Samuel Adams Imperial Stout

Picked up a 4-pack of Samuel Adams Imperial Stout at Fred Meyer the other day.  I like me some 9%+ ABV dark beers, usually, and Sam Adams can have some tasty brews.  So there was the decision making process…

As far as the tasting goes, this brew pours dar, is thick, and overall meh… at 9.2% this is a thick and syrupy brew.  No doubt about it.  My main problem, though, was in the metallic taste/finish.  It was pretty prominent and hard to get past.  Once past it, though, there was a bit of a sweet front and heavy finish… overall, Mrs Heather called the finish with a hint of coffee.  Not my favorite…

JBB6 Rating: Middle of the Road

Samuel Adams Honey Porter

Samuel Adams Honey Porter, one of the Brewmaster’s Collection, pours a dark amber with a good sized head.  The nose is sweet and malty and the body follows with the same… you don’t quite notice the English hops as noted on the bottle, but I will trust that they are there.  Finish was a little off, but that might be a fluke.  Overall, no real honey taste although it was sweet and nothing super special about this little brew. 

JBB6 Rating: Middle of the Road

Samuel Adams Black Lager

This one baffles me a bit and I don’t know what to think… on the one had I like it, but on the other it is just plain wierd.  Samuel Adams Black Lager is part of their Brewmaster’s Collection and comes at you with a dark pour and all of the appearances of a good, solid dark beer.  It has a chocolate and coffee nose, and a nice foamy little head… but the taste is where it turns on you like a rabid wildabeast, showing that it isn’t really dark at heart… it is a lager with a light body, a slight bitterness, and some smokey undertones that put icing on the cake.  I can’t quite get past the fact that this beer doesn’t quite know where to balance the lager vs. the dark characteristics, though, unfortuneately, so it has to go middle of the road.

JBB6 Rating: Middle of the Road

Samuel Adams Chocolate Bock

Part of their Extreme Beers collection, Samuel Adams has something special here with their Samuel Adams Chocolate Bock.  Dark and foreboding, this chocolate beer completely lives up to its name and delivers a truly outstanding experience. Smooth and silky, the chocolate isn’t only present, but it is up on the podium leading my mouth in a beautiful rendition of the hokey pokey, turning itself around and leaving me utterly thrilled.  It doesn’t have the best nose on the block, but where it lacks that, it makes up for it in every other category. The body and finish aren’t too sweet, but they don’t have any bitterness to take away from the overall experience, either. Big thanks to Dave for picking this up at Malt & Vine the other day and sharing some with me…

A good read on their website:

Samuel Adams® partnered Felchlin, a renowned Swiss chocolatier, to develop a unique innovation, Samuel Adams® Chocolate Bock. We started with a complex selection of carefully roasted malts combined with hand-selected Noble hops from Bavaria, the world’s oldest growing area. After using a centuries old brewing process, called Krausening, we slowly aged the beer on a bed of rare dark cocoa nibs from Felchlin®, a renowned Swiss chocolatier. Known for their quality these wild cocoa nibs, harvested from the rainforest of Northern Bolivia, impart complex aromas and flavors of chocolate, honey and vanilla in the beer. The resulting beer, Samuel Adams® Chocolate Bock, has a big, malty character that is combined with the subtle sweetness of chocolate, giving this brew a complex full-body taste with a velvety finish.

Tettnang-Tettnanger and Spalt hops were hand-selected from the world’s oldest growing area and combined with a complex selection of malts including two-row Pale, Munich and Caramel to create a rich and satisfying brew. This dark beer has a big, malty character that is combined with the subtle sweetness of chocolate. Samuel Adams® Chocolate Bock was aged on a bed of cocoa nibs to create its unique layers of flavor. As the beer matured, the fruity, tart, earthy and chocolate aromas were released into the liquid to give the brew a complex, full -bodied taste with a velvety finish. A hint of vanilla was added to meld the symphony of flavors together.

JBB6 Rating: For the Win

Samuel Adams Winter Lager

I am generally a Samuel Adams beer fan.  They have had some good showings on the blog.  This time around, though, they sadly missed the boat with their Samuel Adams Winter Lager.  I liken it to the recent experience I had with the milk the family is now drinking.  Everyone had that nutritional food reactivity test conducted (wife and 3 kids) and found out they were moderately reactive to cows milk.  So… we now have rice milk lining the pantry and filling the bottom of the fridge.  Mind you… I am a picture of reactivity… I can basically eat and drink anything I want, but am now guilty by association.   Such is life. <shrug>

Now, I grew up on goats milk in Idaho… my dad would go out each day, milk the goat, and bring it back into the house for the family to enjoy.  Compared to goat milk, cow milk is mild and watery.  Compared to cow milk, then, rice milk is on the same downward trendline.

Moral of that story… Samuel Adams Winter Lager is the rice milk of the winter beer family.  It finishes watery, has absolutely no remarkable qualities to it, and there isn’t a “spice” to be found.  Bottom of the list for the year so far, folks.

JBB6 Rating: Just Not Right

Samuel Adams Octoberfest

The next couple of posts will be the battle of the Octoberfests… at least a couple of them.  First off is Samuel Adams Octoberfest.  This fine lager comes to us from a rather fine brewery that has had pretty good luck on the blog.  Sam Adams, out of Boston, MA has a reputation of good beers and I am pleased to say this one can be right up there in my book.  While not unforgettable, this is a fine brew that would be welcome in my fridge any time.

A short, compact head leads to a malty-spicey smell that translates well into a dark lager body.  Only hints of spice mix in here with the overall taste being of malt, crisp malt and highlighted by the small amount of hops that are included.  The finish is of medium complexity… it doesn’t just leave you right away with a kiss on the cheak and a wave, but it also doesn’t stay the night… just kind of lingers for a moment and keeps you wanting for more.

Overall a solid seasonal.  Thanks Sam Adams!

JBB6 Rating: Will Buy Again

Samuel Adams Summer Ale

I have been trying to blog this beer for about a month now.  I bought a sixer back then, gave 2 away and created the draft post with just the words from the website, meaning to add my own to bring it home.  Th problem is, Samuel Adams Summer Ale baffles my description brain cells.  I don’t know if it is because it is so good or if it just doesn’t know what it wants to be… It is a refreshing brew.  I like the wheat genre.  It has gone down easy every time.  I just don’t think I am getting what the folks at Sam Adams think I should be.  Which is ok. 

For now, this one will stay at the grocery store… at least until I figure I am ready for a challenge…

From the website:

Bright and citrusy, brewed with mysterious grains of paradise.
Samuel Adams® Summer Ale is an American wheat ale. This summer seasonal uses malted wheat as well as lemon zest and grains of paradise, a rare pepper from Africa first used as a brewing spice in the 13th Century to create a crisp and spicy flavor and body. The ale fermentation imparts a background tropical fruit note reminiscent of mangos and peaches. All of these come together to create a quenching, clean finishing beer perfect for those warm Summer days.

JBB6 Rating: Middle of the Road

Samuel Adams Cherry Wheat

Had some good beer o’clock beer at the office today as an end of *my* workweek wind-down.  First up was another beer from our friends at Samuel Adams.  These folks have had a good showing on the blog and today is going to be no exception.  Another beer from their Brewmaster’s Collection, Samuel Adams Cherry Wheat graced the desk today. 

At 5.35% ABV, their Cherry Wheat isn’t a strong beer, but it makes up for that in complexity and full flavor.  No glass, but even smelling through the bottle produced some good cherry aroma.  So… first taste hit and hit hard.  Moderately strong cherry flavor but not sweet… more like a good, fresh cherry pie that was home made and not with a lot of sugar so a bit of the cherry tartness remained.  Definitely not the candy or cough syrup cherry flavor that I am just not a big fan of.  Cherry led to a solid wheat beer undertone to finish off the mouthful and leave a very pleasant aftertaste. 

There were some pretty mixed emotions on this, but one of the tasters in the room that usually doesn’t like beer thought this was good stuff.  Another member of the team that had polished off 4 over the last week also thought this was great.  Better than great, actually.  I will absolutely buy this again… a six pack, for sure.

JBB6 Rating: Will Buy Again

Samuel Adams Cream Stout

Samuel Adams first showing on the blog was well received, so I had high hopes of the follow up that was purchased in Idaho today…  Samuel Adams Cream Stout came through for some but not others, but came through for who counts, which is the person writing this blog, so they are ok.

We were definitely using the wrong glass, but despite that, this beer shined among the others we had tasted during the last couple of days.  A good, dark, heady-grey foam came to the top and settled in as we passed the brew around.  The first several tastes from the more experienced beer-drinkers around the kitchen all had relatively positive results.  Then, though, we came to somewhat of a dark beer virgin and, well, a picture does happen to tell a thousand words in this case:

Needless to say, that isn’t a fake… it is truly a pretty amazing bitter beer face caught directly on camera.

For the rest of us, though, the dark smoky-smooth flavor and the use of the chocolate and caramel malts really brought this one home.  The best part, IMO, was the fact that it wasn’t too heavy… it didn’t way me down and I really wish I would have bought 6 of these instead of 6 of the Wild Blue Blueberry Lagers… ah well.

JBB6 Rating: Will Buy Again

Samuel Adams White Ale

Sick kid tonight (puke everywhere), so not much time for the blog… in fact just about the 4 minutes this has taken so far + the 3 more I will spend writing and clicking publish.  Good thing I type about 80 words per minute…

Decided to enjoy Samuel Adams White Aletonight as I was feeling a bit seasonal with it being a grey spring day.  At least we had a bit of sunshine.  First thing I noticed was the great golden color… second was that this was pretty cloudy… somewhat like some of the other unfiltered beers we have tasted here.  The taste, then, didn’t surprise me as several different fruits and some spices assaulted my mouth… citrus, melon, and a bit of spice that was southeast Asian in nature.  Not sure if that is right, but that is what comes to mind, so now you have it.

Overall a good seasonal… very refreshing… enough so that I would buy it again and enjoy it on a nice *sunny* spring day.

JBB6 Rating: Will Buy Again