Samuel Adams LongShot Double IPA

Brewed by Boston Beer Company
Style: Imperial/Double IPA
Boston, Massachusetts USA

12 oz bottle served in snifter. Cloudy honey color, with a good deal of fine sediment, and a medium dose of fine bubbles. Thin off-white head leaves almost no lacing. Aromas of grass, spices, and dried apricot. Smooth, creamy mouthfeel, leaving stickiness on the back of the tongue and throat. Sweet, floral flavors turn to lingering grapefruit peel in a dry finish. Although this has a nice malt backbone to balance the hops, I found the flavor becoming a tad too sweet the closer I got to the bottom of the glass. In any case, it’s a great DIPA and definitely worth a try.

12oz bottle into a pint glass A bit young and tough... give it some time. I wish I had another bottle to try in a few months.

Sam Adams hit a home run when the chose Mike McDole’s recipe for Double IPA. Pours a nice copper color with a white lace on the edge. Aroma is very floral and hoppy. Great Hops flavor in your mouth, mouthfeel is smooth and nice. Great bittering on the back end and a smooth hoppy aftertaste. This is a beer I’d buy the other beers for just to get to this particular beer! Hope Jim Koch makes this a regular on his line up!

Enjoyed from a 12oz bottle in a pub glass. The beer pours a light to medium amber color, with a nice and long-lasting white head. The nose initially gives lots of hops up front, with Simcoe and Columbus evidencing themselves. However, as I worked through the beer, I noticed on oddly metallic/minerally note to the nose that really began to detract from its overall drinkability. The palate was smooth and nicely executed, with a smooth level of bitterness running through, backed up by plenty of character malts. Other than the one aroma, this was a well-brewed and well-executed DIPA.

The appearance is a super-cloudy copper. Big puffy light brown head. Carbonation obscured by its murkyness. The head is slushy. Color is glowing, radiant. The smell is major pine resin hops. Very oily. Dark roasted rye bread/pumpernickel malts. Hops are overwhelming. Could use a tad more balance. The taste is hops, big and oaky. Sawdust and wood chips. Very, very bitter. The aftertaste is like a thick brandy. It is intense and brutally bitter. Notice I haven’t mentioned the word "malt" here, and for good reason. The feel is smooth and milky. Thick like motor oil. Leaves a bitter remnant. It’s a major blast of woody hops. Soooo bitter, no sweet or malty balance.

Pours a gorgeous slightly hazy glowing orange red with a thick lingering white head. Aroma is a nice blend of hops, lots of pine with some definitive malts and a citric character that seems very welcoming. Flavor is big on the hops again, starting and ending with lots of pine and floral notes with a caramel malt backbone. Plenty of fruitiness, almost tart like grapefruit. Darn I keep upping my rating the more I taste this as it warms and I get new flavors. Love the finish, biting yet naturally zesty and bitter. Medium to full body and a nice sharp carbonation. Again, I continued to enjoy this beer the more I drank it, and wow, 9 abv? I didnt taste any of that alcohol, very nice.

If you take all the crayons in a carton and scribble them on top of each other this would approximate my impression of this beer’s flavor. Nothing sticks out and makes you say ’oooo’ or ’yum’. Perhaps it’s worth another taste if I get the chance, when my palette is more mature and able to pick out different hops varieties.

Bottle. Pours a nice, cloudy orange, with a sizable head. Surprisingly subdued aroma of rich malts and citrus hops. The flavor, in contrast, is hop-dominated, and only somewhat balanced by malts. Easy to tell that there are many varieties of hops in this brew - citrus, pine, and floral hop notes are all readily apparent, but blend together nicely. Mouthfeel is a bit astringent. A very nice double IPA - probably a bit underrated here, given its label as a Sam Adams product.