Sam Smiths Imperial Stout
https://www.samuelsmithsbrewery.co.uk
Brewed by Samuel Smith Old Brewery
Style: Russian Imperial Stout
Tadcaster, North Yorkshire, England
Samuel Smith’s is an independent brewery and pub owner based in Tadcaster, North Yorkshire, is , founded in 1758. Its name goes back to the famous English brewer Samuel Smith.
The Old Brewery was established as the Backhouse & Hartley Brewery in 1758. In 1847, John Smith purchased the small brewery with funding provided by his father, a successful butcher and cattle dealer from Meanwood, Leeds, but soon built his own new brewery John Smith’s, close by. (the famous John Smiths we have today, as far as I can tell). John Smith’s brother William, who ran the business after John’s death in 1879, left the Old Brewery to his young nephew Samuel in 1886. Samuel enabled by the buoyant beer industry to open Samuel Smith’s Brewery under his own name and was able to compete with the established John Smith’s Brewery.
They brew a wide range of high quality beers made solely from authentic, natural ingredients (the same yeast strain used since the 1800’s), and according to the methods of 1758, (using open, stone fermenting vessels known as “Yorkshire Squares”), and the brewing water still comes from the same well sunk back in 1758.
Samuel Smith’s operates over 200 pubs – including rural, suburban, inner-city and city-centre ones, with over 20 pubs in central London. Most of the these pubs are traditional in their layout and decoration, think old wooden bar, fire place and dartboard. For these bars and fine establishments they produce a wide range of beers including bitters, stouts, porters, lagers, and fruit beers.
Sam Smiths pubs are somewhat seen as a throwback to years of yonder, as they are widely regarded as a very traditional and somewhat eccentric due to their continued insentience of using of dray horses, strict bans on music, mobile devices, tablets, e-books and laptops, with the aim of removing activities that discouraged conversation. The ban also includes “pictures of sport”. They also kept to low beer prices. All the better for it I say!
Having said that though, in October 2017, the brewery issued a chain-wide ban on the use of profanity in its pubs. The “zero-tolerance” policy calls for employees to cut off service to customers who use offensive language. It was reported that this policy, along with recent bans of groups identified as “undesirable” or potentially “rowdy” due to certain types of clothing worn, is part of a “traditional, “uncompromisingly Victorian” aesthetic” that the brewery tries to maintain in its pubs. Nah fuck that! Ha
Some respect to the brewery in that they were not too compliant with the whole fascist Covid-scamdemic coronavirus test and trace system in its pubs. Apparently some local councillors in West Yorkshire were giving them some stick for this. Fair dues, I will drink to that.
Review: 355ml thin bottle of Sam Smiths Imperial Stout: 7% vol.
On the bottle, which is like a bloody book with all the writing on it, has “A rich flavourful brew of the type once exported from Britain to Imperial Russia”, which is interesting and leads to the question why was a traditional English brewery making Russian Imperial Stout?
Russian Emperor Peter the Great, while on a trip to the UK, took a great liking to the dark beer, and requested some be sent over. So this distinctive type of beer, originally brewed as a delicacy, was made stronger to withstand the abuses of shipping in foul weather and the long journey, to the Tsar, and Imperial Russia, least it go off and upset the noble man. But he loved it and it eventfully became a favourite of the Russian nobility, its popularity lasting.
This was history’s first “imperial” strength version of a particular beer, and the term is now applied to other beer styles, like Imperial IPA. Imperial stout beers typically reach into double-digit ABV levels and are packed with flavor.
The good taste continues onto today with the beer winning gold at the World Beer Championship in 2008.
Wow, straight off the bat, right from the top coming off the bottle I can get a whiff of a powerful aroma, a very strong smell of black liquorice, and the expected porter smell.
Smell is pure porter of roasted malts, molasses, and hints of coffee. Definitely noticeable anyway!
It’s a bit intimidating with the smell, but once you get into it it works out ok.
On pour getting a pitch black colour which looks good, a bit of a head that looks promising, but when it all settles down the head is quite small,…..still looks appetizing though.
Standard enough look for a Russian porter, to be fair… full bodied, deep black look, thin head.
No lacing, which tells its own story.
The taste is one of dark roasted malts, with a milk chocolate and coffee variety, especially in the back end…..
Lovely aftertaste, really delicate and crisp on the tongue, love it…….like a coffee ice cream.
Dark chocolate and coffee, very strong flavours, all very good…..but soft on the palate at the same time, not offensive, has a great balance.
Not quite as good as a Guinness (my usual go to Stout), but they have that same full bodied smoothness that rounds off in the end…OK its an imperial stout, and that is the difference to my usual Guinness I know, I know,, but for that its good. and I love that the 7% is very well hidden making this a very tasty stout.
A stout with a lovely smooth feel to it. Will try again…………..
“Punchy and refreshing with a tangy orange sharpiness” is the tagline on the can. 
Very hoppy, bit too much, also a bit sickly in the taste, which could be the orange flavours. Yuck. Feeling the alcohol as well, bit of a sharp zest to this alright. I guess that’s the “punchy” tag they were going with. 
Another Lidl version of what “craft beer” is supposed to be all about. And again another tiny small can, and another cool logo, this time with a scary looking octopus covering the depths of the oceans. Stands out. 
Typical IPA taste, slightly bitter and overly harsh with the hops. Getting citrus, sweet malts, is piney and very hoppy. 
The area he choose for his enterprise was to be in the village of St. Peter South Elmham, near Bungay, in former traditional agricultural buildings alongside the moated St. Peter’s Hall, deep in the picturesque Suffolk countryside, East Anglia, on the east coast of England. The location is ideal for its excellent water quality used in the brewing process – all beers brewed at St. Peter’s Brewery use water filtered through chalk deep beneath the brewery, obtained from their own deep bore-hole.
Other than their range of ‘traditional’ ales, such as Best Bitter and Gatekeeper Golden Ale, St Peters also produce some more unusual beers, such as Honey Porter, Plum Porter and Citrus Beer that replicate traditional pre-nineteenth century practice of adding honey and fruit to create special seasonal brews. Also most recent developments are contemporary session ales such as Stateside Pale Ale, Revival Pilsner and White Raven. And of course for the non alcoholic drinker they created a range of true 0.0% alcohol free beers. St Peter’s Brewery beers are thriving both at home and further afield, exporting to more than 20 countries around the world.
Getting a real porter smell on the nose, but its very faintish and not much to smell at all. Smoky and peaty, roasted malts, milk chocolate all noted but light, very light. On their site they called it an aromatic beer, but hell I didn’t detect a whole lot. Disappointing start. 
Based in the heart of Stockport for over 181-years, owning a collection of around 260 pubs, inns and hotels across the North West of England and North Wales
Coming in a very cool looking black bottle with a very nice logo of a ginger cat. Very easy to buy with that lovely presentation. 
Kind of like a strong cola with ginger. It is very interesting drink and has a deep tasting English ale style to it. A vodka and coke with a touch of ginger. I like it. I even shock myself in saying that!
John Smith acquired the long established Backhouse & Hartley Brewery in 1852. A well run organisation and always utilising modern technology, John Smiths expanded rapidly. Following a series of acquisitions in the post-World War II period, the company became one of the largest regional brewers in the country, operating over 1,800 licensed premises. Although these acquisitions diluted the original family stake in the business to around than 10%. The company was taken over by Courage in 1970 for £40 million, who extended distribution of the brewery’s products into the South of England. Courage was acquired by Scottish & Newcastle in 1995, and the operations were purchased by Heineken in 2008.
John Smith’s became well known for a series of highly successful “No Nonsense“-themed television advertising campaigns, featuring the dour Yorkshireman character “Arkwright” during the 1970s and 1980s, followed by the comedians Jack Dee during the 1990s and Peter Kay since 2002. The brand also has an association with horse racing, both jump and in the flat, it was the principal sponsor of the popular English Grand National between 2005 and 2013.
Yes, the appearance looks fantastic, very good creamy white head, with a copper colour. Looks as good as one can expect. Lacing present. 100% on the looks.
The company make a large variety of different styles of non-alcoholic beer, including a sour, a regular lager, a golden ale and a milk stout, and sell far and wide, including to Hong Kong, Singapore, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Canada and Australia. They are savvy with their network distribution as they have many large supermarket chains selling their wares, from Tesco’s, Waitrose, Sainsbury’s and Morrisons (all in UK), and Albert Heijn in the Netherlands. And it isn’t only cans, they even are on draught as well in certain places in the UK. 
And seeing their pen pics on their site, they have that soy look down to a tee, go figure as this is non alcoholic after all……. They do have the whiff of the BrewDog about them, definitely tapping into that hipster market, with their snazzy can designs, crowdfunding platforms and appealing to the upper and middle class tippler. They are even into movement therapy and yoga, yes, fucking yoga of all things. Not football but yoga, lol. Look at the Covid year, to say a big thank you to the NHS staff, Big Drop visited various hospitals in and around London and gave the staff free pints of their piss to “enjoy”. “What, a 20 hour shift? No worries, have a pint of our non alcoholic pish” That’s tone deaf marketing, really scraping the barrel stuff. Look I know the market for non alcoholic beer is expanding rapidly at the moment, but still……ffs
From the pour we get a massive white head, pretty big, a lot of carbonation going on. The colour is golden amber. Not bad on the eye. 
Founded in the year of 1777 by William Bass in the old industrial town of Burton-upon-Trent, in the centre of England. Bass Pale Ale was so popular that at one stage it was the biggest selling beer in the UK, and not only that but in the space of a hundred years, 1877, it was also the most popular beers in the whole wide world, 
Bought these cans, cheap, in local supermarket back home, and not sure exactly which version of the iconic beer I am trying. Is it the one brewed in the Uk, the old or new version, or the cheap import version from the States, or even the Belgian version! I think its the British version as that’s the one I have drank over the last few years. It used to be well popular growing up in Ireland and was a beer you would find served in pubs, but these days it has fallen out of favour. It was especially popular up in Dublin. But they sell them now in shiny cans with the famous iconic Bass image in the supermarkets here so that’s good enough for me. Whatever, the Irish version in the shiny can comes at a pathetic 3.8% alcohol volume!
On the nose I get a smell of some adjuncts, not great, overall very, very light smells and virtually odorless.
Marston’s is a British brewery, pub and hotel operator, running over 1500 pubs in the UK. It was known as Wolverhampton and Dudley Breweries plc until 2007 when it rebranded as Marston’s.
Brewed specifically for Aldi by Marston’s brewery using the name “Harper’s”. Bought in Aldi! Calls itself “an unashamed American style IPA”. The logo is well cool, showing a buffalo skull, cacti and five-point ranger stars all pointing to an American Wild West feel about this beer.
The nose is a typical IPA aroma, nice on the nose but light. Fruity and citrusy aromas, spicy, malty and hoppy. Ok. 
Old Speckled Hen was first brewed in 1979, and is a premium bitter from the Morland Brewery. It started as a commemorate beer to remember the 50th anniversary of the MG car factory in Abingdon, Oxfordshire. Since 2000, they have moved from the Abingdon brewery to the Bury St Edmunds brewery the home of their new owners, Greene King Brewery.
On a nice white bottle with the red colour of the beer shining through, read that this is an “English Fine Ale”. Just as a reminder that England is known for its top fermented cask beer (also called real ale) which finishes maturing in the cellar of the pub rather than at the brewery and is served with only natural carbonation. English beer styles include bitter, mild, brown ale and old ale. This brew, is considered “Great Britain’s number one premium ale”, as they said so themselves on their website so who am I to disagree!
On the taste got a real bitter aftertaste, which was very creamy and all a bit “urgh!”
