What happened to Sam Adams Boston Lager

cannondale · Post by **cannondale** » Mon Oct 06, 2008 11:48 pm

Has anyone tried Sam Adams BL lately? It appears to have changed significanctly. Far lighter in colour. Similar flavour profile, but muted. Certainly less bitterness. The label says 'brewed in Boston, MA and CIncinnati, OH', but I don't recall whether that was always the case, so I'm not sure whether it's related to brewing it in Cincinnati. Seems more pale lager than premium lager, that's for sure. Wah happun??

Derek · Post by **Derek** » Tue Oct 07, 2008 8:50 am

They started out as a contract brewer (no brewery), so its been brewed at a number of places.

matt7215 · Post by **matt7215** » Tue Oct 07, 2008 4:46 pm

i used to drink the Sam Adams quite a bit before the Brooklyn lager showed up here, Ill revisit the SA and post my findings but I dont think it will replace the Brooklyn as my go to summer lager

jesskidden · Post by **jesskidden** » Wed Oct 08, 2008 8:34 am

cannondale wrote:Has anyone tried Sam Adams BL lately? It appears to have changed significanctly. Far lighter in colour. Similar flavour profile, but muted. Certainly less bitterness. The label says 'brewed in Boston, MA and CIncinnati, OH', but I don't recall whether that was always the case, so I'm not sure whether it's related to brewing it in Cincinnati. Seems more pale lager than premium lager, that's for sure. Wah happun??

As Derek notes, the "original" Boston Lager was brewed by Pittsburgh Brewing Company (Iron City now). Since then, BBC has purchased the former Schoenling Brewery (best known for it's Little Kings Cream Ale, and the final home of the merged Hudepohl-Schoenling Brewing Co.) in Cincinnati. In addition, the company still has contracts with Miller, City (esp. their Latrobe PA brewery, ex-Rolling Rock site) and High Falls (Genesee/Dundee) to brew some of the Sam Adams brands.

In the past, they've also contracted with a number of other breweries (Heileman [Blitz-Weinhard in particular for West Coast distribution], Stroh, Matt, etc.) and they are about to re-open the huge (5m bbl capacity at one time) former Schaefer brewery in eastern PA. Their Boston brewery apparently only does draught beer for the Boston area and some other small batch beers.

Here in NJ, last time I checked, the Boston Lager comes from High Falls in Rochester, for instance. I've always thought it *would* be interesting to do a "horizontal" tastings of Boston's beers that are brewed at the various breweries.

old faithful · Post by **old faithful** » Wed Oct 08, 2008 11:07 am

Agreed, Jess. I had one recently in Cincinnati and thought it was excellent and essentially the same as always.

The real surprise was the Stock Ale, which for the first time in my experience had a genuine ale flavour with English markers to boot. In the past this beer, while never bad, seemed off-kilter to me. This time they are getting it right.

I believe Jim Koch has said that the lager is the only recipe used which is historical, i.e., which his ancestors in the 1800's brewed. The others are newly developed by BBC. Of the range, I like the Stock Ale now and the black beer, can't recall the name, oh also the dopplebock is excellent.

Gary

The Bar Towel