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Guild of Real Ale Drinkers & Enthusiasts (GRADE)


StigVillan

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  • 3 weeks later...

Samuel Adams Utopias is on my bucket list

Only 100 wooden barrels of Utopias 2013 was made, which translates into fewer than 15,000 individual 24-ounce bottles. Each bottle is numbered on the bottom. This year's brew is a full 28-percent ABV.

Sam Adams recommends serving Utopias at room temperature, neat, in a one or two-ounce pour, ideally in a snifter. Not having a snifter handy (I just don't snift much these days), I used a rocks glass.

Pouring it in, it has a beautiful, rich dark amber color. If I didn't know better I would have thought it was a high-end sweet vermouth from the looks of it. I took a sniff.

The first whiff was a little bit soy sauce and a little bit rice vinegar. I didn't know whether to take a sip or dip a gyoza in it. Second whiff, it almost came off a bit like a good vermouth, but less sweet, more savory. Meatier. Makes the mouth water a little. I dove in.

First sip and I thought, "I can't believe this is a beer!" It's very sweet and winey. Much sweeter than any beer I can think of, but, holy crap, it's good! It's so smooth, and it has many layers of flavor. Extremely nuanced, with notes of black cherry and fig, and still some of that rich caramel underneath it. Really lovely finish, too. I could sip on this after dinner every night. It reminds me of a port or a sherry more than anything, but it isn't as sweet as most ports or sherries, or at least the sweetness isn't cloying. It's rich and satisfying.

So, here's the thing: It's good. It's excellent in fact. But is it "200 dollars good?" Obviously, that's subject to your tastes, but for me, there's no way. For about $40 more, you could buy a bottle of Macallan 21 year. Or you could buy two bottles of Lagavulin and still have $40 left to spend on dinner. To me, a whole bottle of this just wouldn't make sense, but, then again, I don't have money to burn.

But if you've got the cash and you really love beer (and also really love port, since it's very similar) then, sure, buy a bottle. We were told that, as long as you keep it at a stable temperature with the cap tightly screwed on, it should age very nicely. Some people keep their Utopias for years, tasting them every now and then to see how they're changing.

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You know what, I tried the brewed-under-license Sam Adams the other week in a Wetherspoons. Considering the first time I tried it I was in Philadelphia, I've got to say for a license-brewed beer it's pretty damn close. And that's coming from a man that totally hates the brewed under license model.

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Had a pint of Abbot Ale which was cloudy. Never had it before and by the time I realised it wasn't settling I had drunk half of it. When I left the pub I noticed the pump it came from had been put out of action. **** Wetherspoons.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I don't know how familiar people are with Badger brewery's efforts but I regularly have them. 

 

This was tonight's, my favourite of their drinks.

 

brandopus-hopping-hare-bottle-in.jpg

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