Samuel Smith Pure Brewed Lager

Interesting. The ones I see locally still have Organic on the label.

 

Looks like it's the only Lager they produce. https://www.samuelsmithsbrewery.co.uk/product-category/bottles/

I thought they made another one, that wasn't organic.

@rc4233, could you post a pic?

@jesskidden or @JackHorzempa do you have any idea?

 

This pic is how I remember their regular Lager.

I remember their organic Lager having this label...


But...https://www.samuelsmithsbrewery.co.uk/product/pure-brewed-organic-lager/

 

Add this to the confusion (which appears to be a 440ml can label ) approved last Thursday by the TTB).

Also looks "Canada-ready" w/ French and English. Note other slight differences ("U.K. Brewery" vs "British Brewery", "USDA Organic" logo)

 

BPA free, eh? I don't believe that I've seen that mentioned on any can before.

 

According to US importer Merchant du Vin's page for the Pure Brewed Organic Lager:

Yeah, I noticed that, too. At first I thought "Well, yeah, 'cause Samuel Smith's beer are bottled..." until I looked at the quantity and label shape...

 

This is the label that I remembered. It would be helpful @rc4233 if you could upload a pic. If not, how did it taste? Was there dust on the bottle? Does the store you got it from have a lot of out of date imports? (Imports usually have the slowest turn around, from my experience)

It's a nice lager. Hope you enjoyed.

 

There should be a date code in white ink on the neck of the bottle, which is a bottled-on date. Something like "SB14Q1". You can ignore the first and last characters. Second letter denotes the month relative to which letter of the alphabet it is, B=February, E=May, etc. Next two digits are the day. Last letter is the year, Q would be 2017 since Q is the 17th letter of the alphabet.

 

Thanks for this.

 

If the last letter in the code (second-to-last character) is an "L", then it would indicate that it was bottled in 2012 which is ancient for a lager. I'd try to return or exchange it if you can.

 

Drink it for science

 

Wonder if the slime-ball here is the distributor or the store manager/owner? 2012...that is really sketchy unless both parties are just ignorant to the date of that beer.

For what its worth, That Sam Smith lager (pure brewed, organic whatever is on the label) is outstanding when relatively fresh.

 

Merchant Du Vin (Charles Finkel, right?) has always been known for purposefully not putting dates on their beers. I learned that when I went to work for a large importing distributor. The fact that they now have an ink jet code is an updated improvement.

As to the store owner and the local distributor that they're getting it from, not having clear and easy to read dating obviously causes problems so I think they can be forgiven.

 

I'm not a shopkeeper but don't they track when the beer was put on the shelf

 

Yes, they think they're getting the freshest beer available from their local distributor. However, in a warehouse that's generally staffed by people who are not necessarily into beer (some of the guys I worked with didn't even drink beer), and not necessarily the sharpest, or who don't really care that much - proper stock rotation when the date isn't clearly there can be tough. On top of that, they're probably rushing around and don't have the time to go to the office to get a code to sort out what the date is. AND, worse than that, that distributor might be getting old beer from the guy above him. Tough one. I don't think anyone on the end side is cheating or trying to rip anyone off.