Samuel Adams Octoberfest

Taste 10/8 Draft. Looks: Dark amber thin head. Aroma: Caramel and a little roasted malts. Taste: Malty, medium bodied and a little nutty. A decent Octoberfest and one of the better Sam Adams. Taste 10/9 Bottle. Looks: same. Aroma: Smelling mostly a yeast/bread aroma (like an ESB) with a little spice. Taste: A yeastier flavor with a weaker palate.

This is one of Sam Adams best efforts. Pours a nice Orange color with a thick toffee aroma flavors of caramel toffee faint chocolate makes this beer delicious and a good representation of the VMO style. The hops are present enough to balance the full malt flavor. This beer is a good change of pace from the hop heavy IPA’s I tend to frequent.

tap. pours frothy amber-red in color. tastes of caramel and spice with a slight nutty aftertaste. I didn’t taste much toffee...but I was quite impressed with this beer!

Best By February 2009; Sampled October 2008
Pours with a frothy, two finger thick, lightly amber tinged, tan colored head. The beer is quite clear and shows a full amber color as it sits on my desk. The aroma has some light spicy hop character to it up front, but this is quickly drowned out by a full malt character. Aromas of caramel, toasty grain and whole grain crackers. Actually there is a fair amount of hop character here that lightly spices the more dominant malt aromatics.

Spicy hop notes cut through the slightly more dominant malt character of lightly nutty, slightly toasty grain notes and a nice, almost rich, but not to sweet, caramelized malt note. As the beer warms up it becomes more malty and rich, but still retains its spicy hop character. Light toffee notes seem to subtly intrude into the mix of well integrated flavors that define this beer. I really am enjoying the body of this brew as well, it is quite quaffable, but has just enough heft to cling a bit to the palate and lightly envelope the mouth.

This is a nice Oktoberfest, I really like that it is still fresh and has a nice spicy hop character. I really also like how the toasted malt character accentuates a soft nutty note. Overall this is a really well constructed beer, incredibly well balanced between hop and malt. I would seriously have a hard time asking for more from an Oktoberfest (well an non-Rauch one anyway). This would be quite easy to quaff liters of this beer at a time.

Pours a nice red/amber color with about a finger’s worth of off-white head. Aroma is a little hoppy with some good malt backbone in there. Flavor is more of the same. Some malt with a bit of hops bitterness. This is a well balanced beer. Nothing to write home about, but very nice and easy to drink.

Bottle. Pours a deep amber, with some ruby and brown. Nice looking head. Aroma of malt, earth, some hops. However despite its promising appearance, I thought this beer overall was weak and perhaps even a little cheap tasting. There was simply nothing special about it. Palate was medium, carbonation soft, and flavor of weak malt and some butterscotch. Don’t look to Sammy Adams for a Oktoberfest.

Bottle. Fruity aroma and decent but not the best Octoberfest I’ve had but above average.

Pours a copper color, sweet caramel taste. Nothing special but not bad either.