(Boston, MA) – Jim Perry and Mark Edwards, one-half of Harpoon Brewery’s Board of Directors, knew that being longtime friends with Harpoon’s co-founders Rich and Dan (the other half of the Board) would eventually pay off; they were tapped to develop the 46th session of the 100 Barrel Series, the brewery’s line of limited batch beers. This week the Harpoon 100 Barrel Series Directors’ Cut was released.
Brewing, like friendship, involves collaboration. “We had the problem of trying to figure out what style to brew, and we never found a beer we could both agree on,” says Jim. “I wanted to brew a stout and Mark wanted to brew a pale ale. In the spirit of compromise, we decided that maybe we should try a blend.”
Harpoon Directors’ Cut is a blend of pale ale and stout. The aroma is a combination of hop from the pale ale with roasted notes and just a hint of smoke from the stout. The rounded body of the beer starts with sweetness from the caramel malt in the pale ale and finishes with aggressive roasted fullness of the stout. The finish is crisp and bitter, but with no astringency. This perfectly blended beer is the marriage of two excellent individual beers coming together to make one phenomenal brew.
“As longtime friends of Rich and Dan, we’ve been involved with Harpoon since the very beginning. This is the first time we have been able to get our hands onto something and really help craft it,” says Mark. “It was fun to taste different styles and mix-and-match. We’re very excited with how it turned out.”
Harpoon introduced the 100 Barrel Series in 2003 to showcase the individual brewing talents of its brewers. Every couple months, a different Harpoon brewer is invited to choose a style of beer, formulate the recipe, and brew the beer. That brewer’s signature can be found on the bottle label. The beers in the series are one-offs; they are brewed in limited batches and are available only until the batch sells out. Since the series began in May of 2003, 46 different styles of beer have been brewed. For a complete list of beers that have been released as part of the 100 Barrel Series, visit www.harpoonbrewery.com.
The Harpoon 100 Barrel Series Directors’ Cut is available in 22 oz. bottles with limited draft availability.
Harpoon 100 Barrel Series Directors’ Cut Beer Specifications:
ABV: 6.3%
IBUs: 41
Color: 85 EBC
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