“Those are topless club prices!”

The Saint Arnold Divine Reserve No. 2 has been released. I was a bit put off by the price of $13.00 for a six-pack. That’s over twice as much as I am generally willing to pay for beer. A coworker remarked, “Those are topless club prices!” According to the description on the Saint Arnold website, “Divine Reserve is a series of single batch beers, each brewed with a completely different recipe.” The Divine Reserve is produced in extremely limited quantities, as in fewer than 500 cases. Is this a clever marketing gimmick, designed to allow the Saint Arnold Brewery to charge outrageous amounts for beer? Or is the Divine Reserve worth over $2.00 per twelve-ounces?

The more I read about it and the more I contemplated it, the more convinced I became that I had to try the exorbitantly priced Divine Reserve No. 2. If “it is best described as an Abbey American quadruppel,” two dollars for a 12-ounce might not be unreasonable, I supposed, considering that similar style beers, like Chimay or Maredsous (the production of which has been entrusted to Duvel Moortgat), cost around $6.00 to $9.00, respectively, for 750 mL bottles. Additionally, I justified purchasing a $13.00 six-pack when I considered that even a domestic brew purchased in a restaurant or bar would likely cost more than $2.00.

I found the Divine Reserve No. 2 to be sickly sweet, syrupy. It might better be consumed during the colder months. If the objective of drinking beer is to become intoxicated, this is a good pick, at 9% alcohol. If this beer “should develop well in the bottle over time,” maybe I will let it continue to take up room in the fridge. Maybe it will improve with age, or perhaps its flavor will be more agreeable with the arrival of cooler weather.