Drinking Good in the Neighbourhood
Proletariat moves, Threes opens at Moynihan Hall, and a dose of Vitamin Sea
We’re starting to get to a point in this newsletter when I’m writing about the same events and topics a second time (heck, this newsletter subject line is a play on one from last April), so this is a good time for me to thank you for subscribing and supporting this newsletter! More than a year has passed since I started this, and I don’t ask much of you, but if you enjoy this, won’t you share it with another beer lover? Or a beer liker. Or someone who’s beer ambivalent.
Anyway, lots to unpack in NYC beer this week, so let’s get to it!
The State of Ballpark Beer 2022
I’ve visited both Yankee Stadium and Citi Field already this season, and I do it for research purposes (okay, fine, I also enjoy baseball) to report back to you each season. The state of beer at New York’s Major League Baseball ballparks is… a study in contrasts, as usual. Anyone who has spent considerable time in both parks in search of good beer can probably already guess where this is headed. Once again, the Mets’ home, Citi Field, has shown strong support for local brewers, offering three stands that serve beer exclusively from New York, and has even expanded their offerings from independent brewers more extensively in the stadium this season.
Meanwhile, independent craft beer is hard to find as usual at Yankee Stadium. Seeming oblivious to the fact that every other ballpark in the majors offers an extensive craft beer selection, and beholden to the almighty dollar in true Yankee fashion, you’ll find plenty of Anheuser-Busch-owned beer from Blue Point and Goose Island, but Brooklyn Pulp Art and Cigar City Jai Alai appear to be the only beers that don’t come from a big brewer in the House that George Built this season. That’s not surprising, since they’ve never been particularly good at stocking beer from independent brewers, but Yankee Stadium had a couple years when they showed some promise pre-pandemic. Now they’re back to shutting out small breweries again.
Meanwhile, Citi Field has expanded availability of craft options, with Sam Adams and their co-owned brands, Coney Island and Dogfish Head, offered at stands throughout the ballpark, even at the Coors-branded bars in center field and behind home plate in the upper deck. As in past years, the Empire State Craft stands by sections 134, 301, and 418 offer cans of New York State beer, with options from Sloop, TALEA, Brooklyn, EBBS, Five Boroughs, Newburgh, and Bronx Brewery (eat your heart out, Yankees fans), just to name a few.
Maybe one day the Yankees will serve beer that their fans want to drink, not the beer the management wants to force-feed their fans. Until then, if you want to drink an independent beer while watching the Yankees, you can choose any ballpark where the Yankees play a road game. The Mets host the Yankees on July 26th and 27th.
Proletariat to relocate within East Village
East Village beer bar Proletariat has announced their St. Marks Place location will close this weekend after ten years in business. The good news: the bar will reopen in a new location just a few blocks away.
Proletariat has been around since 2012, starting in the back of a bakery on St. Marks before taking over the bakery space later the same year. “Rare, new, and unusual beers” was their mantra — the bar has hosted plenty of tap takeovers, events, and has been home to a reliably excellent tap list and bottle selection over the years. Some well-respected bartenders and beverage directors have worked behind the sticks there, and it’s shown in a dedication to service and selection.
A common complaint, however, has been how small the bar is. The next iteration of Proletariat will be in a larger space on a somewhat calmer block — 7th Street between 2nd and 3rd Avenues, complementing a beer-centric block that includes the historic McSorley’s, Belgian-focused Burp Castle, and sports-and-beer mecca Standings.
The last day for the St. Marks Proletariat will be this Sunday, April 24th. They hope to open the new location in May.
Threes Brewing opens new Moynihan Hall location
Threes Brewing has opened their fourth outpost and their third satellite location, after welcoming visitors and locals to their new space in Moynihan Train Hall, where Amtrak, LIRR, and the occasional NJ Transit passengers can swing through to pick up some brews. The space is a retail shop, so it’s to-go beer only, but it’s a great spot to pick up some cans from Threes and other craft breweries before you hit the rails. (Note that there are varying degrees of rules around drinking beer on board trains that’s not purchased on board: it’s a no-no on Amtrak, frowned upon on NJ Transit, and practically encouraged on LIRR, save for a few drinking holidays that bring out the amateurs when it’s temporarily banned.) The shop is open daily from 11am-8pm.
In other Threes news, their annual Can Jam is back in the backyard in Gowanus on Sunday, May 8th. Save the date for an event that celebrates beer by the can, with special cans from breweries all across the country in a pay-as-you-go event. The party will start at 1pm and go until the beer runs out.
Brewery Tracker
Total brewery count: 2,644
Total breweries visited in 2022: 115
Total breweries visited in Massachusetts: 16
Brewery Visit of the Week
Brewery #2633, Vitamin Sea Brewing, Weymouth, Massachusetts (Visited 15-Apr-2022)
A brewery visit can be made or broken on the basis of the weather. My trip to Cisco Brewers on Nantucket last summer was a visit that could’ve gone very if the weather had been 60°F and rainy instead of 80°F and sunny. So here I found myself again in Massachusetts, this time on a gorgeous spring day where people scrambled for outdoor seating in the late afternoon sun at Vitamin Sea.
Vitamin Sea is one of those hazebro fan favorites and has quickly developed a hype-beast reputation in the four years they’ve been open. I’m always skeptical of these types of places, and the obnoxious contrarian that I am, I’m drawn to ordering beer styles that breweries like this aren’t known for. I had a dark mild (called Mildly Amused) before having their Vitamin C-4, a collaboration Double IPA with Middletown, New York’s Equilibrium Brewery. Both were very good. Splitting the difference, I tried the Rail to Rail, their hoppy lager with Mosaic hops that was both clean and dank. Vitamin Sea is no one-trick pony.
But with the sun shining and reggae playing in and outside the taproom on a picture-perfect spring day, the vibes were even better than the beer.
Long Listen of the Week
For a long time, I was convinced El Segundo Brewing Company’s Broken Skull beers were just a silly gimmick — a tasty tie-in with professional wrestler Steve Austin. But this Brewbound podcast suggests he’s a savvy marketer who gives a damn about beer. And I’m not just writing that because Stone Cold said so.
One More Thing
Good evening from the shores of Okanagan Lake in interior British Columbia. I’ll have more from here in next week’s newsletter, but a friend and I spent time tonight at Neighbourhood Brewing in Penticton, and it’s going to be hard to top this place. Their slow-pour Pursuit Pils was outrageously good, as was this Gambler West Coast IPA, pictured here in a glass as gorgeous as the beer itself:
Cheers,
Chris
What did you think of Widowmaker in Braintree? I've sent my dad there on many times to pick up some local suds.
Wait is it actually frowned upon to drink beers on NJ Transit? I've been doing that for a decade-ish, never had much of a problem with it. Although a lot of people *do* frown at me...