Breweries in Boston

Because a large percentage of the city’s citizens are college students and young professionals, Boston breweries are consistently busy places. Boston Beer Works in the Fenway area, a brewery/restaurant hybrid, brews over fifty handcrafted ales, lagers, pilsners, and stouts. Jersey clad Red Sox fans struggle through the thick crowd to get a pint before the game, and return afterwards to rehash the innings with cheeseburgers in hand.

The Sam Adams brewery, which is still in its original location on the outskirts of Jamaica Plain, gives tours six days a week on the hour to giddy groups of friends. Tourists are taken through the brewing rooms and given the 101 course on hops, fermentation, and the bottling process. If you last through the educational portion, you can plop down on the long wooden benches of the tasting room, where each patron is given a generous tasting pour of the award-winning Boston lager as well as the current seasonal selection.

Another local favorite is Harpoon brewery on the waterfront. Tours are offered on the weekends on a first-come, first-served basis and feature tastings of UFO (UnFiltered Offering) and a rotating selection. If a tour isn’t your speed, they also offer tastings Monday through Friday that are shorter and not nearly as crowded.

As long as Bostonians stay fervent beer drinkers, there will always be fantastic breweries in Boston, serving up craft concoctions as well as old standbys.