington over the weekend and thought it was absolutely fantastic. Bees wasn't near that level for me, but it was still a quality beer. I think Trillium does stouts/porters pretty well, but are a step or two behind Tree House when it comes to dark beers. Double Shot 3rd Anniv is one of the best coffee stouts i've ever tried. And Good Morning speaks for itself. I haven't had enough HF stouts to really make a fair comparison. Neither Trillium nor Tree House approaches what HF does with their saisons though. To me, that is where HF really shines. It appears that making juicy IPAs isn't as much of a secret these days as developing a phenomenal house yeast strain.

 

This. I'm pretty critical of domestic-made belgian styles and I feel there are only a handful of US brewers doing them justice. HF is at or near the top of that group for me.

 

HF can do what trillium and tree house do (brew world class ipa/dipa), create amazing stouts/porters and barrel aged beers, as well as dominate the farmhouse style and put an American brewery on the map for a Belgian style....so I give them my vote.

P.S. I love trillium and tree house!

 

I think MA is strong in those categories. CBC crushes the sour department and makes some very good saisons. Mystic saisons are very good. Night Shift and Trillium have put out some good sours. Trillium Sunshower, Cisco Woods series, Sam Adams Stonybrook Red, Jack D'or and Field Mouse's Farewell, a couple decent Jacks Abby sours, and I'm sure I'm missing a couple.