Drink #22 Samuel Adams Cherry Wheat

2.20.2012

When I was a kid I used to get really excited about petting zoos. At the Cleveland MetroParks Zoo there was a really beautiful set-up that looked like a series of big, antique red barns and fenced in areas. The entire thing was complete with gumball machines on every couple of posts filled with corn and feed to buy for feeding the animals.

It was pretty damn picturesque.

And as a kid, you have all these visions of sheep, rabbits, cows and ducks surrounding you and nuzzling your legs and elbows, with their kind eyes and soft fur or feathers. Maybe you’ll be the lucky kid and one will actually whisper something to you–a secret only you and the duck now share as best friends for life. No, just me?

Did I lose you yet? No? Good.

So there you are, so excited to see and feed the animals, the sights, the sounds, the smells. You’ve spent your two quarters for some feed pellets, standing up on the wooden fence, calling to an apparently deaf llama like a crazy person, while a rogue duck brazenly poops on your shoe.

You feel a rough tap on your thigh, because a wonky looking one eyed goat is trying to eat your tissue-filled pocket like it’s a cream-puff but you’re too busy to push him away because you’re fighting off a dirty sheep who is biting your other hand because its apparently hungry for more kid blood.

Your original vision of pet utopia turns out to be more like a misfit island for spazzy broken farm finds complete with a spooked cow who looks like it’s just a few hours away from literally being scared to death by children yelling “moo, moooo” at the top of their lungs. I wonder what frightened beef tastes like? Probably chicken.

All in all, some things are so much better in your mind. Often I want to live in the world I dream of, but it’s rare that it happens. Oh well.

So anyway, as you know, I didn’t drink a drop of alcohol for 35 years–without a care in the sober world–but even I would pause a second at a 6-pack of Samuel Adam’s Cherry Wheat beer when walking down a beer isle.

Cherry? Wheat? Cherry? Mmmm.

So I knew it would be on the Adventure sooner or later. And later came sooner. Or, wait. Sooner was the later thing that came to.. , the, um… Anyway, I had my first bottle of Sam Adam’s Cherry Wheat last night, early on the Adventure.

It actually smelled better than I had imagined. You can’t mistake the smell of the cherries mingling with the beer. It’s a really pleasant scent. This is the kinda beer you’d spill and it would be alright, I would think.

So needless to say, I was excited to be drinking this beer.

At the first sip you can’t avoid the black cherry taste, the beer was musky, tart, yeasty with just a touch of sweetness. It’s nicely malty, a bit earthy. I could sense a touch of salt. And the finish was like cherry scented toast.

But with each subsequent sip, the natural cherry flavors seemed to become increasingly synthetic. The drink had a slight cough syrup quality that at first was fun (not amaretto sour fun), but then ended up being sort of off-putting. You could almost feel the real cherry flavors fighting with the “natural added flavors”. And that was too bad.

By the final ¼ of the bottle, the beer was becoming a bit stale in it’s malty fruitiness and the flavors were making me frown. Each new sip was tasting kinda ridiculous, odd, ending with a spooked beer flavor trying to compete with scary cherry.

I was ready to leave the petting zoo.

I am well aware that even the oddest animal needs love. And I’m not counting Samuel Adam’s out–hell, if I was going to quickly pound a beer with a fun initial flavor, I’d drink a Cherry Wheat again–but it wasn’t one of my favorites. And I was pretty bummed out it didn’t wow me from start to finish.

But. There are many more chickens on the farm. Hm, lots more beer in the isle? Wait. No. No, you know what? You get it. You get what I’m trying to say. You’re smart. I’ll stop while I’m ahead. Or behind. Eh, who cares, right? Right.

Cheers, Ben


PS: I was featured today at FamousDC - “FamousDC is one of the most widely-read and talked-about blogs in the Beltway. We take a humorous look at politics, sports, entertainment and the goings on in the capital that matter most to our audience” - and they did a fun 5 question interview with me. Super humbled, really exciting. I used to be infamous for not drinking and now I’m becoming famous for drinking. Oh the difference a few months make…

PPS: I swear I’m going to have a butterynipple firstshot sometime this week. And I’m going to try and have a drink tonight for Marti Gras. Until then, please make a suggestion for my 25th drink coming up early next week! Something weird, regional, unique or odd. I’m game and it’ll be vlogged (video-blogged). Oh, and if you want to join me for any drink, just let me know.