Local Craft Brewfest

Lots of good beers and spirits to try. Way too many hipsters for my liking. (There must have been a sale on flannel shirts that day)
They advertised for having plenty of food trucks but there were only two there.

Free event passes from Unilocal definitely sweetened the deal, but I was overall impressed by the Local Craft Brewfest held in the Boston cruise port this year. Lines were manageable, and the drinks kept on flowing. Servers were happy to give you one, two, or three refills at once of a wide variety of beers, ciders, and spirits. Your regular breweries — notch, Sam Adams, and Harpoon were represented — but I did try several new ciders and breweries I had not heard before. Distilleries brought several variations on drinks that you could check off in the event program. Several distilleries made signature cocktails in large buckets allowing you to enjoy a cocktail in the small beer sample glasses. Several vendors were also handing out free passes to their facilities.
The only complaint of the evening was the dearth of food. Only two food trucks? And positioned outside in a wind tunnel that made for a survival of the fittest to pick up your burger or salad? There were only 1 – 2 options inside, which was quite disappointing, especially given the amount of liquors being served. Otherwise, a nice night out and good way to try local brews.

Great event! I found a lot of new spirits and foods in the area that I will be searching out.

Too few breweries (some that were advertised/​promised were not there) and way too many ran out of beer (and we weren’t even the last group to attend). Would’ve been worth $ 10 but as it is it was way overpriced and lame.

This is my 2^nd time at this beerfest and I was pretty disappointed this year. The price had increased, the number of beer companies had decreased. The options that were there were varied, some were amazing (Cape Ann’s Summer Saison w/​Strawberry and Rhubarb? yes plz!). When compared to a beerfest like Extreme Beer Fest or American Craft Beer its not surprising how underwhelming this one can feel. At the winter version they also had local distilleries come and that was a real treat!
I do have to give big props to the band. The music was great (and typically is at Hyper-​Local) and there is something to be said about that.
For $ 35 I think this is a great fest but any more than that and I can’t really reccomend it.

Kinda pricey for what you get, beerfest-​wise. Don’t get me wrong. It’s a great concept, but not all the beers on display were local. Cool and all, but I probably won’t go next year.

I’m going this year for the second year in a row, and I’m a bit disappointed that they don’t have their act together enough to post a list of what the breweries will have on tap. Having just gone to ACBF, it is sort of expected to have that benefit for a fest.
Unless this year surprises me, I think this will be overpriced. It increased from $ 36 last year to $ 46 this year, and I can’t see any reason why – the venue is the same, the participants are largely the same (and they can’t fit any others) and without a list of the beers being served I can’t tell if there are limited releases, etc. justifying the price hike. Maybe they are figuring that out the hard way, since it is a week away and they aren’t yet sold out…
I’ll update if I am pleasantly surprised, otherwise I expect this will be my last year attending… which is a shame because I live so close by.

It was a great event for any beer lover out there. I got to try an extremely rare beer from Sam Adams and that was a truly unique experience. I also was exposed to a number of local breweries who I had not encountered before. I am only sorry that I could not attend both sessions.
Tip: Bring some extra cash for the food venders as they are well worth it.

This event was fun. It was nice to try different beers (even though I won’t remember most of them), and it was down the street from my apartment. I will say that I felt the event was overpriced for what it was, even after I got my swhirl on. They should have offered larger cups instead of those tumbers they provided. Also, I felt that the venue was so/​so, I think you need larger cups, more vendors, more food options, and more beers AND THEN you can give the tumblers and charge what you do.
Won’t be back until the price is lowered, or the venue is changed, or the cup size is increased.

Won free VIP tickets through Unilocal — thanks, Unilocal!We had a great time!
Lots of different types of beer from local breweries, good music, friendly people. I learned a lot about New England and discovered some great new beers/​ciders/​wines. A bit hard to navigate, but that is to be expected when hundreds of people are wandering around and drinking. I wish there had been more food (there were small samples from local restaurants and vendors, but something more substantial would have been nice).
The best part was the free ride to/​from the event via Sidecar — huge plus that we really appreciated!

Yeah, this was awesome.
+ Three hours of nonstop beer «tastes,» which really just means nonstop drinking.
+ Delicious food plates for $ 5/​each… we tried the local ravioli (can’t remember from where) and a taco from 5 Horses. Delish!
+ Mead! I love mead! More mead!
+ Live music! YAY!
Being a nitpicky event planner (sorry!)
— The ladies at the front door weren’t automatically handing out pencils with your beer list, so I had to go back out and grab one.
— There weren’t many cup rinsing stations, which would have been awesome. If they had set up the beer stations in a circle with the brews facing out, a set of tables could all have had a cup rinse set in the middle between them.
— Cheap bins o’ pretzels or crackers could have been good for those of us who really should have eaten more before they got there. (Kind of my damn fault.)
All in all, I had a fabulous time. So fabulous that I went home and puked twice and my boyfriend couldn’t get me out of bed to hang out with his friends an hour later. (It was lights out by 8pm. Woops.)
Let’s do it again!

It was great. Wonderful selection of Beers and wonderful people.

Wahoo! Beerbeerbeer… I love it so. And as a pretentious urban snob, I also love me some local vendors/​ingredients. Having attended this fest last year (its first annual!), I’ve been pacing back and forth in my cave waiting for this one for awhile.
Maybe the glow of the very first event wore off, but I can’t say I loved this one as much as last year. True, I did love it very much. Before I launch into things I liked, let me give a short list of things I was not super enthused by:
–the sound levels were just totally off. The Armory is tiny and it has great acoustics, so why did the staff feel like we needed to be blasted with high volume? I wanted to enjoy the bands, but I also wanted them to turn it down a bit.
–There was a lady in charge of hyping… question mark? She did it at the end of each session (I attended two of three). I don’t know about you, but after two and a half hours of drinking, I am plenty hyped. The last thing I wanted to do was engage in a round of «i say hyper, you say local!»
–I was disappointed not to see some of my local favorites there, like SlumBrew, Night Shift, and Pretty Things. I mean, the fest was in Somerville – practically these breweries own backyards! I’m sure they had a good reason, but I missed them.
Good stuff: Hello, everything else! Fantastic beer and mead selections. Some of my faves of the fest were Portico Fuzzy Logic (a new brewery to Boston and super delicious), Sam Adams Utopias (I mean, come on. It’s got a world record. I could hardly believe that BB gifted it to mere mortals), and Watch City’s BABES Doppelbock. Yes, I may be slightly partial due to my BABES membership, but whatever. That was a solid beer, ladies.
The food was yummy. I love any excuse to eat Valenti’s pasta, specifically the strawberry-​chevre raviolo with balsamic sauce on top. Omnomnomnom.
SBN has thrown three fests now, and I think they’re learning from each one. Can’t wait for the fall fest at the Seaport!

There’s a tear in my beer, and it’s because this festival is over.
The true mark of a good beer fest is that you try some amaaaaazing beers at the beginning, and make a mental note of what they are… and by the end, you are still trying some amaaaaazing beers, but all of a sudden the handwriting on your mental notes gets too fuzzy to read!
Although I was disappointed that one favorite was missing (ahem, Pretty Things), there were more breweries represented than you could shake a stick at, and definitely more than you could try in 3 hours. The refreshing thing about this festival was, the number of breweries you could sample wasn’t limited by long lines; rather, it was capped by the amount of beer one person can (or should) drink in 3 hours. The room was so crowded, but there really weren’t any lines to speak of (except the line to get in – word to the wise: arrive early).
The favorites: Night Shift (with Viva Habanera, Taza Chocolate Stout, and Bee Tea, a Belgian-​style beer with green tea and honey) and Slumbrew (between the clever names — Porter Square Porter, anyone? — and some seriously yummy formulas, they won me over).
Other eminent participants: Mystic, Jack’s Abby, Backlash, Idle Hands, CBC.
Side note: while many lovely food vendors participated, EH Chocolatier’s chocolates were life-​changing. Try some! And then buy some!
Kudos to the Boston Local Food Committee for organizing a beer festival on just the right scale. In a neighborhood with parking; with a manageable number of breweries; and not so insanely oversold that you were waiting an hour in line to try a single beer.

What a kick arse event!
The event had was predominantly brewers of beer, though there was a row of vineyards and also a few cider purveyors there as well. I only sampled the beers, as I didn’t want to suffer any after effects of «beer before liquor…» Food was available for sale, though I never bought anything. Upstairs, there were a few cheesemongers with samples.
I attended the evening session on Saturday night (Father’s Day eve) with a friend. Arriving shortly after 7PM, there was a steady line heading back towards the parking lot of the armory by the time I arrived. Luckily it was a relatively fast moving line, with carding, cups, and wristbands at the end of it.
I was worried that the even might get too crowded, though I think they captured the perfect amount of crowd! Enough to make it worth the brewers’ time, while still creating an enjoyable experience for attendees.
The Night Shift «Viva Haberna» beer was probably my favorite. It had the appropriate amount of kick to it! Up to this point, I hadn’t sampled any of their beers, but will now be on the look out for them. There were some familiar names of brewers with a growing fan base like Slumbrew and Jack’s Abby. It is wonderful to meet some of the faces behind the delicious brews and see people passionate about their craft discussing their product.
In addition, Highland Kitchen was not packed (we were worried about that), so it made a suitable stop for food and more drinks after the event ended at 10 PM.
They announced plans for an event in October. Based on my experience here, I suspect that I will be back for Round 2. Kudos on a great event!

I had a great time at this event tonight!
As it got later, the crowd definitely got larger so it was a bit hard to move around. They had a TON of beer to taste. I am not a huge fan of beer and was hoping for more of a cider and wine selection. But, since I was driving it was probably best that there was only one row of cider and wine peeps. All the vendors were really friendly and happy to give you all the details about what they had to offer and where you could find it. My favorite sample was the cider from Bantam.
My friend and I decided to take a sampling break and purchase some food. We got some cupcakes from Kickass cupcakes that were okay and a pork belly taco (that’s right pork belly taco) from Five Horses Tavern that was delicious.
The band was fun and a right fit for the venue. They are having another event in October and after my experience at this event I would certainly go again in the fall.