Review: Budweiser releases a winner in its Reserve Copper Lager w/ Jim Beam

The older I get, the more of a beer snob I am. Alas, I don’t ask for much: great taste, full body and smooth finish.

After seeing the television commercials for Budweiser’s Reserve Copper Logger, a partnership with Jim Beam, I had to try it. While I was at Uptown Grocery tonight in northwest Oklahoma City, I picked up a sixer.

Here’s what the case says on the side of it:
“This is a flavorful American Copper Lager brewed with two-row barley malt and aged on real Jim Beam bourbon barrel staves for a toasted oak aroma, a deliciously nutty taste with Caramel Rye and Vanilla notes, and a smooth finish.”

For what it’s worth, I like lagers. Yuengling is a lager. Samuel Adams is a lager. Budweiser itself is a pale lager, although I don’t really care for it.

What Budweiser has released in this copper lager, however, is something special.

It pours smoothly.

Its flavor is full-bodied but imperfect. You still get hints of the cheap stuff at the top of your palate. That’s my one knock on the product. However, you also pick up the caramel and vanilla notes as the product advertises. What the packaging doesn’t tell you is that you can really pick up on the bourbon, especially as it goes down.

Fantastic. That’s a big differentiator in my book. It’s something I can’t get with any other beer right now.

I was like, “Hello, Jim. Beam.”

The packaging is impressive, too. They bottled this product in smaller bottles, reminiscent of Coors’ banquet beer, an underrated beverage on the cheap side, for the record.

But mostly I like my beer to have some taste, something that would pair well with a meal. The Budweiser Reserve Copper Lager has a little more bite than what you’d expect, and I think it would go well with a steak or something grilled.

This beer is definitely nothing for beer snobs to be embarrassed by; in fact, this might fall under the category of guilty pleasure.

Ryan Welton is a musician who enjoys his beer responsibly. Like old-man, got-to-get-to-bed-early really, really responsibly. He’s got a YouTube channel he’d like you to check out at youtube.com/ryanweltonmusic and a Twitter feed to visit @ryanwelton.

He’d also like you to get off his lawn.