You You're listening to Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast, and today we're gonna talk about beer glassware. Wait a minute, we've done this before. We dabbled our toes in it, but this is- That's a gross way to treat beer glassware. Stick your toes in the glass hole. I think the bent last time was really IPA focused, and on some of the nouveau beer glassware, some of the stuff like Stemless, Tiku and whatnot. Oh yeah, I can see the glasses on the shelf behind you right now. That was the last time they were touched. So this is beer glassware All-Star Edition. So I've compiled the three beer glasses that I think are three that everyone should know about and should own at least one of. So we're gonna put them to the test. I wanna see what you all think of them. These are the three beer glasses that I probably use the most at home, especially if I'm just enjoying a beer and not evaluating. Like I have a nice crystal tulip that sometimes if I'm really tasting something I might use, but these are what I use all the time. Nice. So what do we have? You wanna intro the glasses first? Why don't we introduce ourselves first? Oh, sure. I'm Pat. I work in the Specialty Spirits Buying Department. I'm Jenna. I do communications. I'm Chris. I do wine stuff. Also certified Cicerone, so you've had to go through the rigamarole for glassware type stuff. Oh, the rigamarole. The three glasses that I brought in today, which we will be comparing to the control, which is a Shaker Pint Glass, which is better than no glass, but not much else great to say about it. We're gonna have three glasses that were specifically engineered for beer drinking. So we have the Sam Adams Perfect Pint Glass, which sort of starts off as a Pilsner glass and then bulbs out. Yeah, it has a bit of a tulip flare at the top. A favorite of mine. I use this regularly at home. Good all around glass. Has nice thick beadwork at the top, which they actually stand behind. It's kind of a departure from some of the crystal glassware. So that's kind of a point of focus and contention on this one. I wanna get your opinions on. The next glass is without a doubt the beer glass I've used the most over the years. It is the Duvel Tulip or Chalice, whichever you wanna call it. Again, tulip shaped, much bigger, wider. It is designed to hold the volumes of foam. So again, if you're one of those people that's still trapped in the mindset of that you don't want a lot of foam on your beer, foam is a good thing. Totally agree. One of my biggest complaints about the Shaker Pint at your average bar is, ironically, beer filled to the very top with no foam whatsoever. Right. And it's understandable the way people want a full glass of beer, I get that, but the nice thing about the Duvel Chalice is that the idea is that it's big enough that you have all that room for foam. So it's kind of like a glass, think of glassware in England or Germany, they all have lines on the glass. Right, like the classic Nonick. Showing you where the beer should stop and the head should begin, whereas with the shaker pint, it's like just fill it to the top, which that's an argument I get because a lot of shaker pints are cheater pints too, so they're not even 16 ounces. This does not look like 16 ounces, if I had to guess. It's probably 14. So again, another reason to pick up one of these nice glasses and not just a run of the mill shaker pint. Also, is this like a Matisse reference here? Clearly, yes, art history major in the house. The new Duvel. Duvel famously has an art glass series, so they'll do varying designs. There's a lot of people that collect them. I know I own way too many Duvel glasses. And then this one is celebrating the new Duvel, which we will try later today called Duvel 666. And it's kind of a play on, you know, obviously Duvel means devil. So they're having a little fun with 666, but they're having six different hops in this, whereas a normal Duvel is two. And, and yes, the devil's juice. And that, that work is the dance, right? Yeah. Matisse, except it's devil's. Lastly, we have the Spiegelau, the famous glass maker, partnered up with Steer Nevada and Dogfish Head to produce the perfect IPA glass. This, again, crystal, very lightweight, very thin glass. This is one you really have to be careful with, not quite as durable as the other two, but a beautiful glass. Arguably, the way it's designed is really to focus on aroma and really amplify, you know, the aromatics of especially an IPA. Yeah, I was going to say, I might be mistaken, but I think Spigalow refers to that as an IPA glass. Right. So Sam Adams glass would be, you know, pretty much designed for their lineup, which is very lager-centric with Boston lager in mind. Duvel glass with Duvel and the IPA one just sort of IPA in general, be it, you know, Dogfish Sierra or the millions of other delicious IPAs out there. We're gonna get to Sam Adams' Boston Lager because it's actually experienced a change lately. We've gotten a lot of questions about this from consumers. The packaging says remastered. So we'll get into that later. Is it now a seltzer? Beer seltzer. It's a good thing to bring up because I've kind of given Sam Adams' Boston Beer Company a little bit of the business about this that they don't talk enough about beer. They're a beer company, and they've started over the last few years to focus a little too much on the cider business with Angry Orchard and the FMB business with things like Twisted Tea, and then obviously truly has been the beast for them the last few years. So they're really going back to basics here. They're a lager brewery. That's where they cut their teeth. They make great lagers, and they released a beer called Golden Pilsner. So that's the first beer that we're gonna try. I've given each of you a can, so go ahead and crack it and pour some into each of the four glasses. Sam Adams, if you've seen the commercials, they're very proud of the fact that they actually go and do hop picks and hop rubs every year in Germany. So if you are going to make a classic lager and you're going to use classic lager ingredients, it's kind of a less is more situation. So the quality of your ingredients needs to be paramount. And when people are relying on what's available in the marketplace, European hops can sometimes not be the freshest. So arguably with Sam, they really do have these established hop relationships that have existed for decades. And when you taste Heller Tau middle fruit and Tetanang Tetananger, which are the two hops in this, you're getting really choice, excellently fresh versions of those hops. And classic choices for the style. What's kind of interesting too about this is that this is a great example of how you can very slightly tweak recipes ingredients wise and end up with pretty different beers. So on paper, this is very similar to Sam Adams Boston Lager. It's 5% ABV and 32 IBUs, whereas Boston Lager is 5% and 30. They both use the Sam Adams Lager yeast strain. They use Sam Adams Two Row Pale Malt Blend. And then the only difference then that they've given is that Boston Lager uses Caramel 60, which is gonna definitely present a change in flavor and color. When I tried this, I thought this was just, I've been drinking a lot of Pilsners lately because a lot of craft producers are starting to give their, take their chance at brewing one. I thought this was an excellent example. So I'm curious what you all think. And it also is kind of one of the simplest styles and cleanest and clearest. So a good thing to run through the glassware here. It's too bad because Sam Adams, real pioneer in craft lager and they don't get any respect anymore, I don't think. Yeah, it's remarkable how much head retention the Sam Adams and the Dogfish IPA Glass. Totally agree. Collapsed in that chalice. You know, and it started off pretty decent in the Duvel Chalice and then it did collapse like Chris said. Of note, both the Sam Adams Duvel and the Dogfish Head slash Sierra Nevada Glass all have, what do you call the laser etching in the bottom? An atomizer or something? Nucleation points. Yeah, nucleation points. So in theory, these little laser etchings, if you look, it's happening, it creates a constant stream of small bubbles coming up off the bottom of the glass. So it certainly adds to maintaining some head, whereas the shaker pint just slowly fizzles into literally just a ring of foam around the edge and that's it. Yeah, I like that, the nucleation points. It makes the beer look beautiful. Those streaming bubbles makes you think it's classy like champagne. I think one of the reasons that I've always loved the Duvel Glass so much is that, so I didn't want us to just be pouring through gallons of beer here, so we're obviously splitting one beer. Yeah, it's not going to retain the head the same way if it was a full chalice. Yeah, that too, but I like with, even if you don't have a lot of beer left in the glass in the Duvel Glass, or in this case to start with, when you tilt this, you can get your nose the closest to the beer of any of the glasses. Like that huge bowl opening really allows you to put your nose super close to the beer. Yeah, I feel like it accentuates the earthy hop character in this beer. It's the one glass where it leaps out the most at me. I feel the hops really come forward in the IPA glass here too. I agree, I was going to say the same thing. Oh yeah, I hadn't gotten there yet. That's fucked to soon. And the aroma on the shaker is just like visibly muted compared to the other one. Yeah, that's ridiculous. Yeah, screw these shaker binds. Boy, they're indestructible though. You drop them on the floor, they just bounce. That is the plus, especially from a bar owner's perspective. That's what my mom said about me when I was like two. It was repeatedly attempted to. The Duvel Glass too, if you like, you know, really giving some aeration to your beer and swirling it around, I think is super conducive to that without I'm really kind of getting after it here and it's not flying out of the glass. What do you guys think of the beer in general? This beer is very nice. Clean, easy, reminds me somewhat of the beloved, but with a little less sweet corn character. Really nice beer. Good hop cut on the finish, I feel. Yeah, agreed. I think it's very well made. It's not as hoppy as some of the hype craft Pilsner's are. Right. But if anything, that's just cause, you know, they're, if anything over hopped for the style. This is more traditional. Yeah. There's still plenty of hop character there. Oh yeah. There's some bite. It's a dry beer, but. And they are, like you were saying, they're definitely quality hops that fit the style properly. Traditional hops too. Which I do like. I mean, I tried a new Pilsner at a local brewery just last week or the weekend before, and it was all Southern Hemisphere hopped and it was really excellent, but it's like not what I'm always looking for. Pilsner, I want, it just wasn't, didn't make me go back to it. I'll put it that way. A Pilsner like this, I think is fun because it can kind of serve both masters where it can be exciting enough for somebody that's really getting into beer and wants to know what a classic German Pilsner tastes like and it has enough bite to it that, you know, you know, it's a dry beer, but for somebody who isn't really looking for a ton and just wants a nice, refreshing, crisp beer, it doesn't make you think too much about it. It's just really nice, crisp, refreshing. It's beer flavored beer. Yep. It is, but I think it's impeccably balanced. I mean, the more I'm smelling out of these three glasses, the more the malt is starting to come to the fore. So I get like a sweet honeyed malt nose that's folded into that classic earthy European hops, which just tells me they're in incredible balance. And on the palate too. And going back to the shaker pint, still like the nose is just dead. I think I've reached a point where I'm just gonna pour the shaker pint's contents into the other glass of my choice, right? I think it's worth mentioning too. It's kind of interesting is we get the chance to visit a lot of breweries. And one of the questions that I always ask is, what are the, I'll ask the brewer, what have you been drinking lately? Or what of your lineup do you enjoy drinking the most? And more often than not, it's whatever lager the brewery makes is always their go-to. So this beer, as could have it kind of funny, it came about as this was a brewer's beer. Like this is just what the brewers wanted to drink and would brew for themselves essentially. As I mentioned before, it's all the ingredients they have on hand all the time. So it's kind of neat to know that this kind of came about as a beer for the sake of drinking beer and not worrying about if it was trendy or if it fit in or if it was something people were ready for. This is just what everyone always wanted to drink at the brewery. And now thankfully there's renewed interest in lagers and people are curious about Pilsner's. So it kind of finally was the right time for Sam Adams to say, well, we already make this and people love it. So maybe we should release it and see what people think of it. Yeah, maybe we should actually sell it, right? I mean, brewing is notoriously thirsty work. I mean, gotta tote the malt around, I mean, on a small scale, of course. Especially if you're gonna drink like one or two beers instead of just, you know, two or three instead of just one, you want something like this. Nobody wants to stand next to the brew kettle and sweat and then go to drink that. Get a barley wine? The other thing that I think is exceptional about this beer is the value. So this is a 1999 12 pack and I think we're running it on sale right now for 15.99. Wow, what's that compared to like regular Sam Adams or the seasonal Sam Adams? Same, so it's line priced. Yeah, I think what you should be comparing it to is that I'm not telling anyone to give up on their local stuff, but buy this alongside some of your local craft lager breweries and I think it can stand up there in quality and it's a nice value. So you're looking at, when this is on sale, it's a few bucks more for a 12 pack versus a four pack from a local guy. Yeah. And Sam is still independent. I know a lot of these bigger breweries get maligned for being bought out and whatnot. Sam definitely brews a lot of big type stuff, but they're still an independent brewery. All right, so that is the Sam Adams Golden Pilsner. Grab some before it's gone. Tell Sam Adams that you enjoyed it, so hopefully they bring it back. Look for it in 12 packs right now, six packs. All right, we will rinse our glasses and try Duvel. Up next, one of my all-time favorite beers, I've called this my desert island beer before, the namesake from the Duvel Brewery. This is Duvel. A devil of a fine beer. A beer that is so iconic that it literally defines the style, Belgian strong golden ale. The key to this beer is two hop varieties, Sots and Styrian Golding, clocks in at a 8.5 alcohol by volume. It is, however, no kidding. It's brewed with sugar though, which is proportion of the fermentables, which is the magic behind it because that produces what Belgian brewers refer to as digestibility to the beer, meaning it is very light. You can drink, drinkability to is kind of goes hand in hand with digestibility. So you can get into some real trouble with Duvel, very appropriate for the name because it's so easy to drink and it's so strong. It's a glorious beer. It's a magical beer because of everything you said. It has a classic hops that you would expect more in a lager, right? Yep. But then you get some of those fruity, ale notes and it is incredibly drinkable and it's bottle condition. Yes, I am often lauding the glory of bottle conditioning. The life on this beer is 18 months, which given how light it is and how much it's about aromatics would never be possible if it weren't for that bottle and conditioning. In addition to being good for scrubbing out oxygen, it produces this different kind of carbonation to the beer. It makes it softer, creamier mouthfeel. And this bottle fermentation in these really thick glass bottles to withstand all this pressure. Pat pointed out tons of foam on this. Glorious. And that is why it's just chunky in the IPA glass. Yep, the head retention, like rocky, irregular head. It's like the Belgian lace. It's like meringue. Yeah, wonderful. And it tastes as glorious as it ever has. It's, you know, floral in the nose. It's slightly honeyed. It's fruity. I know, I just took a sip out of mine and it just all like floated to the bottom and then came back up as one solid chunk of foam. Yeah, it kind of reincorporates. Yeah, it's like a little meringue iceberg. Yeah. Even in the Shaker Pint, it's got big chunky foam. So again, I think this really kind of showcases that the where the Shaker Pint falls short. I mean, the body of the beer tastes flatter and flabbier. In the Shaker Pint, that blows my mind because you wouldn't think like the shape of the glass can affect the actual body. I get it with head retention and aromatics, but like why does the beer feel different on the tongue? Yeah, it's got no nose and then it almost has like no flavor compared to the rest of the glasses. I would say that the actual Duvel Glass, too, for me, it accentuates the fruitier, maltier notes, whereas the IPA Glass definitely focuses hop. It's crazy how different the IPA. It almost I think makes it over the top in the IPA Glass. It's weird. It's like way more citrusy. The finish is stronger. I hate giving a glass that kind of credit, but it honestly does. I know. Success. See, this was all worth it. I actually think the IPA Glass might be my favorite with the Duvel Glass being my second, which may be blasphemous since it's made for Duvel. Well, I think it tastes very traditionally Belgian in the Duvel Glass, where it turns it into, it accentuates the American side of the spectrum of flavors, I think, in the IPA Glass. Yeah, I agree, 100%. What do you guys think about the, one of my only gripes with the IPA Glass is I always hit my nose with the other side of it. Yeah, I've got a bit of a ski jump schnoz, and it definitely, like, when you're getting to the bottom part of the glass, you end up banging into yourself. Yeah, maybe that, again, yeah, since we don't have full glasses here, maybe that's why I'm noticing it more. Well, you know, there's some... I would say there's some functionality to that narrower aperture of the glass, because it tends to focus that, like we're saying, that the hops and the citrus notes really jump out of this glass, and I think it's because of the shape. Yeah. Yeah, it's a well-defined glass hole. Mm-hmm. This is kind of a contentious thing with the Sam Adams glass, is that it has that thick bead on the top. Do you remember why it has that thick bead? Yeah, to, like, splat and get splash, right? Well, they claim that there's... You know, they did a lot of, like, fluid dynamics research with it, and their claim is that when you're pouring it over the bead, it creates this, like, little micro-turbulent, like, spiral of wave action, kind of, right when it hits your mouth, so it further, like, accentuates the mouthfeel of the beer, in theory. Because normally, any nice, high-quality glass, you don't want a thick bead on. Like, you look at this beagle owl, you know, it's thin as a piece of paper. Any of our nice wine glasses here in this room, very thin, good whiskey glasses, no bead at all on them. I like the way it feels in the mouth, though. The IPA one's almost, like, sharp. The big bead works. I get too worried about breaking them when they get so thin like that. That is my concern with them. Like, I've had the same, like, six Sam Adams Perfect Pint glasses now for, like, 15 years. Yeah, I've got eight to 12, and never broken one. Yeah, I'm very careful with them, but at the same time, like, a lot of dumbasses come to my house and drink my beers. Sure. And the fact that they haven't broken any really speaks to the quality. Some of mine have been in the dishwasher enough that there's no branding on them anymore, and they're still in great shape. Yeah, and that is nice to be able to... These, I always feel confident, the Sam Adams glass, putting it in the dishwasher. I'll rinse a glass before I pour beer in it if, you know, you're concerned about dishwasher residue, but, you know, it does get a little tiring to hand wash every beer glass, which I usually do, but I broke one of these dogfish ones just within the last few months of getting them. That's how fragile they are. And I dropped the Sam Adams one once, and it just, a little teeny tiny, like, V-shaped notch at the bead was all that happened, so. I haven't broken any beer glasses, but similar, like, wine glasses that are thin, like this dogfish head one, I've broken just putting into the dishwasher or setting into the sink or something, and then it just shatters, I'm like, ah, okay, cool. Yeah, I was cleaning up after a seminar in Geneva the other day, and I put a Glencairn Spirit Scope on it just upside down into a rack, and it hit the bottom plastic rack and just shattered. Yeah. Yeah, I really put beer glasses through the rigamarole, because I'm always tasting beer every single week, so I mean, I'm always pouring into them, rinsing them, dumping them, rinsing them, so like, there's always a higher chance of me knocking it against the sink, knocking against the faucet or something, so. I can tell you that the Duvel and the Sam went out for being nice and durable. Yeah, for sure. And I would say, just as Roger was saying, a good water rinse before, even in a glass that is ostensibly clean is never a bad idea. Do people not rinse out their glasses before they use them? I would say, yeah, a lot of people, especially with dishwashers, figure, you know, that's what you have at the thing, because it's nice and clean when it comes out. But you go to a Belgian bar, and, you know, they've got the little spouts to rinse out at any bar now. It's definitely more important in bars because they use non-rinse sanitizer. So if they're using a three-compartment sink or some dishwashers in bars, you know, it has like a sanitizer that just stays on the glass. Yeah, like any brewery is rinsing. So back to this beer and these three glasses, I think it tastes like classic Duvel out of the Duvel glass. It tastes very hop-forward out of the IPA glass. And I really like the mouthfeel of it on the Sam Adams glass. And maybe I'm talking myself into believing the turbulent lip thing. Well, this is the danger of this kind of thing is like there can be groupthink, there can be convincing yourself that you're perceiving a difference. I don't know. It seems obvious in certain aspects. Yeah. Yeah, I like it. The only one that I wouldn't, like, you know, and I totally get what you're saying, Jenna. If you do want, like, a more hop forward, it really happened in the dogfish glass. I think I'm just so used to drinking this beer out of the Duvel glass. I'm going to drink it out of that. But I agree with you too, Pat. Like, I thought it did really well in the Sam Adams. I mean, the Sam Adams Perfect Pint is kind of aptly named. It really does work well. I mean, any beer. Yeah, I do rarely discriminate. The only thing I might not put in there is, like, a half of ice or something that requires larger volume or something like that. But otherwise, it works with everything. Mm-hmm. I do, I prefer, like I already mentioned, prefer the flavor from the IPA Glass. However, I would choose the Duvel Glass because that's just how it's meant to be enjoyed for this particular beer. Plus, we would appreciate a good Matisse. Yeah, exactly. This is also just a beautiful glass. Well, that's yours to take home today too. Compliments to the good people at Duvel. Thank you, Duvel. Poor little orphan shaker pint here. Nobody loves. I have no sympathy for it. All right, let's move on to IPA. I haven't had one of these since we had Sam on the podcast. I was debating whether or not we should try this or 90. Kind of interesting the way, for those that aren't aware, Sam actually came up with 90 minute first, and 60 minute was the reaction of, yeah, I like 90 minute, but you get rocked because it's 9% alcohol. 90 minute came out in 2001. Its name, for those that are unaware, refers to 90 minutes of continuous hopping. If you haven't listened to our podcast with Sam, definitely give that a listen. He has some pretty funny videos on the Dogfish website as well, talking about how the way that they originally engineered this continuous hopping was with one of those old school table football machines, which is pretty great. Kind of a mystery as far as the hops here. I think that's intentional because a topic we're about to get to shortly right after this is the way that iconic, especially some of the original like OG craft brewers face this problem of how do you have iconic beers and keep them relevant? From a sales perspective, they might not still have the same kind of sales, so the temptation there is to tinker with the recipes. So I don't know for sure if 60 Minute has ever been tinkered with. I feel like it probably has a little bit. As new hop varieties get developed every day and released, why not utilize some of those? So it's always this, you know, huge debate about do you tweak something? And if you have an IPA that is a blend of hops to begin with, you know, there's definitely an argument for there. Well, why don't we try dry hopping with a little bit of this in addition to what we already use versus, you know, if you have something like Two Hearted from Bell's, I mean, it's a single hop, you know, Centennial IPA. So you're probably not going to change a recipe like that. But all Dogfish is saying is that there's a there's a boatload of Northwest hops in this beer. So I'll leave it to you all. If you have some theories, I imagine there's probably some sea hops in here. Maybe you're Chinook, Cascade, Centennial are some of the likely candidates. But let's put this through the test. It, of course, is meant to shine in this guy. The little nose is glorious. It is so floral and perfumed. Interestingly, once again, I find the IPA glass accentuates hops, but it accentuates the earthier elements. Like I, I get the most sulfury hop nose on every beer we've had so far out of the Spiegelau glass. That's Jim's BO. Oh, oh, wow. But, but in the Sam Adams and the Duvel glass, it's more perfumed and floral to my mind. Duvel glass once again is bringing out the Malt character. Like people forget that this was that East Coast-ish, dare I say, English style IPA for a long time. Yeah. There's that bready, biscuity Malt character that really comes through in the Duvel. And I think a big reason for that is because it's not retaining as much foam. And so much of the volatile hop compounds are trapped in the foam. Good point. You know, it's why you especially want a nice head of foam on a hop forward beer like an IPA. Yeah, these two, the Sam Adams glass and the Spiegel out where the, there's like a waste that's restricted seem to produce a great head and help retain it too. Yeah, you brought up a good point. So there really is that aggressive tapering in both of these, like especially when you sit next to the two next to each other, you really can notice that. The nose is almost identical from both glasses to, I imagine, because of that. Yep. A little more accentuated on the dogfish because, as Chris has pointed out, it tapers in instead of out. Right. I might like the Shaker Pint better than the Duvel Glass with this beer. I actually, no, I'm serious. Try them. Try them side by side. I actually think the Duvel Glass gives it the most balanced slash towards malt, like you said. I actually enjoy it the most, ironically, out of the Duvel. That's kind of a goofy thing to say. Like it's the least hop forward and I like it the most for some reason. It's a Pat's Pint. This is the first beer that tastes pretty good out of the Shaker Pint. Yeah, I think it's definitely a little muted, but there's more flavor coming from the pint glass. The other two just did not show well in the pint glass. Yeah, I'll give you that. It's better than the other two, but still. This is pretty beautiful. Kind of mesmerizing when you spin the sammar around the bubbles. Jenna, have you had a beer out of any of these three glasses before? Obviously, the Shaker Pint. You're from the south side. I know that. They don't use glasses. This is the glass I have the most of at home, the Shaker Pint. But I do have all of these at home. Well, thanks to Kyle. Oh, that's right. When we combined belongings. He is quite the beer guy. Yeah. There is literally no room in any cabinet for glassware anymore. My house used to be like... I do not know where this is going to go. I got rid of all of them. Every once in a while, you got to kind of line them up and say, all right, somebody's got to go. I've got a lot of gift set glasses that have got to go. Yeah, they were kind of novelty, like interesting looking. Yeah, we are going to have to throw away a few to make room for this guy. So what does he usually use? Put him on the spot. He usually uses an IPA glass most of the time, sometimes a shaker pint though. But a chalice too though, I see him use a chalice quite often. And if he's lazy, he'll take one of my wine glasses because they're just hanging. I drink beer out of wine glass all the time. Oh, me too. Especially sours because they look so pretty. I think it's a valid choice. I mean, on the last podcast where we dabbled with this, Teku was kind of the buzzword in the beer world and people were really geeking out on them. They are striking and they're very expensive glass. They're very much influenced by wine, stemware. They're essentially a wine glass. So I'm probably drinking this out of, I don't know, I might want it out of the Duvel instead of the IPA glass. I don't know, the IPA glass definitely is. It's giving you the most hops. It's close with the Sam Adams, I think, but I'm giving a slight edge to the IPA glass. Yeah, I think you have to. I'm going Sam Adams actually. Only because, I mean, that's the point. It's an IPA, so that bitterness is supposed to be there, but I kind of like it doled a little bit from Sam Adams. Yeah, I think that's a very fair point. And one thing we can say is the IPA glass is doing exactly what it's supposed to, which is accentuating that hop character. It's funny how this beer was originally pitched as a session beer even before session IPAs were a thing. And it sure does taste that way. I don't know if it's because we just drank Duvel before this. Yeah, but isn't this beer like 6%? Yeah. But it does seem very easy drinking. It's like two hams. Hams are like four. They're not that much lower. I think hams are probably closer to three, two or something. No, they're about four, four, two. Well, no wonder I love them so much. You'll have to consult your ham sack. All right, so those are the ones that I wanted to put through the rigmarole. Since we have tried some beers from these breweries, I thought it'd be fun to try some of the innovation that they've been working on. Where do you want to start? So I got one from Sam, one from Duvel, and one from Dogfish. Start with the Sam. Yeah, whatever. Sam Adams Lager Remastered, quite the topic here. Oh yeah, get this one out of the way. In case you missed the Sam Adams Boston Lager commercial during the Super Bowl. I did miss it. It's pretty funny. It's with your cousin from Boston. Uh-huh. And he imagines, you know, he sees the remastered thing and he's like, now brighter, and he imagines like a brighter Boston. So the idea being that, you know, two people are fighting over a parking space and they're like, you take this space, I insist, you know, or Yankees fan and a Red Sox fan hug each other. Welcome to the stadium kind of thing. The big buzzword on this is that it's brighter. As I hinted at before, what's happening with some of these venerated craft brands is that when, you know, the craft revolution happened, it was all about big beers, you know, breweries like Anchor introduced things like Porter, Barley Wine IPA for the first time since Prohibition. So I mean, we're talking about big bold styles that then they tended to kind of amp them up even more with, you know, Pacific Grown Hops. So craft beer was pretty big in general. It was about big flavors. And it wasn't necessarily about the kind of beers that you could drink a bunch of. You drink, you know, a couple of them. But obviously people's tastes change over time and you have to, you know, deal with the fact that there's going to be competing products on the market, things like, you know, the Seltzer craze and everything. So they're looking at sales long term on some of these venerated brands and going, hey, you know, these aren't selling like they used to. Why? Some of it inherently is just because the choice is insanely different. I mean, Boston Lager was, you know, first brewed in 84. I mean, Jim Cook had to go around and pour it for people and it blew people's minds because there was literally nothing that tasted anything like that in America. So, you know, it had a really good run where it was very relevant, very beloved. But a lot of people, as time went on, kind of just, it wasn't necessarily something that resonated with them. And it didn't sell as well because there's so many more choices and different styles. And so the critique of it was that, you know, it was kind of a big beer. It was real caramely. Very malty. Real malty, real bitter too, like had a very generous amount of hops and they were always been those German ones. So they're a little different. They're kind of earthy and spicy. And so there's no official take on this, but I can tell you for sure that Boston Lager has changed before this. It tastes a lot different than it did, you know, I'm sure Chris, you're the person to talk to. Yeah, I always thought it was an excellent beer in its original iteration. The first thing I noticed is the color difference here. They've clearly backed off on the Caramel Malts here. Yeah, I feel like the bitterness has been dialed down in years past, and that's not something that they really did recently. What they did recently, when you, you know, they don't advertise this a lot because it's kind of a geeky brewing term, but the only change that they say they've made in this recipe is that they've used biological adjustment of pH. So when I hear that, I think of a situated malt. So when you use a situated malt, people kind of tend to think, oh, you mean like, you know, a Berliner Weiss or like a Kettelsauer? You can use it for that, but it's been used by German brewers for, you know, a really long time as a way to adjust pH, which can be beneficial for, you know, brewing efficiencies, but it also, I think the easiest way maybe to perceive what the difference it can make if you add a little to the grist is in cooking, if you were to use like some lemon in a recipe or some vinegar, especially like, you know, at the end, it's always described as like, oh, it helps the flavors pop. And it helps, you know, everything become a little more pronounced or brighter. So I think that's really what they were going for here is that they wanted the beer to give a perception of drinkability and be brighter and kind of make the hops pop a little more. They've lightened up, you know, attenuation wise, I don't know, the ABV is the same, but it definitely feels like it's a little easier. Feels way lighter. It's not nearly as like melted caramel and toffee kind of malt character. I mean, I hate to say it, but it's not as good as it used to be. It's just not. That's what a lot of people are saying that our old school, like hardcore Sam fans, I think at least they've left this close enough that people that have never had it, it still has considerably a good amount of body and hop character to it that sets itself apart from trying to... This is not them trying to turn Sam Adams' Boston Lager into yingling. Like they're not trying to make it a amber lager that macro drinkers will drink or so watered down and washed out. That it's lost its identity. It may, you know, it definitely is not as rich, but the hop bite to the finish is still very much there, in my opinion. I like it. I think it drinks a little more like a modern lager. I like the dial back malt character, but... Undeniably easy drinking. I mean, there's no two ways about that. Yeah. Pretty good. And it's good out of the Sam Adams Perfect Pint. What a lot of people are... The other thing that's happened right alongside this is the fat tire change. And I was almost debating bringing that in and having us try that. Another big, biscuity, malty beer. Right. I mean, and Amber Ale, like they were the two iconic American craft beers from an amber perspective, was, oh, Sam Adams, Boston Lager is an amber lager, and then Fat Tire is an amber ale. So it's more estuary. It's a little more, you know, biscuity is famously the descriptor that you've always talked about, Pat, with that beer. And they just did a demolition to Fat Tire. Yeah, that's like a golden ale now or something, isn't it? Yeah, that's the... They don't even want to say golden ale, but like they've almost miscommunicated it that way. And like a lot of people are flat out calling it a golden ale. It looks like a golden ale. It's like straw colored. I have not had this reformulation. I was living in Colorado back in the early days of Fat Tire when it was not available anywhere else. And I remember it. That is really... I would go so far as to say like that's kind of a travesty. So much so that I think you might see Fat Tire Classic come back because the new reiteration is so different. It's lost all that malt backbone, all the biscuity character. Like, just in the name of this, we need something lighter, brighter, easier to drink, crushable, you know. That's for another time. Maybe we'll all try it and can fully... We'll bitch about that other old beer some other time. Jenna, what do you think? I quite enjoy this. It's good, right? I don't remember the last time I had the regular Sam Adams before this remastered one. So my memory is a little hazy, but this is quite enjoyable. I like it. I love that immediately Roger's like, Chris, you're a resident old. Tell us about Sam Adams. Well, I meant, you know, Chris has had his finger on the pulse of the craft beer movement way long, way before a lot of other people did. So it's not just his age. A is not that old, but he was doing things like going to anchor and bringing back nip bottles, seven ounces of, you know, old foghorn when most of the country didn't even know what a barley one was or. So, time to dance with the devil, folks. This is the new 666 Duvel. You ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight? Yeah, I don't know why, if their whole spiel's gonna be that the glass literally says the six hop devils, and you're gonna call it 666, why not just divulge the hops? But all they're saying is that it's four in addition to the classic Sots and Styrian Golding. I would bet Citra's in here because that was the fan-voted hop for Duvel Triple Hop when they did their dry hop. So I would say Citra's probably in here, maybe an experimental, they've done that before. Yeah, because as Pat noted, Banani, it feels more yeasty estuary than the classic Duvel did. Absolutely. But there's also that bright citrusy note from some kind of probably modern hop, you know? Well, they do say also a zest of orange on the label here. Six hops and a zest of orange. Oh, really? Maybe that's what I'm picking up. Maybe it's not the hops at all. Oh, it's quite tasty. One thing interesting about this too, that I think if you revisit it now, thinking this, when you were talking about banana, think like Hefeweizen, there's wheat in this. And I don't believe there's wheat in the original. Really? That makes sense because the first thing that came to my mind was like Blue Moon with orange, with an orange slice. There you go. Not hot doggy enough. No coriander, thankfully. But now that you mentioned that, I don't know if this is power of suggestion, but I feel like I can taste the wheat on the palate. I was thinking you would, when I said that, you think like cream of wheat. Yeah, I think it's definitely there. It's pretty good. I think it's a really nice beer. It reminds me of summertime, maybe because I associate all the beer styles we've been talking about with beers, white beers with the summer. I could see even garnishing this with some citrus. Maybe we'll be invited to a pool party this summer, guys. Maybe I'll bring in, I gotta find out when the blood orange season is. I'm trying to remember when that is. I could see this being great with a little bit of blood orange. I had a Cara Cara orange at my parents' place last weekend. It was very delicious. A lot more people must be growing those because I see a ton of them now. They are. They didn't even know they had them. And I was like, wow, this is a real dark orange. I had them recently too. I got them at Jewel. They were over there, got a whole bunch. They're around and they're good. They're less of a crap shoot. Most normal oranges, half the time they're good, half the time they're crap. Although I've had really good luck with citrus this year. I don't know. Been some good ones, but yeah, Cara Cara's good. It's the fruit talk interlude. I found mini apples the other day too. They're like little tiny baby apples. You're not supposed to eat those. They were in a bag, so I bought them. Mrs. Kermoffle. They were adorable. I can see those catching on. There are some nice heirloom varieties. They're little tiny guys that rose apples. Before it gets too deep down the palm fruit train, what's the next beer here, Roger? All right. The next and last brew to perfect segue into the fruit side of things. This is from Dogfish. It actually dovetails perfectly with the last beer we had and this, because it is a double golden ale, which sounds a lot like Belgian strong golden ale. Yeah. Also sounds made up. It also has grapefruit juice, lime peel, blue agave nectar, and a touch of sea salt. If that sounds like a Paloma. Yeah. That's what it smells like. Yep. So Dogfish set the world on fire with sea quench. That was their new Belgian moment with Voodoo Ranger. A bunch of new young eyes fell on Dogfish after sea quench. Sea quench famously used lime. Damn, this is salty. So grapefruit-y. Very grapefruit. Holy cow. How? Out east, there's this whole thing with like sma... What do they call those? Smashes? Smash, yeah. Remember when we were talking about crush. Crush, right. The crush, yeah. Fresh citrus. So I think this is influenced by that as well because that's something Dogfish has been working on with their spirits portfolio. Yeah, they have their different canned crushes. Right. So I kind of think this is a melding of the beer and the spirits world, like how can we kind of mirror one another? So it's brewed nice and high, but in a very attenuated way. Yeah, it is light on its feet and dry. It is light on its feet and- This is 8% alcohol? Holy cow. I happened to look at the can right when you were mentioning it. I was like, oh my God, 8%. This tastes like four. Yeah, this will get me messed up this time. Literally four. And the nose is so aggressively grapefruit and lime zest. I mean, it's just in your face. 8% alcohol? This is a four pack or a six pack? Six. What are we selling it for? Like 12 bucks. Oh, hell yeah. Jenna is gonna be passed out on her porch. I actually also think that the salt is well judged here. It is. It's salty, but it's not too salty. Pops up on the finish, but it makes it taste savory rather than salty. You can't play the Roger, why is it so salty? No, I think this is actually pretty nicely done. Jim, didn't you send me a ringtone of why is it so salty at some point? You might have. Several times over the years, I've had Jim on the side make a ringtone clip of something Roger said and sent it to me. I have yet to use them, but I have them. Well, at least in this case, it literally has salt added to it as opposed to. We should give away Roger ringtones to listeners. Instead of gift cards for questions. But salt is so. If you ask a Roger question, you get a ringtone. Salt is so wisely used here, I think. It does exactly what salt is supposed to do, which is enhance flavor without it making it particularly salty. Yeah, I was going to say, I don't know what it says about my palate, but I don't really pick up on salt directly. I think for me, it just enhances the flavors already there, but I don't know. It does what salt should do, right? I don't characterize this as being salty, in my opinion. I'm going to drink so many of these this summer. I also get the agave too, which is cool. I mean, it really does bring that tequila essence without being boozy at all. I suppose. I think if I'm looking for it, you get the agave, especially on the finish, it sits on the front of your tongue in just a sweet way. Swirl it around a little on the nose. I think if you look for it, you'll find it on the nose. I am a little stuffed up, but I have been teaching a lot of tequila classes recently. This beer, I think, again, I didn't even really plan this. It's the latest thing from Dogfish and it sounded interesting, but it's so perfect that it came after Duvel because it clearly was influenced by Duvel and this Belgian strong ale. You never could guess that this is 8 percent at all. Ridiculous. Ridiculously hidden. You almost think that they might have used sugar in this too. Because how on earth did they get such an attenuated light mouthfeel if it's all malt, right? Generally, you're texting Kyle about this? I was going to send him a photo of it, yeah. I have it in the moment. This is generally not my thing and I like it. This is great. Many of these will be crushed at the beach. So yeah, that's what I got. That's our tour through pretty awesome offerings, I think, from Sam Adams, Dogfish, and Duvel. Three stalwarts of the brewing world showing that it's a long time coming for Sam Adams. Good on you to finally wake up a little bit. Dogfish, I think it's nice to see something new from them as well. They've been kind of pumping the brakes a little. The beer we were most excited about is just like the throwaway thing at the end of an hour long episode. And I think it good on Sam that he seems to really, you know, they're the OG adjunct people. And I mean, he really seems to care about incorporating things in the right way as opposed to flavor blasting stuff. Right. So, tip of the hat as per usual to you, Sam. If he was here, he'd write that down in his notebook and be like, oh, that's a beer name I'm going to use. OG adjunct people. I'm going to email him that tonight, actually. You know, a lot of breweries are trying to make something that would cross categories, and he did. And like, this absolutely does that. So, good work, Team Dogfish. Well done. Great. You guys ready to taste six spirits in six different spirits glasses? No, I'm kidding. Roger left no time for the rest of us, so we'll follow up with you listeners at some point on that. Yeah, we should definitely do that. I hope you've had fun listening to old man beers and old beer glasses. And we definitely don't need to do wine because everyone knows Lafite's best straight out of the bottle. Maybe straw on it and call it a day. Now that you can't get plastic straws anymore, the biodegradable sugarcane straw is the best alternative probably for your Lafite needs. There's no curly straw though with those. Maybe if we GMO the sugarcane first, we can get it to grow in curly queues. All right, everybody. Well, thanks for listening. Take a look in your glassware cabinet in general. You should always drink your beer out of a glass no matter if it comes in a can or a bottle. You are really missing out on the flavors and aromas, the way that we've talked so much about this. Hopefully, that at least makes you realize that glassware matters and you should really invest in a couple of nice ones. Treat yourself to it. It's a whole different experience if you're spending the money on a quality made beer. Pick up some nice glassware to enjoy it in. Agreed. And you're even better off with a shaker pint or a juice glass or whatever than drinking it straight out of a bottle or a can. Right. Unless it's like a bucket of Bud Light. Yeah. Unless you don't need to smell it. I don't need to smell hams. I know what a ham smells like. I'm just going to drink a hams. Like beautiful Cure de Parc? Jim, it's going to be the summer hams again. I took one year off. Smell my hamsack. Was last year the summer of Paps? Yeah, I drank a lot of Paps last summer. Thanks again for listening to this episode. Please download us on your podcast platform of choice. Share. If you like what you're hearing, please write us a review. Tell everybody that you know. Tell your friends. Tell your sis. Tell your ma. Listen to Barrel to Bottle. Are you laughing at the same thing where it sounded like Roger was asking Share to write us a review? Sonny Bono? Do you believe? Until next time, I'm Roger. Hey, I'm Pat. I'm Jonah. I'm Chris. Keep tasting. If you like what you're hearing, please write us a review.