Notch Brewing (2021)

I’ll be there. I’ll probably walk over, so look for the sweaty blonde guy.

 

My wife and I traversed the crazy car accident back up on 95 South Portsmouth, flash thunder storms, and general Rte 1 garbage but we made it around 6:45pm. Great space (agree parking is rough), had (my first) Mliko pours of The Standard and Grodziskie to start. Polish lager was delicious, as well as Between the Waves. Looking forward to the outside space opening up with food and live music.

 

New space is gorgeous. Fire Walk With Me was fantastic, and that courtyard is going to be amazing.

Very excited for Notch Provisions - they have a separate stall coming for to-go food and beer, it looked like.

overheard some other BA folks talking about how they got invited, sorry for not saying hello.

 

Would have enjoyed saying hello to folks from BA for sure, but sort of a tough thing to figure out how to do. Maybe I should have worn my sandwich board with my avatar on it like I usually do when I go out for drinks? I kid. I absolutely would enjoy drinking beer with some of you fine folks.

It was fun to be there, but I felt like everyone there knew each other—except for my wife and me. No problem though as we just sat at one of the tables and talked shit about our families, which was fun. Most of the crowd hung by the bar, leaving the tables empty. Service was insanely good. Every time I moved a server asked if I needed a drink.

 

Chris put out a call for folks on here to message him about an invite if they'd like. I'd assume some people did.

With the overt rationale of checking out a new spot, I'd love to hear why I should go to Brighton over Salem. Basically a lateral move in terms of distance for me. Is it nicer than sitting by the water?

 

I think the overall appeal of Brighton if you’re not close by is the outside space/food/future music venue. I can imagine a pretty epic Oktoberfest there. I would definitely go for a specific event, however Salem is about 15 min closer for me and to not have to drive on Rte 1 or Storrow is worth a lot lol.

 

As much as I love Salem and that space, I was more than comfortable and happy with the Brighton setup. For me, it comes down to convenience. When we lived in Cambridge, Arlington now, it was 45 mins one way give or take to Salem. Now, it's less than 20 mins by car and 30 mins by bike (not an option previously) one way. No brainer.

If it's a lateral move for you, then I think it's just to check out the space.

 

Looks like it will be a quick stop for me on the way home. I'll definitely be checking it out sometime soon

 

Yup, I plan on going for a couple beers. I'm booked the next two weekends so this is my only shot in the next couple weeks to check it out.

Plus, how often do you get a special invite to an event?

 

Just curious if you noticed any bike racks or anything at the Speedway? I'm anticipating many bike rides from Watertown...

 

Yes, almost certain I saw some at the top of the parking lot as we were pulling in last night.

 

From the perspective of distance, it's a lateral move. Both are a little over an hour. The difference for me is that I can count on one hand the times I've traveled in the direction of Salem in the last decade. Maybe that's an understatement but at the least I am almost never "casually" traveling in that area. Whereas Brighton is not very far from places I am at fairly often so it's much easier to pop by. When work travel resumes it's not unreasonable to consider stopping by on the way to or from the airport. It's not as easy as Mystic was but still a possibility. I really miss Mystic because I could grab a flight of beers and 5-10 minutes later I could be at my gate.

Given that Notch doesn't generally have more than one to go beer option that also limits my desire to drive out to Salem, so having someplace that is easier to randomly stop at is much more attractive to me. I'd love to find reasons to randomly be in Salem more often but it just hasn't worked out.

 

Could be wrong but believe Brighton is staged around the decorum of a “little tank pub,” considering on-site enjoyment via serving tanks/lines to the Lukr Taps + to @Davl22 point a solid venue for future events (e.g. Cask & German Gravity Festivals)

Whereas Salem will focus more on experimentation and limited releases (e.g. Voll Projekt)

 

Apologies if my post wasn’t clear - that’s also how I was invited and I could have taken that opportunity to say hello, given we were invited the same way and therefore all post on here.

It’s a different vibe than Salem, and worth checking out just to get the sense of it.

 

After speaking with a couple of Notch employees last night, I don't believe you will see fundamentally different tap lists at the different locations. Yes, there will be different events held at one location or the other. It's also likely that the tap lists are not going to be identical at all times, but I don't believe they will be wildly different, nor do I believe experimentation and limited releases will be the focus of Salem only. Not sure what makes you think that. It's obviously early, but the beers pouring last night were identical to the beers currently pouring in Salem.

 

Article is a bit dated, so could have changed:

Nonetheless, Chris has discussed the variability & tap system (e.g. switch board, serving lines, faucets) in a bit more detail via podcast(s), but that is also subject to change

 

Oh man I assumed I wouldn’t miss much by taking a break from BA. anyone know if I have to have an invite to show up tonight?

 

That's usually the point of an invite-only soft opening.

 

Touché. I have to say, that’s about as gentle an answer as I could expect after asking a stupid question on the internet.