Mybeerbuzz .com Highlights Harpoon Brewery Rec .League

I love bringing you new beer and our mission statement of “bringing good beers and good people together” still rings true even today.  I’ll admit one of the coolest benefits of running a craft beer news site is the opportunities I get to sample beers I wouldn’t have otherwise been able to get my hands on.  Today we’re sampling a Massachusetts-only beer that I think will make Mass residents (and athletes) very happy.

Our beer today comes to us from our friends at Harpoon Brewery and it is called Rec. League.  This beer celebrates “life’s little victories” and it encourages the athlete in all of us to enjoy a cold one.  Rec. League is brewed with some unique ingredients like buckwheat, chia seeds and Mediterranean sea salt and according to Harpoon it is a “powerful source of electrolytes.”  If that’s not enough for your inner-athlete, Rec. League will have only 120 calories and a really sessionable 3.8%-AbV.

To properly test out Rec. League, I decided to chill it and sample it after running (yes I’m a runner).  My weekend runs are a short 3-miles, so I chilled the beer and off I went. 

Rec .League pours a slightly hazy bright golden color with just a bit of lemon and sweet grain in the aroma.  The flavor combination is pretty unique and interesting, but if you didn’t read chia seeds, buckwheat or sea salt, you’d maybe only notice the sea salt.  The beer is light bodied and drinkable with citrus and light malt flavors and this hazy pale ale is just a bit juicy as well.  The finish has a gose-like saltiness, but it does finish clean, satisfying and quenching.  My sampling day happened to hit 91-degrees outside so I “enjoyed” my way through the 16oz can pretty quickly.  Rec. League leans a bit toward the lighter side of beer, but it is easy drinking and thirst quenching, so I think Harpoon definitely hit their goal of creating a refreshing cool-down beer.

While I can’t do any justice to the electrolyte content or calorie count, I can say the 3.8%-AbV is a good idea for a beer packaged in 16oz cans and meant to be consumed in a thirst quenching manner (aka fast!).  Overall the beer has some unique ingredients, some well balanced flavors and a satisfying finish that I think you will like.  If you can get your hands on this beer, be sure to go for a run (in Massachusetts) and try it for yourself…and when you do, please let us know what YOU think.