Happy Anniversary, at Moby Dick's in New Bedford, MA

 Date of Visit: June 1, 2021 

We spent a week up in Massachusetts at the beginning of June for our anniversary. 

Most of the time was spent at my folks' down near Cape Cod visiting with them. We did take a day trip over to New Bedford and spent time at the New Bedford Whaling Museum. 

It had been a super long time since we'd been there. I think both kids were very young when we went the last time and we went through the place at kid breakneck speed. Not a lot of people were there, and we closed the place after taking our time going through all the exhibits. 

This is a really well put together museum, where I feel equal parts impressed and disgusted, if that's something you can be. Whaling kind of makes me sick, but this is a beer blog, not Christine is Grossed Out by Whaling blog. 

After we finished up, it was dinner time and the next block over featured Moby Dick Brewing Company. Friends know us well enough that for a wedding anniversary, we'll be happy to eat almost anywhere, as long as the beer is good and the food is gooder. 

We're not fancy but we do like good food and drink. Doug had done a little pre-trip googling for local restaurants and this looked to be a winner. 

We sat outside because we're still not fully comfortable with indoor dining experiences when the inside is a little too crowded.  It was hot and sunny, and rush hour so the traffic was pretty loud but this provided for some good people watching. 

All the beers here are named for people and scenes in "Moby Dick," and I had to start with this one. Because if nothing else, a great pun means the world to me. 

Ishm-ale, named for the opening line of the book "Call me Ishmael," had me howling right off the bat. Yes please. It is an irish style amber, and was cold and refreshing for sitting outside. Pictured above with the menu and other good names for beers thanks to Melville's master work.

Moved on to the Captain Bildad, but I actually think they may have brought me the wrong beer and I got the Stove Boat. 

According to Untappd, the beer I ordered would have had a 10% ABV.  Usually at something that high, you get a real alcohol smell/flavor when you bring it up to your face. 

I got none of that from this glass, so either they have done an amazing job brewing a higher ABV brew, or I got the wrong beer. Either way, it was incredibly easy drinking, which can be naughty for high ABVs. Neither beer is currently listed on their website as available on draft so I can't really go back and check on what I got and what Stove Boat's ABV would have been. 

For dinner, I had the Fish & Chips and ordered a Pulpit New England IPA to go with. I find if I'm having a nice fried fish, or seared scallops, a good IPA goes nice with. 

Unfiltered, as you can see, hoppy and juicy, it was the perfect partner to the meal. Literature fans will like to go read this excerpt from Moby Dick of Father Mapple climbing the ladder into the pulpit at church, and enjoy all the symbolism Melville puts into the importance of a pulpit, a leader in it, the bow of a ship.

"Yes, the world’s a ship on its passage out, and not a voyage complete; and the pulpit is its prow."

Reading the excerpt there from that chapter made me almost want to go back and read "Moby Dick" for a third time in my life, but no. I'll actually pass.

I got the Tumbling Caprice, which was a very fruity almost pie-like beer. 

Sometimes you get a berry beer and there is a great smell to it but no flavor, or vice versa. This was a delightful mix of both. Crisp and tart, it was a very lovely finish considering I wanted some cheesecake with berries or something, and they didn't have it on the menu. 

God's way of telling me to have another beer. 

We ended our day in New Bedford by going down to the Fort Taber/Fort Rodman park area, walking around and playing Pokemon while the sun got to setting. We petted dogs, watched a man fly a drone, and looked out into the distance into Buzzards Bay and beyond, thinking of the whalers, the crews, the whales themselves, and the world out there as fishing boat after fishing boat made their way out into the evening to get out into position for the next morning's work.