Dorchester Brewing

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By in Brew Blog Comments Off on Happy Birthday To Us!

Happy Birthday To Us!

As we approach our one year anniversary, we can’t help but remain in awe about how much support and love we’ve gotten from our friends, customers, partners, family, neighbors and industry folks to help us get to this point. Thank you just doesn’t seem enough – you all are the reason why we are celebrating this milestone!!!!

It seems incredible that it was only one year ago when we were planning to open our doors for the very first time and getting all of the last minute details finalized in the tap room and prepping for our ribbon cutting ceremony with the Mayor. And today we are doing our final prep for our biggest party of the year on Saturday! It seriously went by in the blink of an eye. And, we are beyond thrilled for where we are today and even more invigorated at what’s to come for the future!

Here’s some of the bigger milestones we’ve hit throughout our very first year:

36: Number of Dorchester Brewing Co. Beer Styles Brewed

12: Total Number of Partner Breweries

33: Number of Partners Beer Styles Brewed

4,167: Total Barrels Brewed

33: Total Number of Employees

81: Total Number of Charitable Partners Donated Towards

34: Number of Food Trucks and Vendors Hosted at the Brewery

253: Instagram Pictures Posted

541: Number of Events and Parties Hosted

1,800: Current Barrels Brewing Per Month

LIMITLESS: Happy Customers Who Love Our Beer

Thank you again to everyone that made this last year the best one yet! Please join us in celebrating our birthday on Saturday. The city of Boston has given us a one day permit to double our capacity, so that means no long lines to get in – we’ve got double the space and double the fun. As part of our celebration, we’ve got a pig roast and food from the Bacon Truck, a very limited fresh beer release honoring our 1 year anniversary, live music and LOTS of giveaways, including our limited edition 1 year anniversary glassware, free cupcakes and pretzels and more. Here’s the full schedule:

ALL DAY: Pig Roast, Beer Release and 25% off all Merchandise

Captain Squib BEER RELEASE: To celebrate our one year anniversary, we brewed a classic East Coast IPA fermented with the Sac Trois yeast strain for pronounced pineapple character, accompanied by tropical fruit notes from Idaho 7 and Citra hops. 6.5% ABV

11:30am: Free Custom Limited Edition 1 Year Anniversary Glassware for the first 150 people in the door

12pm-2pm: FREE Soft Pretzels from the guys at Wicked Twisted

12:30-1:30: Special Surprise Musical Guest (may or may not be a large bear playing a keytar) 😉

1pm-8pm: The Bacon Truck (they are serving from their truck and the pig roast should be ready late afternoon around 3ish)

2-5pm: Live music from Summer Beard

6pm: Celebratory Cupcakes for ALL

7:30pm – Close: DJ Sprino Spinning 80’s Dance Party

By in Brew Blog, Meet Our Team Comments Off on All About Quality Control (And Fred!)

All About Quality Control (And Fred!)

As part of our “Meet the Team” series, we’ve been introducing you to members on our team that make it all happen! Today, we’re excited to get to the down and dirty of actually making the beer…good beer at that. In fact, the best. We’re extremely proud of the steps we put in place to ensure the highest quality beer production for all of our beers including our house beers as well as our brewing partners. To that end…have ya met Fred?

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Fred Hamp, DBco’s Lab & Quality Assurance Manager became involved with DBco from his old friend Todd, our Head Brewer, from their days at Harpoon. Fred had been a stay at home dad for a few years and the timing was right for him to re-emerge into the craft beer scene at Boston’s newest startup. Fred has been with us since our building was a bit of a construction zone and he helped us design our QA program from the ground up (literally from the dirt floor!).

Fred’s love affair with brewing started long ago, fresh out of college. He hounded every brewpub and brewery in the Buffalo area until finally Tim Herzog of Flying Bison Brewery took pity on a him and let him clean kegs and access his brewing library. While there, Fred became committed to brewing professionally and saved his pennies to pay for the Master Brewers Program at University California Davis. After graduating, he took a job with Harpoon and did pretty much every job in the business until finding his passion for Quality Assurance and Control. After working with Todd at Harpoon, the rest was history!

When we tasked Fred with developing our lab and QA program, we told him to go big or go home.  As Fred mentioned, “The lab and QA program at DBco is state of the art for a brewery even 5 times our size. We place the quality of our brews on a pretty high pedestal.” When pulling it all together, he purchased the best equipment out there to ensure a high quality end product including: A Haffmans combined CO2/02 meter with piercing station for cans/bottles, a laminar flow hood that is PCR ready for micro work, a pharmaceutical grade spectrophotomer, a microscope for quantification of yeast, an autoclave, incubator, and more! We’ve got quite the science lab in the middle of the brewery.

When he’s not elbows up in beer, Fred loves to immerse himself in the craft beer culture. When we asked him his favorite beer, he said, “I think choice is incredibly important. As an example, who wants to listen to the same album over and over again?  Sometimes you want speed metal, other times EDM, funk or classic rock. When I drink beer, I usually let the season/ time of year influence me. My favorite DBco beer right now is the soon to be released Baltic Porter.  It is incredibly balanced and complex… a real treat.”
And, as a last word from Fred, he believes”Beer is culture.  People come together over beer and this allows an environment for ideas and beliefs to swirl together.  The diversity of the community in Dorchester makes this dynamic even more exciting.”

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By in Brew Blog Comments Off on Fall Beer Profiles and Oktoberfest

Fall Beer Profiles and Oktoberfest

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Now that we’re into September, you’ve been seeing a change on tap at your favorite bar and liquor stores. To really get into the spirit of fall beer, we thought we’d talk about fall beer flavor profiles and what exactly it is about fall beer that makes it so…..fall. And what you can expect for the next month at DBco.

When you’re looking at a traditional fall beer flavor profile, there are some obvious differences then summer beers – no matter what type of beer drinker you are from novice to expert. Fall beers typically have a maltier profile than summer beers, which are often dry and quenching. Traditionally, the German Fest beer and Austrian Vienna Lager are the go-to styles for Fall. Both have smooth, lasting malt flavors accompanied by the herbal and spicy hop notes that German hops are known for. For Fall, our Head Brewer, Todd Charbonneau thinks of darker, sweeter malt profiles with generally more substance than Summer beers, so that’s what you’ll be tasting. Todd and the rest of our team over here love to transition into a deeper beer with these flavors with a lasting, smooth finish. But, not too early! We waited until post-Labor day for a reason. Don’t rush it – just enjoy it. Fall never tasted so sweet.

Where exactly does all of this Oktoberfest come from? If you want a little mini history lesson, the original October fest or Marzen style was typically brewed in March (Marzen). Then, they cellared it in cool caves throughout the warm German Summer to drink in the fall. The original Munich Oktoberfest was held in October of 1810 to celebrate the marriage of Prince Ludwig to Princess Therese. Today, Munich continues to celebrate annual every mid-September through early October, known as Oktoberfest. Us Americans, as we typically do, latched on to have our own celebration!

To kick things off, TODAY we are releasing our very own Oktoberfest beer called Dorchester Festbier. It’s our version of the German Fall classic that is fully bright and deep golden. It’s brewed with Vienna and Pilsner malts with malty sweetness throughout. The 6.3 ABV beer is well balanced by a single addition of German Hallertauer Tradition hops with a long and satisfying finish. Try it today with one of the bgood pretzels and brats!

We’re also super excited to announce our very own Oktoberfest event, taking place the same time as Munich’s kickoff on Saturday, September 17th. We’ll be celebrating all day from 11:30am-11pm with lots going on including food specials from our food vendors, a traditional German band, and lots of fun Oktoberfest themed surroundings (just wait!). Get more info here.

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DORCHESTER BREWING CO.
1250 Massachusetts Ave.
Boston, MA 02125 (Dorchester)

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Sun 11:30am-9:00pm
Mon 11:30am-9:00pm
Tue - Thu 11:30am-10:00pm
Fri - Sat 11:30am-11:00pm

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