Best Breweries in Portland Maine

Best Breweries in Portland Maine.Over the last many years, Portland, Maine, has transformed from a incredibly commercial delivery port to one of the most colourful gastronomic scenes in the united states. Just because the metropolis’s culinary famous person has risen, so has its craft brewing scene, which adheres to a number of the identical tenants. Portland, Maine breweries had been triumphing awards and turning heads for years.

The fine breweries in Portland, Maine spotlight neighborhood ingredients and the styles of time- and exertions-in depth techniques that could earn an approving nod from any follower of the Slow Food movement. On sunny weekends, the cluster of breweries around Industrial Park, located on Industrial Way, regularly has the vibe of a laid-returned block birthday party.

Food vehicles serving everything from lobster rolls to Neapolitan-fashion pizzas gather while both locals and out-of-towners mingle over pints.

Here are 10 of the exceptional breweries to check out for your subsequent visit.

Allagash Brewing Company

Back in 1995, properly before the American craft brewing motion exploded, Rod Tod opened this microbrewery in an antique warehouse on Industrial Way, an industrial park outside of Portland’s center.

His flagship creation changed into a Belgian-fashion wheat ale—a crisp, slightly hazy, clean-drinking number with pointers of aromatics consisting of orange rind and coriander.

In a time whilst industrially produced macro lagers still dominated taprooms, it turned into a tough promote. To win human beings over to his product, Tod famously went round to local bars and offered to buy them an Allagash White.

Since then, Allagash Brewing Company has end up one of the most big American craft breweries and long past directly to help positioned Portland’s brewing scene on the country wide map. In 2019, Tod picked up a coveted James Beard Award for Outstanding Wine, Spirits, or Beer Producer.

While Allagash White stays by some distance their pleasant-dealer, the brewery also excels at a ways greater niche—and hard work-extensive—styles. The brewery has a separate place dedicated to wild fermentation, which includes a coolship, a conventional Belgian method of spontaneous fermentation.

The ensuing beers, like Coolship Pomme, made with four sorts of apples from a Maine orchard and aged for 2 years in very wellbarrels, are the sorts of keepers meant to be introduced out at domestic on special occasions.

Although the brewery is best offering digital tours at present, all the personnel are quite knowledgeable and usually happy to answer even the most technical questions on brewing strategies.

Both the taproom and outdoor seating vicinity with picnic benches have a own family-friendly vibe. The draft menu often consists of some of Allagash’s harder-to-discover and confined-release deep-cuts, making this a actual highlight for fans of the brewery.

Get your self a beer, then sidle up to the Bite Into Maine meals truck, which serves flights of lobster rolls on mini brioche buns.

Shipyard Brewing Company

Founded in 1994, Shipyard Brewing Company paved the way for a slew of other craft breweries that might later open up in Portland. To nowadays, the commercial enterprise remains a circle of relatives-owned affair with a real streak of pleasure in its Maine roots.

Expect to peer services like a Wild Maine Blueberry Pie Ale, made with the state’s beloved fruit and providing can artwork that nods to the kids’s classic Blueberries for Sal. Thanks to the brewery’s on-website online pilot device, they’re continuously experimenting with small batches of seasonally stimulated beers.

Bissell Brothers Brewing Co.

After paying a visit to Portland’s quirky International Cryptozoology Museum, which capabilities tongue-in-cheek artifacts and famous on cryptids like Bigfoot and the yeti, swing via this close by craft brewery situated in a century-antique refurbished railway building.

While most of Portland’s fine-recognized breweries are clustered together more or less a fifteen-minute pressure out of the town center, Bissell Brothers Brewing Co. Is placed proper on Thompson’s Point, a scenic peninsula inside the heart of the action.

Although the brewery makes the whole lot from milk stouts to barleywines, the focus right here may be very lots on IPAs. Expect lots of double IPAs and hoppy pale ales, normally within the traditional New England fashion with a haze as impenetrable as pea soup.

With greater than a dozen faucets that rotate each day, there’s always some thing new to sample right here.

As an advantage, the kitchen serves up unpretentious, locavore eats that pair flawlessly with an afternoon of trying specific beers. Try the wings, which are available in patterns ranging from fermented Fresno pepper warm sauce to an agave glaze with dried chiles and toasted sesame seeds.

Other specialties consist of forums, made with artisanal cheeses from round Maine, charcuterie from Broad Arrow Farms, and house-made seasonal pickles. Save room for the house-made smooth serve ice cream, which comes in craft beer-inspired flavors.

Austin Street Brewery

Like many human beings inside the craft beer world, Will Fisher and Jake Austin were given their start as domestic brewers before turning seasoned. In 2013, they decided to name their fledgling brewery after Austin Street, Westbrook, where they first tinkered with microbrewing.

Their first outpost continues to be on Industrial Way, right across the nook from Allagash, Foundation, and a handful of different heavy-hitters. Today, they’ve expanded to two locations on the town with a combined one hundred sixty barrels for getting old between them.

Offerings here run the gamut from the considered necessary New England-style IPAs to Glitter ‘N’ Grit, an incredibly pink, pleasantly tart gose brewed with dragonfruit and blood orange, and Moses, an imperial-power saison.

Both Portland, Maine breweries are host to normal events, starting from vinyasa-fashion yoga to calligraphy training. Portland’s food truck scene is pinnacle-notch and you could expect to look regular appearances via neighborhood favorites like Cargo Pizza Company, which fires up pies to order with toppings starting from traditional to deliciously unorthodox.

Foundation Brewing Company

Another brewery clustered over on Industrial Way throughout the road from Allagash Brewing Company, Foundation Brewing Company installation keep in 2014 with a properly-carried out roster of traditional beer patterns.

Their middle collection consists of a malt-ahead brown ale, a couple of hoppy IPAs, a faded ale, and a pilsner brewed with Bavarian hops. There’s additionally a selection of elderly saisons, barleywines, and sours from their cellar, plus rotating limited-release specials that go a piece extra out of the box.

The great element approximately travelling the taproom right here is the team of workers, who are all happy to geek out about the finer factors of fermentation.

In addition to beer, the brewery has its personal on-web page pizzeria specializing in Detroit-fashion pies. Specialty alternatives include a riff on a Coney Island dog, with sliced hot dogs, yellow mustard, and uncooked onion; a Buffalo chicken pizza with gorgonzola, buffalo sauce, and a garnish of celery, chives, and aioli; and a Mexican-inspired number with chorizo, mole, black beans, and avocado crema.

Best Breweries in Portland Maine

Bunker Brewing Co

Located interior a handsomely remodeled purple brick building with a patio area, Bunker Brewing Co. Is a pleasant, low-key hangout favored via locals. The craft brewery has been a fixture in town for extra than a decade and plays host to all forms of activities ranging from e book talks with nearby authors to stay bluegrass, jazz, and different musical performances.

The brewery gives a number of patterns, which rotate often. The considered necessary hazy IPAs are there, of direction, however you’ll additionally locate alternatives like deep, darkish porters elderly in maple-rum barrels or a traditional German Bock, inspired by way of the hearty, excessive-ABV beers that once sustained Paulaner priests through their annual Lenten speedy.

Both youngsters and puppies are welcome inside the taproom, which adds to the convivial surroundings.

Goodfire Brewing Company

First opened in 2017 in the East Bayside community, Goodfire Brewing Company has built up a reputation for hop-forward New England-style IPAs and double IPAs, plus a modest assortment of different patterns. One of the fan favorites that’s regularly on draft is the Vic Secret IPA, which comes bursting with massive tropical flavors like passionfruit and mango courtesy of a heady dose of hops.

Unlike some of the craft breweries in town, which double as eating places or nearby taverns, Goodfire Brewing Company continues it simple by means of sticking to what it does absolutely nicely: brewing beer. The taproom, which has a view of the brewery itself, is a incredible location to hang out in for a day.

As with many different breweries, it additionally gets relatively regular visits by way of neighborhood food vehicles like Truckin Pizza, which hauls its wooden-burning oven around to whip up pizzas with toppings like crispy bacon, shaved Brussels sprouts, goat cheese, cherry tomatoes, and a drizzle of warm honey.

Foulmouthed Brewing

Situated throughout the Casco Bay Bridge the Old Port waterfront, Foulmouthed Brewing is a crowd pleaser. There’s a solid menu of comfort meals which includes items like a pretzel made with spent brewer’s grains and beer cheese, and ruin patty burgers providing locally sourced pork from Solo Cucina.

Order a glass of Blue Balls, a heady 12% ABV Belgian-style dark robust with Maine blueberries or The Way A Pale Ale Should Be, which uses regionally sourced malts. If one or greater contributors of your party aren’t large beer drinkers, the Maple Old Fashioned, with Maine maple syrup, is a easy alternative.

Battery Steele Brewing

Yet another brewery on Industrial Way, Battery Steele Brewing occupies what was a barn. Shane Noble and Jacob Condon converted the gap right into a welcoming, rustic spot with thirteen faucets pouring up IPAs, light ales, and kettle sours by the pint. Swing with the aid of for samples and to inventory up on cans to take domestic.

As with the other breweries on Industrial Way, Battery Steele Brewing sees ordinary appearances by means of top-notch meals vehicles from round Portland. The roster rotates constantly and the great has a tendency to be impressively high.

Some of the neighborhood favorites encompass BP Shuck Shack, as a way to shuck pristine, raw Maine oysters to order, Smokey & Brines, which serves regionally cured charcuterie and pickles, and Tacos Del Seoul, serving Korean-Mexican fusion tacos and burritos.

Oxbow Blending & Bottling

Since beginning its farmhouse brewery in Newcastle, Maine, Oxbow Brewing Company has become one of the country’s maximum ambitious breweries. The consciousness right here is on traditional European-style brewing strategies that spotlight the terroir and microfauna of the brewery’s environment.

Think: blended-fermentation hybrids like Albarrique, a farmhouse ale brewed with Riesling grape juice and apricots, then elderly in barrels, or Beautiful Buzz, a saison de miel brewed and conditioned with Maine wildflower honey,

Heading out to rural Newcastle is a piece of a trek, which is why locals right here have been pleased with the advent of Oxbow Blending & Bottling proper on one in all Portland’s liveliest regions within the East End.

Since Oxbow focuses on styles that require cautious blending and barrel-getting older, they wished a certainly big space to save all of them. This 10,000-rectangular-foot warehouse holds extra than 200 very wellbarrels, plus an event space, taproom, and a gallery showcasing works by way of neighborhood artists.

Best of all, the patio outdoor serves meals by the team at Duckfat, a Portland favorite known for its Belgian-fashion frites fried till they’re shatteringly crisp in, of course, duck fats. There’s also an extensive wine listing and a selection of Amaro.

Lone Pine Brewing Company

With greater than a dozen draft strains, plus an intensive selection of cans and bottles, Lone Pine Brewing Company is some other serious stalwart in Portland’s craft beer scene.

As anticipated, the lineup includes a number of hazy IPAs, along with the murky eight.1% ABV Oh-J, which visually resembles its namesake juice and derives its heady notes of citrus from Amarillo and Centennial Falconer’s Flight hops in place of real oranges.

Keep a watch out mainly for boozy pastry stouts brewed with leftovers from Holy Donuts, a Portland group regarded for their potato doughnuts.

To explore Portland’s thriving craft beer scene, as well as other highlights of coastal Maine, hop aboard a luxurious cruise.