Samuel Adams' Merry Mischief:
Greetings one and all and welcome back to yet ANOTHER holiday beer review (yes, I know you’re getting sick of these but blame the beer industry for making so many winter beers).  Today, we look at Samuel Adams’ Limited Release/Small Batch winter beer Merry Mischief which is a gingerbread stout beer.  This beer seems as if someone raided my thoughts about the holidays and made a beer of all things that I love about holiday cooking and sweets with the combination of dark stout beer, spices, and gingerbread which, oh man, drives me wild (yeah I’m pathetic like that).  The beer itself pours a deep brown/black with a light brown head of foam and a nose of holiday spices, gingerbread, and coffee.  The beer’s initial taste is a quick one-two punch of creamy stout beer and hard edge spicy dark beer that moves to an even keel of coffee and roasted malt notes on the mid tongue and a dark gingerbread/molasses flavor that moves to an after taste of solely a gingerbread only flavor.  For me, this is what holiday beers should be with a wide variety of holiday spices and sweets all rolled (stored) into a beer bottle.  I’ve never been a big fan of the Small Batch Samuel Adams’ line but this beer alone is enough to change one’s mind.