Spring Break
Pull a pint of porter
Thomas Goodwin
Issue date: 3/2/09 Section: Focus
Ask five beer geeks about porters and you might get five different answers. They will probably tell you there are brown, mild, robust, Baltic and imperial porters, each with their own nuances. This isn't even including the broader American and English styles. I'm going to try and steer clear from being that pedantic for the time being. Sometimes a beer is just a beer and a cigar is just something you smoke to look cool.
Originally from England, porters began as a hodgepodge of brown and darker colored ales with stronger, maltier tastes than the norm. Their name comes from the workers, porters, who were very fond of the beer. Since then, they have evolved into the many different styles and flavors we know and love.
A lot of this can be accredited to American brewers, who have taken the idea and the flavors and brought them to whole new levels. Smoked porters, raspberry porters, imperial porters, hoppy porters; all examples of American ingenuity. The porter itself can be viewed as a partner for other flavors, in the same way that chocolate can cover almost any food and make it more interesting. Or bacon; you can pretty much wrap anything in bacon, which is also an American ingenuity.
So what do these things taste like anyway? And what makes them any different from a stout? Well, aside from ingredients used, porters are less burnt and roasty than stouts and are generally a little sweeter and a little less bitter (which probably seems redundant). They cover a broad range of flavors, including caramel, toffee, chocolate, malt and coffee, depending on what the brewer decides. If you like stouts, but dislike the burnt, acrid flavors you might like these.
They are medium to full bodied beers and generally range from 4-6% abv. The hop flavor and aroma will generally be low and subtle. The bitterness is just enough to let some sweetness slip through and prevent the beer from being too sweet or cloying. They will be light to dark brown to black, but porters are generally never pitch black and you can usually see some hints of red shine through the edges.
Originally from England, porters began as a hodgepodge of brown and darker colored ales with stronger, maltier tastes than the norm. Their name comes from the workers, porters, who were very fond of the beer. Since then, they have evolved into the many different styles and flavors we know and love.
A lot of this can be accredited to American brewers, who have taken the idea and the flavors and brought them to whole new levels. Smoked porters, raspberry porters, imperial porters, hoppy porters; all examples of American ingenuity. The porter itself can be viewed as a partner for other flavors, in the same way that chocolate can cover almost any food and make it more interesting. Or bacon; you can pretty much wrap anything in bacon, which is also an American ingenuity.
So what do these things taste like anyway? And what makes them any different from a stout? Well, aside from ingredients used, porters are less burnt and roasty than stouts and are generally a little sweeter and a little less bitter (which probably seems redundant). They cover a broad range of flavors, including caramel, toffee, chocolate, malt and coffee, depending on what the brewer decides. If you like stouts, but dislike the burnt, acrid flavors you might like these.
They are medium to full bodied beers and generally range from 4-6% abv. The hop flavor and aroma will generally be low and subtle. The bitterness is just enough to let some sweetness slip through and prevent the beer from being too sweet or cloying. They will be light to dark brown to black, but porters are generally never pitch black and you can usually see some hints of red shine through the edges.
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jeff
posted 3/03/09 @ 6:35 PM EST
Good job mentioning the Smuttynose robust porter. I've had many porters from all over, and I think this might be the best in the world. For those interested in porters, two more things should be mentioned. (Continued…)
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