Bohemian Brewery Dunkelweizen: Bohemian’s latest seasonal is a Dunkelweizen,
or dark wheat beer, brewed with yeast from the Bavarian monastery of Andechs. The banana and
clove characters of the yeast meld perfectly with the bready, sweet caramel of the wheat malts to create
this delicious wheat beer.
These Samuel Adams beers have been floating around for the last couple of weeks.
Samuel Adams Latitude 48 IPA 2013 - Mosaic: The nose is of pine, tropical fruits &berries. The taste starts with some initial citrus notes then trabsition to a smack of pine and earth. Some nice caramel and toffee flavors round out the end and go well with the hops. Bitterness is moderate with a slightly sticky finish. A surprisingly nice IPA.
Samuel Adams Alpine Spring: The nose is of grass, lemon, & white pepper. The taste starts with an herbal bitterness against some clean, almost honey-sweet malt. Light sulfur notes round out the finish. Quite a nice Zwiklebier.
Cheers!
11 comments:
Not sure if it was recently added to the shelves, but I picked up a bottle of Boulevard 2012 Saison-Brett at the wine store location on 3rd west.
http://www.ratebeer.com/beer/boulevard-smokestack-series--saison-brett/61449/
I was there last Saturday & didn't see it any. Must be a new shipment. Love that beer
Had the Bohemian last year at this time, quite nice. So the Sam Adams got me thinking. I get frustrated by the larger craft breweries like Sam Adams and Sierra Nevada who have been in the Utah market for years but who almost never send their most interesting new beers here. The list is lengthy, but we almost never get the fairly common Sierra Nevada beer camp stuff, the recently released across the US Barrel Aged Bigfoot, the Sam Adams single hop series or Imperial Series. I mean, some of this is in Wyoming! I think we should start emailing these places and asking for some respect for the large Utah market.
@ Douglas. Joel the new head brewer at Bohemian says, this is a new Dunkle that he's created.
@Douglas, Your post got me wondering, is the solution to email the breweries/distributors themselves or should we be contacting the DABC? I would love to try some of these "special release" beers. One of the emails I had with a DABC person said that they look to stock year round SKUs, opposed to one-shots. Which makes sense with the limited shelf space that state stores have. To solve that problem we need dedicated beer stores like the ones that specialize in wine. Is there any logistic problems that I am not seeing arrayed against a "Beer Store" like the wine store?
Cheers,
Scott
I think the essence of the problem with breweries already established in Utah, is one of perceived demand. The 'special' Sam Adams, Sierra Nevada or even Rogue stuff is not major money makers for them. Instead, they are beers that they market to places that they want to shine in, and to increase their reputation etc. The problem is that they aren't thinking of Utah when allocating these goods. Again, the Beer Camp stuff from Sierra Nevada is not super rare or hard to get in many much smaller markets. Barrel Aged Bigfoot may make it to Utah someday, who knows. But it was in Idaho already. We get loads of good stuff, but almost always we are missing the most desired products for some reason. The beer geek community in Utah is actually large as evidenced by this blog. If we got together and spent only a little time each, I think we could change some things. I'm open to any suggestion, but I think I would start with the breweries. But then again, I don't totally understand the system.
Well are breweries like Sierra-Nevada--who are set up to distribute to Utah--actually withholding certain products from this market? Or is the DABC just not placing orders for these products?
The state doesn't operated the DABC like a business, they operate it like a governmental department. They won't order the new seasonal beer until the previous seasonal beer is gone or near gone. A business would mark down the old stock to make way for the new. The DABC will sit on old stock until it turns to vinegar and make sure you pay full price for it.
The Beerhive and the Bayou are the only entities that are bringing in special orders in large quantities (that I know of). Until more bars and clubs start by taking more of an initiative in ordering new labels and seasonals, I fear it will never trickle down to the liquor outlets.
Obviously, the DABC is a huge part of the problem. But Mikey's response mirrors my perception of the problem which is one of demand not supply. Certainly the DABC is not ordering things like the Barrel Aged Bigfoot, they don't even know it exists. Mikey, what role do the distributors play in this?
The distributors are basically contractors for the state. They are the vehicle that gets the beer here, but if the state doesn't want to sell an item it's out of their hands. The DABC doesn't see beer labels, they just see "seasonal" and if their inventory show they have adequate stock on Beer A they won't order until they feel they need a restock, which could be many many months.
Did that answer your question?
I'm in the Pittsburgh area right now. I walk into this rural Bud drinking oasis last night and I see a Barrel Aged Bigfoot for sale. Something is very wrong if SLC isn't getting any.
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