Samuel Adams Brown Ale
December 17, 2006 – 10:06 am
I just had the Sam Adams Brown Ale for the first time the other night. It poured a dark orange and brown color with a thin head that dissipated very quickly. It certainly looked like the other brown ales I had tried before.
Immediately I noticed a malty taste. There was a hint of caramel, maybe toffee. But there wasn’t much bitterness. The finish was quick and clean. The aroma, again like other brown ales I have tried, was mostly neutral, not giving much hint of the malty backbone of the beer.
I am fairly quick to find a beer too “hoppy” or bitter. Thus, I tend to enjoy the beers that are more malty than hoppy. In that sense, I enjoyed the Sam Adams. I found that the clean finish neutralized the malt taste nicely. I find the main risk with malty beers is that they linger on the palate, giving the back of the mouth that sweet and sticky sensation, which may be fine for candy but isn’t that enjoyable in a beer. The finish of the Sam Adams wipes all of that out.
A fine brown ale indeed.