Top 3 currently-existing New England porters

Hill Farmstead Everett
Jack's Abby Barrel Aged and regular Framinghammer
Jack's Abby Framinghammer variants

 

Mayflower.

 

Berkshire brewing coffeehouse porter

 

I like otter creeks stovepipe porter, ipswichs oatmeal porter, and trillium's pot and kettle oatmeal porter

 

trillium pot and kettle, grey sail leaning chimney

 

Smutty Robust Porter, Mayflower Porter and Berkshire Drayman's Porter for me. If you want to count Baltic Porters - Smutty and all the Framinghammers. I think it's difficult to plug HF into the mix given there is no distribution outside of the brewery and select draft accounts.

 

Tough to pick three and there have already been some great porters mentioned. I wanted to toss out Wormtown's Pro-Am Porter as a top three candidate.

 

HF Everett
JA Framminghammer
Wolavers Alta Gracia
Shed Nosedive
BBC Coffehouse Porter

 

After trying it this weekend I would say Hodad belongs in the discussion. I'm not even a huge coconut fan, but that beer is extremely well done.

 

HF Everett
HF Twilight of the Idols
Wormtown ProAm

 

Slumbrew's Porter Square Porter isn't the best, but its an easy to find bottle of good quality

I have a soft spot for Smuttynose Robust Porter as well

 

Just because Everett has isn't distributed means it shouldn't be included in the best Porters of New England? So any HF, Lawsons, and Tree House beers shouldn't be included in the best beers of New England either?

 

Rain Cloud anyone?

Ghost Pigeon

is Mayflower the real deal? Is that their only good beer? I just think the whole enterprise is generic. Haven't had it though, just samples of others.

 

I really enjoy Cape Cod's Porter..One of the better unsung beers in this state.

 

Mayflower's lineup is solid (and the Porter's a standout) but they don't do XTREME brewing for butterfly collectors, so some may find their brews too generic or too balanced.

 

It's funny that balance is not always a positive thing in the beer-geek world these days.

Side note - I learned that Mayflower is aging some porter in bourbon barrels for a brewery only release. So they may be slowly trying their hand at more geekerific beers.

 

Hard to pare it down but I'd go with these three because they show off different sides of the style.

~ Berkshire Dean's Beans (my favorite coffee beer of all)
~ Mayflower (a clean classic version, good to drink any time)
~ JA Framinghammer (really robust but not a chore to drink, which I felt the barrel aged version was to some extent)

Others in the conversation...

~ HF Everett (only tried this once in a few ounce sample but it made a serious impression on me)
~ Wormtown Pro-Am
~ Wolaver's Alta Gracia
~ Slumbrew Porter Square
~ Foolproof Raincloud

 

Only including ones that are fairly easy to come by in my area:

- Smuttynose Robust Porter
- Mayflower
- Trillium Pot & Kettle
- White Birch Humble Porter
- Henniker Working Man's Porter

I've got to try some of the others mentioned too.

 

Smutty Robust Porter no doubt.

I guess HF Everett,then Mayflower?

Honorable mention:NEBCo.'s Ghost Pigeon

Cheers All....