The St. Patricks Festival is always a great one to attend.  The weather is getting nicer so what better reason to drink outside on a Saturday?  Plus, it’s a week before actual Paddy’s day so you basically get an extra weekend of celebration.

The 2011 St. Paddy’s festival will be held at March 4th and 5th at the South Boston Brewery.  It’s $20 a ticket but you’ll get a discount if you have a friends of Harpoon card.  Free shuttles run from south station all day long, so no excuse.

Tickets are purchased at the door. Remember to come early! Lines are usually pretty long…

Harpoon Brewery

For more information visit http://www.harpoonbrewery.com/

Welcome to Harpoon Boston!

Living in South Boston has many advantages.  There’s the beaches, the close proximity to Downtown Boston and the waterfront, among others.  All of that is great, but I have to say the hands-down best thing about living in South Boston is Harpoon Brewery.

Many Bostonians are familiar with the various Harpoon Festivals throughout the year, such as the October and Harpoon St. Patrick’s day Festivals, but few are aware of what else goes on at 306 Northern Avenue in South Boston.  Here, Harpoon hosts many exclusive “friends of Harpoon” tasting events, beer dinners and brewery tours.

The Harpoon Brewery Tour is hands-down the best brewery tour that I have ever been on.  Period.  Sorry Sam Adams, Shipyard and Redhook, Harpoon has outdone you all.

Beer holder. Mmm.

What makes the Harpoon Brewery Tour so great?  No, it’s not the 25-minute open bar at the end of the tour (that helps), but it’s the overall package.  The tour starts out like any other, with every other tour guide yelling his tired and rehearsed jokes loud enough so all of the eager out-of-towners in the group can hear. He shows you the goods, all of the storage containers and then talks about hops, malts, barley, WORT and blah, blah, blah.

What makes this tour so special is that the tour guides (two of them switch off) actually like what they are doing.  All too often brewery tours are hosted by no-personality robots who act as if they are performing a chore rather than a hobby. At Harpoon, the guides are enthusiastic enough without being annoying or fake, productive enough to ensure that the tour lasts 20-25 min (before tasting) and doesn’t bore the regulars and most importantly, they are unpretentious and real enough where you don’t feel “stupid” when asking a question about unfiltering, UFO beers and so on.

"Green" IPA

Speaking of unfiltered beers, another one of the highlights of the Harpoon Brewery Tour has to do with an unfiltered beer that is not part of Harpoon’s UFO line – the IPA.  Yes, Harpoon’s flagship beer, the Harpoon IPA is sampled during the tour as a “green” beer.  No, this isn’t their attempt at a Peak Organic IPA, this is Harpoon IPA before filtering, straight from the source in it’s fermentation stage.

This was definitely one of the highlights of the tour, but not the last. A walk through the brewery past cases upon cases of Harpoon, ready to be distributed led into a explanation of the Brewery’s history, and being granted the brewers license #001 in Massachusetts, and battling neck and neck with Magic Hat as New England’s #1 and #2 brewer (Sam Adams doesn’t brew in Boston). Great stories overall, which actually kept you entertained the whole time through.

Beer Tasting and Gift Shop

This leads us to the end of the tour, about 20-25 minutes, as promised, after the tour began.  As you can imagine, the ending has us in a tasting room. The Harpoon Brewery tasting room is actually a small bar in the middle of it’s gift shop.  With two bartenders behind the bar and a brief introduction of all the beer on tap (about 6 including 100 barrel series and Leviathan), our 2 ounce glasses are continuously attended to.

After the tasting is over (about 20 minutes long), you have a great understanding of Harpoon’s beers and a great glow to go along with it.  This is great marketing on Harpoon’s part, as you are then released into the gift shop feeling as happy as ever.

Growler Koozies

If you do end up spending money after the Harpoon Brewery Tour, be sure to splurge on a growler and a growler koozie to go along with it.  Simply brilliant, and perfect for a afternoon trek back to Southie.

Harpoon Brewery Tour Information:

Saturday – 11:30-5pm (every half-hour)

Sunday – 12-3pm (on the hour)

For more information visit harpoonbrewery.com

With a motto such as the above, it is only right that Harpoon Brewery celebrates their love for beer with their friends.  3 times a year, Boston’s beer lovers gather together at Harpoon’s South Boston’s brewery for music, beer, and good company.  The annual Summer Session is the best, with the warm weather complimenting their UFO Hefeweizen and classic IPA.

Dates are as follows: June 5th and 6th 2009

Harpoon Brewery, South Boston

For more information visit – www.HarpoonBrewery.com