And that’s pretty cool in a way, right? It’s not realistic for every cool local creation to get nationally saturated distribution (that’s how we lost the variety in the first place, the trend toward nationally-ubiquitous brews in the early 20th century). I think we’ve clawed our way back to right where we were ca. 1920 – something like 1,500+ distinct commercial, often very regional, brews, way back up from say the '70s (what, maybe 20?).
Plus, gives me something to look forward to next time I’m in Wisconsin (or New Hampshire, or Michigan, or . . . .).
Exactly. One of the joys of traveling is looking for good local brews. And Martin is right - Sierra Nevada isn’t the best pale ale out there. It’s #2, right behind Stone Pale Ale!
Are you me? I feel the exact same way about both Noble Pils AND the Cranberry Lambic (I once said it was like someone drank Sam Adams light, ate a bunch of cranberry sauce, then vomited that back into a bottle.)
But do they even still brew Noble Pils? This year, the spring ale is Alpine Spring, a lager…
I like Sam Adams myself. It has a flavor that I find to be good. I don’t even try to know more about beer than that.
But all these comments about microbreweries and specialness… I’m sure that the Sam Adams people take care with their beers. But for many years it has been brewed here in Rochester by the Genesee Brewing Company, maker of swill beers that the vast majority of restaurants that proudly offer Sam Adams would never deign to serve.
New Glarus is a little patch of wonderful. It doesn’t get ANY play outside of Wisconsin because they refuse to expand beyond the state. We stock up everytime we take a trip down south.
New Glarus makes some wonderful beers. In fact, I’ll be making a pit stop in town there next weekend. I think Spotted Cow is, well, let’s just say I don’t find Spotted Cow anything special, although I will pick up a six-pack when I’m in the area, just because you can’t find it here regularly. (It’s not officially distributed in Illinois, but if you know where to look, you can sometimes find New Glarus beers in Chicago, but the places that do sell it are being a little naughty.) Anyhow, New Glarus makes some of the most incredible fruit beers I have ever tasted. Now, I’m not generally one for fruit in my beer, but their Raspberry Tart, Wisconsin Belgian Red, and Apple Ale are out of this world. They just have such a great nose of fresh fruit, without being cloyingly sweet or artificial tasting. New Glarus is the whole reason I’ve reconsidered fruit beers.
Yep, they begin brewing it year round starting next month. Cite. I have not noticed any difficulty in finding it.
Their new IPA is also quite tasty–Whitewater IPA or whatever it’s called. I wasn’t so hot on Longitude 48, but Whitewater hits all the right notes for me.
I am sad you had a disappointing beer experience in Boston. Next time you come, let me know. I can hook you up with a couple dozen good restaurants with great, carefully chosen local New England beer lists.
Lots of responses in this thread remind me of music threads discussing great songs/artists. Its like people put down Stairway to Heaven or the Beatles and say obscure song/artist X and Y are better. Sam Adams is an excellent consistent good beer. If Sierra Nevada or smaller brews were as good or better wouldnt their sales reflect it?
No Harpoon? (Which is a tasty group of beers also brewed in Boston.)
I agree with you on the stranglehold on Bostonian’s psyches. My soon-to-be-BiL and his GF came out to TX to visit his parents. They brought along a case of Sam Adams. (like we couldn’t get it here?) And they brought it to the BYOB Thai place they dragged us to. Don’t get me wrong, I like Sam Adams, but dude, branch out a little? When I visited Maine, I wasn’t bitching they didn’t have Saint Arnolds; rather, I was reveling in the opportunity to visit Allagash, Geary, and try Cadillac Mt. Stout.
That said, I recommend trying Utopias, if you can. It’s the closest thing to Madeira I’ve had in beer. Much better than the execrable Triple Bock. Not that I’d pay the ridiculous price they want for one.
Funny you should mention that. Someone upthread mentioned New Castle and I was going to say that Fat Squirrel was far and away my very favorite brown ale. I have a 6 (well 5) pack of it sitting about 10 feet away from me. In fact. If you ever want to make really good beef stew, use a bottle of Fat Squirrel. (Though people look at you funny when you call it Squirrel Stew, but I suspect that’s mostly because they start to wonder if you may have actually used squirrel meat).
I don’t like beer. But the Sam Adams beer I was offered was definitely the least disgusting beer I’ve tried. I know that hardly sounds like a ringing endorsement, but I really hate how beer tastes so this is actually high praise from me.
My cousin got me a bottle for my birthday two years ago. It was quite an experience. I’m not exactly sure if I’d pay that kind of price myself for it, but I’ve never had anything else like it. Pretty awesome stuff.
That said, I discovered the bottle doesn’t keep for too long at room temperature conditions once opened. I assumed it would keep like a normal liqueur, but it starts to turn eventually. Luckily, we had gotten through most of the bottle, but, after a year or year and a half, the last 3 oz or so were completely soured. It’s like the maple syrup in it had started to go bad or something. Odd.
Is Genesee that bad? They don’t distribute it out in the Pacific Northwest so I’ve never tried it. How does its product compare with the macrobrews like Bud, Miller, and Coors?
Sam Adams was special 20 years ago when, except for a few imports and regionals, you really didn’t have any alternatives to what was put out by the Big Brewers. Now, there are hundreds of micro and craft beers available in many different varieties so it’s no longer stands out. That being said, I do like a few of their beers. My favorite is the Double Bock which just hit the stores again a few weeks ago.
I’ll add that, last I checked, Sam Adams is the craft brewer with the most sales in the U.S., but supposedly that’s still less than 1% of all beer sold in America. Keep fighting the good fight.
Thank god for Sam Adams. Their market penetration is such that, no matter what podunk piece of BFE I happen to be visiting, chances are I’ll be able to find a drinkable beer.
Also, they’re decent people. When there was a massive shortage of hops a couple of years ago, Sam Adams was one of the first breweries to be shipped hops, meaning that a lot of small operations were going to be stuck out in the cold. SA famped back their own production and sold hops at cost to anyone who needed them.
