United Nations of Beer

Sam Adams Barrel Aged Release Party at Table 6

by Lucia Novara
(Denver, CO)

Sam Adams Barrel Aged Release Party
Table 6, Denver, CO, USA
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This week I had the pleasure of attending a beer dinner hosted by Samuel Adams at the excellent Table 6 Restaurant here in Denver.

I brought my trusty Beer Photographer to the Stars, Alabaster Simpson, with me to help document the magical pairings and eat the extra meat cutlets.

Grant Wood, Senior Brewing Manager for Sam Adams, graced us with his presence and talked to us about Sam Adams new Barrel Room Collection along with the other yummy tastings.

Links to my beer reviews appear within the text.

We started with the three beers from the new Barrel Room Collection, which will only be released in Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Denver, Colorado. Denver has the honor of being the only place west of the Mississippi these beers will be available and they'll be on the shelves here before Thanksgiving.

The Barrel Room collection consists of Samuel Adams Stony Brook red, Samuel Adams New World Triple and Samuel Adams American Kriek.

All three are barrel aged and the Red and Triple are bottle conditioned, but the Kriek is not. When asked how it would age, Wood said the out-front cherry taste would probably mellow and the maltyness would develop. All three are packaged in 750 ml bottles with a champagne cork retailing for $9.99.

The actual dinner was unreal- the chefs at Table 6 were not messing around. Each course was paired with a beer from Sam Adams Winter Classics Collection.

Course one was miso scallops with fried brussel sprouts and orange maitake mushroom vinaigrette paired with the Samuel Adams Winter lager. The carbonation of the beer cut the salty richness of the scallops and the orange vinagrette brought out the orange peel tones in the beer.

Fried brussel sprouts disproved the theory that anything tastes good fried. I maintain that whether they are fried, filleted, or fricasseed, brussel sprouts taste like a brown paper bag full of rotting cabbage.

Course two pork belly confit, white pear soup, and oyster caramel with the Samuel Adams Holiday porter.

When I first read "pork belly" I pictured a big ol' gut with a belly button and a happy trail gunked with oyster sauce served up on a platter, so I was pleased when a nice little mini piece of meat came out instead.

The pairing was brilliant- the pork belly was essentially meat fat cooked in its own meat fat juices, so the combination of that with the richness of the


porter was luxurious. The oyster sauce was made with hot chili paste and honey, and you might think the chili would be a bad combo with the sweet porter, but like chili and chocolate, or couches and hangovers, it was a match made in heaven.

Course three was pastrami cured roasted rib eye with horseradish potatoes paired with the classic Boston Lager. If you don't know what Boston Lager tastes like I'm not sure why you're on a beer website, so I'll spare you a belabored description.

The horseradish in the potatoes was a great combo with the Nobel hops in the lager (some beer was used in cooking the potatoes as well). I don't eat rib eye, but Alabaster Simpson maintains it was some "Strong ass meat!"

Course four was chicken skin fried sweetmeats with pumpkin stuffed risotto and Fezziwig Veal Au Jus paired with Samuel Adams Old Fezziwig ale. Continues below

The pumpkin risotto was just sweet enough to be a great match up with the ginger and cinnamon flavors in this brown ale. The fried chicken skin was wonderful as always, but when I discovered that "sweetmeats" isn't some delicious vision of Twizzler-wrapped-pot roast, but rather a gland of some sort, I abstained from trying it.

Course five (yes, FIVE, it was amazing) was the highlight for me: Samuel Adams Imperial stout Frosty with Fries. Brilliant.

The chef used the beer to create the frosties and combined with the best fries I've ever had, it was like my favorite junior high meal had gotten all grown up, dealt with its acne and found a haircut that suited its face.

You'd think that after five courses and eight beers we'd be wrapping things up. Well they saved the big guns for last: the Extreme Beers were brought out of hiding to finish off the night.

First up was the Samuel Adams Triple Bock, which has been much maligned by the beer snob community. It was first brewed in 1994 and the batch we tried was 15 years old.

Finally, the big finale was the Samuel Adams Utopias 2009. Since its release in 2002, this brew has held the title of "world's strongest beer" in the Guinness Book of World Records and is illegal in 11 states. I liked it already.

Whew. What a night. Alabaster Simpson and I rolled out of there stuffed and happy as two little pork chops. If you live in Denver and are looking for a fancy shmancy place to take a hot date, hook it up with Table 6 (and note the gratuitous cock in their decor).