A Can't Miss Tour
Written: Jan 14 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Free Beer, Informative Tour, Friendly Staff
Cons: Located in Bad Neighborhood
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| bkprewitt's Full Review: Samuel Adams (Boston Beer Company) |
I've been on the Sam Adams brewery tour six times and I look forward to going back again. To the best of my knowledge, they give tours at 12, 1, and 2 on Saturdays at their Boston brewing facility. For more details about the tour, including times and directions, check out their web site at http://www.samadams.com/
When going on a tour, a knowledgeable tour guide greets you after you watch a video on beer and brewing hosted by Jim Koch, founder of the Boston Beer Company and brewer of Sam Adams.
From there, your tour starts by covering the brewing history of the Koch family and of the Boston area. It proceeds then to provide a background of the ingredients that go into the brewing process. In this part of the tour, the tour guide passes around samples of hops and barley, two key ingredients of beer. Follow the suggestion of the tour guide: eat ONLY the barley... not the hops.
After learning about the ingredients, your are next whisked away to the brewery floor, where the entire brewing process is explained from start to finished. A brewery brewmaster explains the purpose of each of the large metal vats and containers on the brewery floor. Here you learn how the combination of barley, hops, water, and yeast becomes that wonderful alcoholic beverage we love to consume.
Following the educational potion of the tour comes the best part of the tour (it's the part that keeps me coming back!!!). To cap off the tour, those 21 and over get to sample some of Sam's best (those under 21 are given complimentary IBC root beer, so they aren't totally left out). Tour takers are treated to three to four 7-oz. draught samples of Sam Adams brews.
There are three things that make the sampling so the beer so awesome:
1) The beer is so fresh! It could only be fresher if you were swimming the the brewery vessels. The taste of beer this fresh coming from the tap is something you will find nowhere else.
2) You get to sample a wide variety of their brewery styles, including those that are in "experimental" or "test-market" status which can only be found on the tour. I got to taste the Pale Ale before it even hit the stores!
3) It's free beer!!!
Other plusses:
* - you get to keep the 7-oz. sample glass (glass has Sam logo on it)
* - send a Sam Adams postcard free from the brewery
* - the gift shop has awesome prices on clothing and merchandise (I wish I could buy one of everything in the store!)
* - the staff was awesome... not only were they friendly, very knowledgeable, and eager to answer questions, they had a great sense of humor. Five of my friends and I hit all three tours one Saturday (not so much for the tour, but the free beer) and they were totally cool with it. They gave us a hard time, but only jokingly (like when they asked questions during the tour they'd say: "The group in the back should know the answer to this question by now."). I think they got more amusement from it than we did.
Only one negative:
* - the brewery is located in one of the worst parts of Boston. Fortunately, it's a very short work from the subway station to the brewery.
All in all, I consider this a brewery tour that can't be missed. If you plan on visiting Boston and you do only one thing, take this tour! If you live in or around Boston, go often!!!
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
bkprewitt
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Reviews written: 2
Trusted by: 0 members
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