Yankee Brew News Archive

Boston Brewpub Total Boosted to Nine: Three New Craft Brewers Add to Diversity of Hub Beer Scene

Originally Published: 10/96

By: Kerry J Byrne

When Commonwealth Brewing Company opened in 1986 it remained for years the only place in Boston where you could sit down to eat and order a pint of freshly-made, hand-crafted beer. In fact, Commonwealth was the first brewpub east of the Mississippi.

The brewpub concept slowly caught on until finally, a decade later when the calendar read 1996, the dynamic Boston/Cambridge beer scene boasted six brewery-restaurants. Suddenly this summer the city of Boston witnessed what might have been the greatest flurry of new brewing activity in its history. In the space of one month three new brewpubs opened in Boston and Cambridge.

With the opening of North East Brewing Company, Brew Moon-Cambridge (the third unit in the Brew Moon chain), and the Fort Hill Brewhouse, the city suddenly finds itself with nine brewery-restaurants. Add to the equation the city's four commercial breweries and Boston (if you include Cambridge and Somerville) boasts 13 active brewing operations which combine to produce well over 100 different beers each year. (It would break your heart if I told you what a burden it was to have to sample each and every one of those beers.)

Following are descriptions of the three most recent additions to the Boston family of breweries. Though the standard beer styles still abound at each location, you should find that there's enough experimentation and a number of rare and off-the-wall styles (not to mention off-the-wall ideas) to keep things interesting.

North East Brewing Company

1314 Commonwealth Avenue., Boston; (617) 566-6699.

Head Brewer Dann Paquette is trying to do things a bit differently than other brewers. "I'm trying to make distinctly malty beers," said Paquette, who has worked at Mill City, Old Harbor and John Harvard's breweries. "I don't think there's a brewery around here that focuses on malt. I thought it would be unique and I happen to love malty beers."

His selection of well-crafted beers includes Bostonia Blonde (a kolsch, the pub's light offering), Nor-Easter Pale Ale (with a pronounced Cascade flair), Lobsterback IPA (aggressive, with a nasty disposition), and Black Sow Stout (a creamy body with a big roasted kick).

However, the list is dominated by two noteworthy selections: beefy MacFearsome Scotch Ale (Paquette's biggest and strongest beer, fearsome due to its rocky, malty backbone and alcohol kick) and the most interesting beer on the list, Triple Black Wheat. Carnation-colored Triple Black Wheat is full of refreshing real fruitiness, but has enough body and flavor to let you know that it is very much a beer's beer. It is made with a whopping dose of black currants, black raspberries and blackberries - 84 pounds of fruit per 15-barrel batch to be exact, according to Paquette. It is like no other fruit beer I've tasted.

"I didn't care how it came out," said the brewer, "as long as it didn't taste like extract."

Paquette doesn't want the trend-breaking brews to end with the MacFearsome or the Triple Black Wheat. He plans on a number of unique Belgian beers, lagers and smoked beers using a variety of woods.

"We have several different ways to smoke malt," said Paquette. "We also have over 80 different types of wood and vines we can smoke with." The smoking will be done in conjunction with a kitchen which cooks all its grilled food over wood fire.

As for the pub itself, co-owners Scott Patten, Mike Reardon and Bill Mason searched across Greater Boston and as far away as Newport, Rhode Island, looking for the perfect site for their brewpub. They settled on a large space on heavily traveled, heavily populated Commonwealth Avenue in the Allston section of Boston. The brewpub, housed in the same space once occupied by Play It Again, Sam's and other popular college hangouts, boasts two floors, 10,000 square feet and 340 seats.

"The layout of the building was actually ideal for the type of setup we wanted," said Patten, explaining why he and his partners finally settled where they did. That setup includes a variety of smoothly blended motifs in one building.

At the front of the pub, wall size windows open to the street, giving the area a wide open feel while keeping it breezy and cool in the summer. A real wood-burning fireplace (none of this sissy gas-powered stuff), couches and a coffee (beer?) table are tucked away in one front corner of the building. Board games are also found in that area.

The main bar is just a few feet from the fireplace. The central brewhouse (with a 15-barrel PUB system) separates the bar from the main dining room. In the cellar is another bar area which, without windows and still being completed when I last visited, felt like your classic college hangout.

"We wanted one very big room with a free-standing brewhouse in the middle," said Patten. "People can sit here and eat and feel like they're part of the brewing process. "The whole place is designed so you can almost get five different atmospheres. You can come here five different times and feel like you've spent time at five different places."

North East is one of a growing number of cigar-friendly brewpubs in Boston. Entertainment will include jazz on Sundays, blues on Monday nights and other music at random times throughout the week.

The lunch menu is small and relatively inexpensive. The most costly items are grilled shrimp salad and pizza with grilled chicken, sausage, olives, onions and fresh mozzarella (both $12.95). Entrees range from grilled chicken with balsamic mayonnaise, tomato and sprouts ($5.95) to crab cakes with chipolte mayonnaise ($7.95). The bar also has its own inexpensive menu.

The dinner menu is larger and in accordance with the growing brewpub trend of serving high-end items at high-end prices. Swordfish with mango and avocado topped with sweet potato hay and chili oil (I'm not making it up) will cost you $16.95, as will sirloin with vidalia onion jam and roasted garlic mashed potatoes, making the entree items on average among the most expensive at a Boston brewpub.

Brew Moon

The Atrium, 50 Church Street., Cambridge; (617) 499-BREW.

Scott Hutchinson, head brewer at the Brew Moon chain's third location, wants you to know that the beers he is making in Cambridge are not cookie cutter versions of those served at the Brew Moon restaurants in Boston and Saugus.

"All the recipes are mine," said Hutchinson, who brewed at Mass. Bay Brewing and Brew Moon in Boston before taking over the Cambridge location. He's taking full advantage of his new-found authority by going all out with his beer selection.

"These beers are much more aggressive than the ones at our other sites," he said. "They're much more assertive in terms of bitterness and gravity and overall character."

A quick sampling of the various offerings confirmed his claim. Perhaps the most notable selection is his big and brawny Excalibur IPA (an 'Imperial' IPA according to a wooden sign which hangs above the bar). A forceful, almost overpowering beer, Hutchinson says it has been slugged down in great quantities by thirsty Cantabridgians, and is second in sales only to his Boston Special Reserve pilsner. It should be noted: bartenders are allowed to serve but two pints of IPA per customer. The reason? Eight and a half to 9% alcohol. Whoa, Nellie!

Other interesting selections are Rogan (sic) Alt, a rye beer in the alt style. It is made with a blend of flaked and malted rye, as well as black malt, caramel-40 and Munich malts; and Rosin Dubh (Gaelic for black rose), a funky, crispy-smooth German dunkel. Also on the beer list were Mayberry RFD Wheat and Boston Special

Reserve, both similar to their namesakes at the Boston locale, and a medium-to full-bodied Eclipse Extra Stout.

Hutchinson said he had a number of other beers in the idea tank: a chamomile hefe-weizen made with 20 pounds of chamomile herbs; a dark wheat; a weizenbock and an Octoberfest.

Along with interesting beers is a unique, rather bold, brewpub design. Walking down Church Street. from Massachusetts Avenue. in Harvard Square, you come to an unassuming door on your left , above it a small awning with "The Atrium" printed in white letters. Through this rather unheralded facade and up a short brick corridor you enter what may be the most dramatically designed brewpub in New England.

On the ground floor of a four-story atrium, naturally lighted through windows on the roof, is a dining area and the brewery-restaurant's main bar. On the right, just as you enter the atrium, is a 15-barrel PUB brewing system. Above the bar, and you won't see it unless you make it a point to look for it, are fermenters and unitanks.

All told, the brewhouse is packed tight against the walls of the building along three stories. It may not be the ideal place for Hutchinson to do his work, but it does make for an interesting design, one Hutchinson, Brew Moon head brewer Tony Vieira, and a team of architects spent a great deal of time designing in order to maximize the space constraints of the building.

The result is a very big feel to a pub that is actually the smallest of the three Brew Moons, according to Hutchinson. Said Brew Moon chief operating officer Fred Rash: "It was a challenge to build there, though the Atrium itself is very unique and provides us with the opportunity to do some interesting things."

To the right of the corridor, before you enter the atrium, is the main dining room. The subdued dining area, filled with soft colors and lighting and the same design patterns found in the other Brew Moons (but with a Cambridge flair), provides quite a contrast to the bar area.

I have not sampled the food yet, but the menu appears consistent with the noted fare offered at the other Brew Moon locations. Rash said each restaurant has a core of "about 75% of the items" which are the same, but the rest are unique to that particular location. The average dinner-menu entree costs $12.50 and ranges from Moroccan spiced half chicken with grilled vegetables and a choice of garlic mashed potatoes or dirty rice for $9.75 to charred herb pepper crusted rib eye with grilled veggies, onion roasted bliss potatoes and Roquefort butter for $15.75.

The Brew Mooners planned on offering jazz on Sundays, but had not as of press time.

Fort Hill Brewhouse

125 Broad Street, Boston; (617) 695-9700.

When I was a wee lad in high school I worked as a tour guide along Boston's Freedom Trail, teaching the city's history to hairy-arm-pitted Spanish girls, giggly teenagers and a collection of toothless Southerners straight from the trailer park.

But I learned a bit about Boston history myself while working on this piece when I talked to Christian Strom, owner of the Fort Hill Brewhouse. His long narrow pub, the smallest in Boston with just 125 seats and a capacity of 200, looks like it was carved out of the earth, though it is located on street level.

The back of the pub has walls made of huge slabs of granite. Most of the rest of the walls are made of brick. The floors are old hardwood and the ceiling is supported by exposed beams of what Strom said is long leaf yellow pine wood.

The look is not one designed by Strom, but one that has been in existence for 366 years. It seems the granite slabs and some of the timbers were part of the south battery sconce of a fort built on that location in 1630. At that time (this part I knew myself), before much of the water surrounding the Shawmut peninsula was filled in to form modern-day Boston, the area on which the pub now sits was on the waterfront. Today it is several hundred yards from the ocean, on the edge of Boston's financial district.

The hill upon which the fort sat was once known as Corn Hill, said Strom, but later came to be called Fort Hill. Strom, who use to own Ayer's Rock, an Aussie-style pub across the street from Fort Hill Brewhouse, was more than happy to use the existing structures when he converted an old warehouse into the brewpub. Actually, he might not have had a choice. This place is SOLID.

The stone and wood give the pub a hard, strong, comfortable feel. And it's a great atmosphere in which to sit back and sample a few beers from brewer Mike Munroe's long list of choices.

Munroe had no fewer than eight beers on tap during my August visit. He was looking to add two more regulars. If so, Fort Hill, the city's smallest brewpub, would have the distinction of having one of the two largest brewpub beer selections.

To summarize quickly: Light Ale, the usual suspect, but with a nice, spicy German hop zing; Pale Ale, a big up-front hoppiness which fades quickly; Red Ale, a pleasant mix of chocolate/caramel malt with a nice bitter finish; Brown Ale, very English, with a silky mouth feel; Porter, with a mellow chocolate flavor; Raspberry Ale, big fruit aroma but small fruit flavor. Behind the fruit flavors is a nicely balanced beer; Pilsner, with rounded flavors betraying its use of an ale yeast; and India Pale Ale, the brewpub's most popular beer according to Munroe.

"I like to brew beers pretty true to style," said Munroe, who worked at Commonwealth, Back Bay and Ipswich brewing companies in the past. His desire to brew to style can be seen in both the Brown Ale and IPA. The Brown Ale was particularly well-crafted and to style. Unfortunately, lagging sales is forcing it to be pulled from the list. The IPA's adherence to style is evident in the use of English malt, cane sugar, standard English ale yeast and East Kent Goldings hops. It is also flavored with a bit of Cascade and Willamette hops. It has 42 IBUs and 6.5% alcohol.

"I'm a real hop head, so I love IPAs, ESBs and stouts," said Munroe. "I'm trying to do a couple of low key beers, but on the rest I'm not holding back." Among the beers Munroe planned on adding to the list were an American wheat and an oatmeal stout. The brewing system Munroe works on is the same one used by Mass. Bay Brewing Company before its facilities were significantly upgraded last year.

Because of the brewpub's location in Boston's financial district it is particularly busy during lunch and after work hours. The food is basically pub fare, with appetizers, soups, salads, sandwiches and pizza (no grilled Hungarian loose-leaf artichoke with cream of pesto fondue and tossed Chilean beef curd on this menu).

The pizzas are the most expensive items, ranging from $6.95 for plum tomatoes and pesto with handmade mozzarella to $9.95 for pesto shrimp with plum tomatoes, red onions and Fontina cheese.