Paste Magazine Says These Two Maine Breweries Make a Great American Pale Ale

More love from away for Maine Breweries.

Whether it's a brewing award or a 'best of' list, you usually see at least one Maine brewery being honored. It's 'cause Mainers make wicked good beeah, deeah. The fine publication Paste Magazine is the latest to honor two craft breweries from the 207.

Paste Mag was on a quest to find the best American Pale Ales in 'Merica. They asked craft breweries across the country to send in, at the most, two different beers to be judged. The entries had to labeled as a 'pale ale' and made in America. The judges included professional beer writers, brewery owners, professional brewmasters, among others. 83 beers where entered, but only 50 made the cut to be blind taste tested.

So how did we do here? Ranking at #41 was Baxter Brewing's Pamola Xtra Pale Ale. The pros said: 'Sometimes you just want a very light, easy-drinking, simplistic, crowd-pleasing pale ale, and Baxter Brewing’s Pamola fits that description exactly.' Baxter Brewing responded to the honor on Facebook saying 'We'll take it! Thanks!'

Higher up the list we find, not one, but two brews from Maine Beer Co. of Freeport. The amazingly delicious Peeper Ale ranked at #7! The flagship beer was ranked back in August by Forbes as the second best craft beer in America. Second place is where another Maine Beer Co. brewski landed.

MO was a HUGE hit amung the panel of judges. Here's what they had to say: 'Whoever formulates hop-forward beer recipes at Maine Beer Co. just knows how to push our buttons, but we’re glad to at least note that beer geeks everywhere seem to agree with us. MO is the slightly bigger brother of Peeper, and it’s also the more assertive and unforgettable beer by the same margin. A first whiff just hits you with a dank force field of fresh, green, resinous hoppiness—that purity a homebrewer will recognize from sticking one’s nose into a bag of hop pellets. It perfumes the air with pine and bright, sparkling citrus—pink grapefruit and orange, and maybe some stone fruit as well, atop a minimal body of crackery malt. Like many of our favorites, it’s off-dry but not genuinely sweet—just enough to enhance the hop-derived fruit flavors and lend them a greater zeal. It ends with the immaculately clean crispness we’ve come to expect from MBC. There’s no brewery in 2016 using American hops so well, so consistently.'

Congrats Baxter Brewing and Maine Beer Co.! Cheers!