NH's Best Beer? Choose From The 58 Craft Breweries

Never talk religion or politics. Or the best local beer.

Well, the Daily Meal broke that last rule when it claimed to have zeroed in on the best beer in New Hampshire. The foodie website named 100 other top beers in America, too, and you can check that list out here.

New Hampshire's top beer, according to the Meal, is Stoneface Hopulization. Made in Newington, Stoneface packs a punch with an 8.9 percent ABV.

"With an 8.9 percent ABV, Stoneface’s double-dry hopped beer Hopulization is a certifiable juice bomb," the website said. "Galaxy and Calypso hops give this medium-bodied beer notes of citrus and pineapple perfect for any IPA fan."

The popularity of craft breweries in New Hampshire have spiked sharply in recent years. There are 58 craft breweries here, according to the Brewers Association. That's 5.6 breweries per 100,000 adults 21+ in the state, the ninth-highest ratio in the country. They make 103,329 barrels of craft beer every year.

Overall, beer sales volume was down 1.2 percent in 2017, according to the Brewers Association. But craft beer sales jumped 5 percent and accounted for 12.7 percent of the overall beer market.

If you’re into the beer you might recognize some of the more popular or highly rated brews on the list, including Russian River Pliny the Elder — and Younger, of course — Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA, Allagash White, Founders Kentucky Breakfast Stout and The Alchemist Heady Topper.

Good brewers and ingredients are essential to any great beer. But other factors — including something as small as the tap used to pour the beverage and the glassware used to drink it — also play a role.

To figure out which beers are America’s best, the authors at the Daily Meal cross-referenced beer ratings on the app Untappd and the sites BeerAdvocate and RateBeer. The site looked for beers that got the highest marks from both average joes — including your tatted up, bearded friend — and beer-tasting professionals. The authors also used their own “extensive tasting experience and knowledge,” giving preference to the best beers the site’s editors have had in the last year.

The Daily Meal also gave special consideration to states with a smaller number of brewers, including North Dakota and New Mexico.

“Thus, nearly every state in the union is represented on our list of the 101 best beers in America,” the authors wrote.

The beers are not ranked in any particular order, noting that it’s “frankly impossible” to compare one style against another.

So don’t worry, you can still debate which is actually the best.

Patch reporter Dan Hampton contributed to this report.

Photo credit: Shutterstock / Natalya Okorokova