Samuel Adams LongShot Grape Pale Ale
Created by Samuel Adams Employee Lili Hess, Hawaii
This is a very creative spin on a pale ale. As Lili describes it, "It’s like you are drinking a pale ale after biting into a fresh green seedless grape." This delicate brew is light-bodied with unique sweet, yet dry flavors from the grapes. What a combination...
This is a very creative spin on a pale ale. As Lili describes it, "It’s like you are drinking a pale ale after biting into a fresh green seedless grape." This delicate brew is light-bodied with unique sweet, yet dry flavors from the grapes. What a combination...
2.8
301 reviews
Boston, United States
Community reviews
Longshot series is a great idea, not much fruit flavor let me down.. but a must try i guess
I like the idea of the long shot series, but this shot was too long... I do like a fruity beer sometimes but this one let me down
Bottle. Pours an amber color. Not bad for a long shot winner. Aroma is grapes, apples, and other fruits. Flavor is yeast, grains and fruit. Not bad.
12-oz, Thanks, Headbanger! Pours a slightly hazy medium amber with ruby highlights in the center. Slight head of off-white and gray. Nose smells more like red apples than green grapes. Creamy medium body with soft but moderately assertive carb. Bready malts underneath a loose, fairly synthetic-tasting wash of fruit flavor. Some sort of generic red fruit punch note, basically. Not sure what all this talk of green grapes is about, to be honest.
12 oz. bottle to a large snifter. Poured a fairly clear, orangy/amber hue, with a tight, foamy, off white head that reduced rather quickly, but left some sticking lace. The nose was very light with some sweet fruit esters, malt and a little yeast. The flavor was also very light with the fruit, some vinous notes and a little hop dryness, almost tartness, toward the finish. Pleasant and drinkable but the flavors tended to be nondistinctive and thin.
Pours copper, clear body, colored with a small white head, and some lacing. The aroma has notes of caramel and bready grains, light white grapes, some floral esters and yeasty. However the flavour was of sweet malts, some balancing hop bitterness, and faint tannic astringency. Aroma and flavours are mixed, all over the place. Just doesn’t add up.
I’m not surprised that this contest-winning GPA got such a low "GPA" - it’s not a very exciting beer. Golden-amber color with a nice white head. Aroma is white wine, light fruits, and sweet malt. Solid malty backbone with some grape flavors and slight hops. Refreshing but a little light on the flavor. Medium on the palate. Brewer pussyfooted around a little bit on this one. More grapes, more hops may make this a little better.
330ml rich amber with a slight haze and the best head i’ve seen in a long time. Poupori of aromas, fruitsalad, wafers and a malt sweetness. Not sure I get the grape thing - maybe grapes imported in to NZ are different? A rich fullness in the mouthfeel, sweet but other notes that defy description. Grapes & maple syrup - only in America huh?
Bottle: The aroma is a combination of raisins, grapes, grain, and grass...a pretty unpleasant combo in my opinion. It pours a bright transparent amber with a moderate soapy off-white head. Weird combination of caramel and raisin up front. Finishes moderately grainy and lightly grassy. The flavors just don’t mesh and the graininess is very unpleasant. Light bodied with with mild carbonation.
Bottle. I had this one right after it came out, and Im going off memory. Smelled like a very gentle belgium white. Very faint smell of fruit. Tasted crisp and light, hints of gape and hops, with some grain malts, and very drinkable. Unique flavor. Glad to see Sam Adams pick a non-typcal beer for this winner, although not entirely my choice of brews, but a refreshing alternative.
Very tasty and smooth. Hints of grape. Pours light golden with a medium head. Unique.
Medium brown with nice white head, a nice looking brew. Sweet nose. Flavor is convoluted with some cheap sweetness and mild hop bitterness and mild hop flavor.. a useless brew that doesn’t work
(bottle - 12 oz) Hazy orange pour with a thin white head. Aroma is lightly malty with a hint of sweetness that’s probably from the grapes but it’s not very apparent. Flavor is light and malty with a very thin and watery bitterness near the end. Odd flavor of sweetness in the aftertaste. Some grapes in the flavor, but not a whole lot.
I always like a unique beer idea even if the novelty hinders its success but this offering didn’t do it for me. I will applaud them for a nice looking beer. When poured into a glass from the bottle it was light in color and had a green edging similar tot he label but int he glass it was a murkier orange amber. The smell was malty sweet but the flavor was light and needed a good long time in the mouth to pick up bitterness. Did finish nice and dry but really was confused about how this is a grape ale. Was refreshing but no more so than an actual pale ale.
Not much to this one... no hops, no grape... did I read the label wrong? very boring... would you like this beer? It’s a LONGSHOT
12 oz bottle in Longshot mixpack. Pours a clear golden amber with minimal white crown (<1 finger) and spotty lacing. Aroma is rife with malt sweetness, maybe some honey, no hops, and a slight hint of the grape. It’s very pleasant. The flavour is initially weak in malt character with almost no discernible hop quality, and a lingering sweetness from start to finish. It’s like you’re drinking a sugar-sweetened soda until the end, where you get a bit of barley malt aroma lingering in the back of your palate. The grape taste doesn’t immediately jump out at you - it’s very subtle and takes a few tastes for it to build up on your palate. Once it does, this beer becomes very enjoyable and unique, but it’s not as fruity as one would think. I can really see this beer as binary, where you either like it a lot or you don’t. Very much a session-like beer and if I’m in the mood for it, would love to have a full 6-pack of it instead of having to buy the mixpack just to get it. Light bodied on the palate with spritely carbonation, crisp finish and although it is not even close to any style of beer I’ve had before, it’s enjoyable nevertheless.
Bottle. White wine and barley malt aroma. Amber color with small head - highly effervescent. Under-ripe grape and barley malt flavor. Unique.
A copper colored beer with a slightly sweet aroma. In the mouth it was refreshing, but very simple. In fact, I didn’t notice the grape flavor at all. A very ho-hum beer. Next.
Pours amber with nice sized brown head. Light hint of hops with some sweet notes from the malt. Flavor has some grape, but not the hit I thought. Really sweet with more caramel notes than grape.
12oz Bottle: Pours clear amber w/ a small off-white head. Aroma is sweet malts w/ a touch of hops. Reminds me of an English Ale, very caramelly aroma. Caramel flavor w/ a nice little hop presence towards the end & a slightly dry finish. I don’t quite get putting this beer in the fruit category. English Pale Ale, yes. Fruit, not so much.
I was unimpressed with this beer. It poured a clear amber colour with a small white head. aroma was slightly floral, with no grape taste- even though i tried my hardest to find it. Strong caramel and very reminiscent of a pale lager.
Wow, this is horrid. Why even put out such a mess? I don’t even know how to decribe this other than to say it doesn’t even taste like beer.
12oz bottle. Pours amber with a thin fizzy, white head. Smells malty and slight, sweet grapey. Tastes caramelly malty throughout, the grape flavor doesn’t kick in until the finish. Medium body, ok carbonation.
Actually the homebrewers description put me in a negative frame of mind. Green grapes are crap, especially the seedless kind, they have no taste and serve the lemmings who go to the grocery store. The only good green grape is an unripe concord which is so sour it gives you a stomach-ache after a couple. Perhaps that beer would of been good but not this crap.
This is a terrible beer. Not so much because it taste really bad but because It won the longshot contest. my impression of this beer is like drinking a really week pale ale after somone has just spit their cheap blush wine into it. Just a really bad idea. I think the lady who created it must have some compromising photos of someone from Sam Adams. i’m afraid thi is an example of title 9 in the world of competitive brewing. It’s a shame to because the weizenbock that makes up the other half of the longshot six pack is really good.
12oz bottle-pours a rich offwhite head with copper color. Aroma is caramel-medium malt, secondary earthy hops, light/medium fruit. Taste is balanced caramel-medium malt, earthy/spicey hops, light/medium fruit. OK/mild carbonation.
I enjoy this beer, its got an English quality with a mild hint of grape at the end, still its got character.
Not sure why this one is ’fruit’, plays a minor role. Very nice caramel, malty aroma. Toffee , earthiness and English stylings in the palate. Seems like a session - style English Pale ale. Do get a bit of coloring from the fruit in the background. Thanks Ron for the trade!
12 oz, bb Jul 2008. Clear, shiny orange-copper with a two-finger creamy head that lasts. Honey, molasses, earthy root vegetable, and crisp green herb aromas. Cinnamon-honey, grain, and light bubblegum are the front flavors, with later some toasty nut and caramel apple. Woody herbs and crisp apple on the finish. Near-medium body has sufficient drying for all the sweetness. Started with a little too much carbonation, but turned out to be a fairly smooth beer. A little much of the sweet and twangy flavors for me.
12 oz bottle...Amber with barely a head...just some scattered bubbles and a tracing around the glass where beer meets foam...cider/wine mixed aroma...sour apples...sweet and light with an infantile syrup quality....delicate lacing forming....I gave the appearance a 4 because for this style the lacing is appreciated....Flavor is nice--apples , light malt...but it ends a little thin and watery...nice effervescence...I do taste the grapes, mainly in the finish and a hint in the aroma...the delicate lacing sticks through its entirety, so the 4 sticks as well...Metallic finish in the very last sip...thus changing my original 13 to a 12....sorry Lili Hess