The Humble Gourmand

I am on location in Burlington, Vermont, to do a little of the investigative reporting that I love best: sampling local beers. Vermont is home to some of the best beers in the world – MSNBC rated Burlington the fourth best city for beer anywhere, after Amsterdam, Berlin, and Bruges. Portlanders might argue with their eighth place ranking, but Vermont, with its exceptional craft breweries, is well-deserving of America’s top spot.

Magic Hat is probably Vermont’s best-known, but Harpoon, Otter Creek, Wolaver’s, Trout River, and Long Trail are probably not strange names for those with enough time to peruse their local beer purveyor’s shelves. Rock Art, arguably the state’s finest brewery, has very limited distribution: it is not available outside of Vermont, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. Matt and Renee, if you’re reading this, get me a bottle or two in DC!

I heard an interesting tidbit last night over a pint of Orlio, Vermont’s newest organic brewery: breweries and brewpubs are mutually exclusive. To distribute your beer, in kegs or bottles, you may not also have an associated restaurant. Thus, wonderful breweries like the Bobcat Café in Bristol, The Alchemist in Waterbury, and Zero Gravity in Burlington never get to sell their beers outside of their main restaurants. The downside of this is that most of us will never get to try their fantastic beers (the Alchemist makes a Double IPA registering at 120 IBUs – it puts hair on your chest!). Perhaps Vermont, stronghold of the Eat Local movement, wants to keep its best beers in-state, available to residents, ski bums, and the occasional curious leaf-peeper.