Sam Adams Longshot Honey B's Lavender Ale.

For some reason I got really excited when I saw this 6-pack of Longshot at the store, took a glance at it, and thought it was all Blackened Hops. I put one in the fridge that night, pulled it out tonight to try and saw that it was actually Honey B's Lavender Ale. Maybe it's sexist, but I'm not surprised a female would decide to brew with lavender. (As a man, I prefer to brew with flavors like SHOCKolate and GUN.) In any case, lavender is a very aromatic ingredient that takes some work to leverage in any food or beverage.

Right on the pour, I got a strong floral, lavender aroma, slightly hoppy and sweet. There is a bit of honey on the palate as it is also brewed with honey, and I get a very mild sweetness. The base flavor seems to be more of that nondescript pale ale sans hops that tends to be common amongst beer utilizing honey. I suppose great restraint must be shown towards hopping when using honey as well. The lavender is a little more subtle on the palate than the nose and contributes mostly in a generic flower petal taste and texture. The carbonation is not unusual, but the mouthfeel is somewhat creamier than I would have liked. While it describes itself as a kick-back beer, it's a little too voluminous, not exceptionally crisp and doesn't seem to come off as very cold.

Not a loser, but certainly not a kickass beer that I must recommend to everyone. That being said, I will probably remember this enough to tell a story about this one lavender beer I had way back when. And that's my beef with these kinds of herbed/spiced/honey beers. More often than not, they just don't bring enough to the table to stand on their own or against any food or occasion. What would I do with beer? I would drink it when I happen to have one around and I just want "a beer". Maybe that's a bit of a backhanded compliment, so I want to reiterate this is not a bad beer. It's just not what I'm looking for in a beer right now. Ok, ok, I let that one slip out a bit but now let me suppose this was brewed by a dude. "Yeah, it's ok, dude. I tend to like more hops...but I get what you're trying to accomplish with the lavender. Brewing is about self-expression, right?" (ZING). Anyway. How would I like to see this revised into an even better beer? More assertive. More lavender, more unconverted honey, complementary flavors and aromas like jasmine, chamomile, milk,, etc. Really, I am now just thinking about body washes, and you should probably just make a heather ale.

• Appearance: Clear gold. Kicked up a little finger of a head which fell down to a ring.
• Smell: Fragrant lavender but not perfume-y.
• Taste: Very mild, slight sweet honey. Lavender generalizes into more of a generic flower petal sensation.
• Mouthfeel: A bit too creamy for me. It seems like it just doesn't stay cold enough, but it's also been rather warm lately.
• Drinkability and Overall: Too voluminous to be a refreshing beer for my taste. Rather generic, unfortunately. Not sorry I had it though, but not in my top 5.

Bison Honey Basil.

I suppose this is a seasonal from Bison that I saw in the store the other day. Brewed with honey and basil, it sounded like an interesting combination. I decided to use a goblet because I thought it would help capture the basil a bit better, but I was surprised by how dark this poured. I wasn't expecting that, but I guess I didn't know what ale they were using here. The color is a really nice, clear, vibrant red-orange that catches the light very well. The taste is interesting, to say the least. A mild malty punch up front but it evaporates really quickly and dries out. Maybe that's the effect of brewing with honey. In tasting my experimental batches of mead, I found that champagne yeast can ferment a lot of that sugar and end up with a pretty dry product. The finish has a slightly spicy, herbal tone, and that must be the basil. Overall, it's a very subtle, mild beer that requires some big draws and a swish to pull out some of the flavors.

It takes some amount of effort to enjoy this beer, and for that reason, I wouldn't say it's a very good session beer. Plus, the honey gives it a boost up to 6%ABV. For solo drinking beers, there's certainly more satisfying brews.

• Appearance: Clear, red-orange, no head.
• Smell: Slightly malty, mild spicy (like chiles) honey
• Taste: Short-lived malt, mild honey, cool basil on the finish
• Mouthfeel: Very low carb, dry, round and hollow.
• Drinkability and Overall: Very easy drinker but too mild to go with anything. Falls into the class of beers worth trying once but not much more than that.