Harpoon Tasting at the Perfect Pour - 09.12.08

As previously mentioned, I was recently turned on the The Perfect Pour (by Melanie, to whom I owe great thanks!), a new local beer and wine establishment. It is my new Beer Mecca (TM cmdln). They have, hands down, the best selection of domestic and international microbrews that I have seen yet, at the very least in my area. Another pleasant discovery is that they host regular beer samplings.

Tonight I stopped by for the Harpoon beer tasting. I had the pleasure of chatting with Nick from Harpoon about their current and upcoming offerings, as well as tasting the following brews, none of which I have had previously:

• UFO (UnFiltered Offering) Hefeweizen - A solid example of hefeweizen style, and worthy future exploration.
  
• Octoberfest - I'm not a big fan of the Marzen/Octoberfest lager style, and this struck me as being par for the course, but quite drinkable.
  
• IPA - Very good, and compared favorably to similar brews like the Dogfish Head 60 Minute IPA. Then again, I am biased towards this style. :)
  

The conversation was as good as the beer, and I was interested to hear of Harpoon's upcoming Leviathan Series. The Triticus, a 14.3% wheat-wine ale aged in bourbon casks, sounds particularly intriguing, and will be the first release under that label.

I ended up walking away with a six-pack of the IPA and a Harpoon IPA pint glass, which made for a lovely cap on the event. I plan on attending other tastings there, a schedule of which can be found on The Perfect Pour's website.