Boston Lager Remastered

Craft Business Daily says only that BBC will be "testing (the new version) in New York this fall." That's the problem with basing such reports only on the TTB COLA like the website in the OP does - sometimes the beer is never brewed, never marketed or doesn't make it to full distribution out of test market(s).

Boston Tweaks Iconic Boston Lager Recipe is based on info from the brewery...
Unfortunately, I, like most of you, am "... unauthorized to view this page" 'cause we're too damn cheap to pay the annual $500 sub.

SABL has been brewed by half dozen or so different US brewing companies at even more breweries - Pittsburgh, Stroh PA, Genesee, Blitz-Weinhard (Heileman), F X Matt, City-Latrobe, Miller (Tumwater and Eden), Hudepohl-Schoenling (I think that's it) and BBC in Cincinnati, Lehigh Valley and Boston. The idea that the recipe has never previously been "tweaked" seems unlikely.

 

The “easier drinking” part worries me too. I hope that doesn’t mean making it more like Budweiser or adding a bunch of new-school fruit hops (not knocking them, but that’s not what I turn to Boston Lager for), like Sam ‘76.

I’ll try it either way, but I hope it doesn’t change too much.

 

Some, actually almost all, of my favorite beers are easy drinking beers, well I’m reading that as highly drinkable. That is a quality that I find very important in the beers I enjoy. I’d very much doubt that Boston lagers hops would change, maybe quantity and time of additions? Who knows though I guess we just have to stay tuned...

 

Did some more looking around and came across these two keg labels from last month. The one on the left calls it the "Reformulated Version for New York State Only" BUT it has also already been "Surrendered" by BBC (never figured out why brewers "surrender" their COLAs).


I kinda find the fact that BBC is contract brewing at City Latrobe more interesting (the bottle label for this new version does not list "Latrobe" only the 3 BBC brewing cities). BBC's 2019 Annual Report noted:

I figured they only used Latrobe for their non-beer "other beverages" and a quick review of the COLAs for BBC's permit at Latrobe shows that other than the two above, they've all been for Twisted Tea.

 

If a marketing ploy consisting of new labels on an old beer is illegal then someone should criminalize large scale changes to an existing beer recipe while still pretending it is the old beer....just kidding.....maybe.

 

This. For example, Sci-Fi's "Battlestar Galactica" would have been even better if it hadn't been called the "re-imagined" series. "Re-imagined" always sounds like either an effort to be a bit too precious, or a prospective apology to me.

 

I find the term just annoying, and the way it is being used now, meaningless. Hell, we even have a bank that advertises itself as "re-imagined"!

 

Which aligns with exactly what I said about it. It's not trendy and it's old fashioned.

 

If the don’t make an appreciable change then what would the point of this exercise be?

 

It’s hard to really know how “appreciable” the change is without actually trying it. I like the beer and buy it regularly as is. And, either way, what do you care? I drink beers I like and don’t feel any need to have a reason for doing so that satisfies some random dude on the internet.

 

To me it sounds like tweaking the malts & hops to make BL less sweet and less heavy with a dryer finish. Right now I'm having my 4th “easy drinking” BL (Bitburg Lager) and it's not aimed at the “macro masses”

 

No judgements, everyone likes what they like. But it’s going to cost money to pull this off so to make it worth the trouble it needs to be different enough that you’ll notice.

 

The more I thought about this the stranger it is to me. Jim's story of using his great-grandfather's recipe was always a neat one to me and BL made them what they are. Seems really odd to suddenly flip that script...

It would be cool if they did a mixed pack of old and new. Their Latitude pack was a really fun idea and I miss that type of ingenuity within craft beer.

 

If nothing else the timing might be right, if the BL sales Is waning a bit the strong seltzer market gives them financial flexibility to take a reasonable shot. Modern hops, change the malt, brighten it up a bit, maybe it works. But they’re a thriving business so worth a shot.

 

Well, you gotta give Jim Koch some props for generating 'buzz'. We are at 74 posts (so far) discussing an 'old' brand of beer (Boston Lager).

It will indeed be intriguing to see what huckster Jim has to say about all of this 'publicity'.

Cheers!

 

Anybody else reading Jess Kiddin's research on this new beer? Looks like it's only gonna be tested, and only in NY state to start with. Could be it never gets beyond that.

 

Soooo is this subscription also gonna take me out for a multi-course dinner at a nice French restaurant and afterwards invite me in for “some coffee” each month?

 

He’s a pretty savvy businessman, putting a bit of a new paint job on gramps recipe might actually be a good idea. Something like Budweiser no way, when they wanted different they rebranded it, but Boston Lager to me is a craft lager no matter how much they brew and sell. I realize beer is beer but I don’t think of BL as a BMC kinda beer, so a tweak seems acceptable.

 

yeah, that Latitude 48 “deconstructed” single hop 12 pack was amazing. Really sad they only made it a couple times .

 

I thought a part of their ploy was a supposed change to their recipe?