There’s nothing quite like a good porter; Peaks and Pints can recognize one almost by its aroma alone. These dark, often full-bodied beers have something of an attitude thanks to their caramel and chocolate tones. The origins of the style are traced to the 1700s, when it was a favorite beer of the porters who worked the shipyards in London. In the U.S., the porter style nearly vanished in the years following Prohibition, as light-bodied lagers appealed more to the masses. Homebrewers and small craft beer makers helped revive the style. Today, Peaks and Pints porters in the beer flight Craft Beer Crosscut 3.5.17: A Flight of Porter.
Deschutes Black Butte Porter
5.2% ABV, 30 IBU
Deschutes named its porter after a stratovolcano in the Deschutes National Forest near its brewery in Bend, Oregon. While there, grab a fresh pint of one of the loveliest porters in the country. The aroma bears a hint of nuttiness, followed by the unmistakable smells of rich yet soft milk chocolate. Black Butte Porter is slightly bitter in the first sip, but mellows out with a chocolate and roasted finish. As creamy and chocolaty as it should be, this is the porter all other porters strive to be.
Reuben’s Robust Porter
5.9% ABV, 30 IBU
Ever heard of a brewery starting because of a birthday gift given by a one-month old? Little Reuben bought his father, Adam Robbings, homebrew kit, with the help of his mother, Grace Robbings. The Robbings went on to found Reuben’s Brews in Seattle. Reuben will be proud of his parents’ Robust Porter. The judges are: 2012 and 2013 World Beer Championship silver medalist, 2013 US Open silver medalist, 2013 Washington Beer Awards silver, 2014 Australian International Beer Awards bronze, 2014 Washington Beer Awards gold, 2015 World Beer Championship gold and 2015 Washington Beers Awards Gold. We certainly enjoy its great depth of richly roasted chocolate malts and coffee tones. It has an espresso bitterness balanced by a touch of creamy vanilla and caramel sweetness, without being cloying or off putting.
Midnight Sun T.R.E.A.T.
7.8% ABV, 30 IBU
Known in long form as “The Royal Eccentric Ale Treatment,” this imperial chocolate pumpkin porter from Alaska grabbed a gold medal during the 2007 Great American Beer Festival. With an ingredient list boasting pumpkin, cocoa nibs, cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg, TREAT is just that. It’s as if someone baked a pumpkin pie and smashed it inside the bottle.
Wingman Perfect Proctor Porter
6.1% ABV
Wingman Brewers and Peaks and Pints collaborated on the Perfect Proctor Porter, a slight deviation of Bert Grant’s famous Yakima Brewing & Malting Co. Grant’s Perfect Porter. We skipped the Scottish peated malt and added a whole vanilla bean plus Cascade hops for bittering. Our version of the porter, perfect really, pours smooth with roast, slight hop and mellow vanilla notes.
Viven Smoked Porter
7% ABV
Brewed at De Proef, Viven Smoked Porter renders our 5-ounce taster glass a deep dark color that allows almost no light to pass, save for a ruby glow at the edges. The nose provides a multicultural beery experience — offering up notes reminiscent of sweetish English porter, the chalky-meets-chocolaty dryness of many classic domestic craft porters, a little Belgian yeastiness and even some German rauchbier notes. Viven Smoked Porter hits the tongue with gentle, balancing sweetness, giving way to a much drier, roasty middle, then into a woody, lightly smoky, almost chalky character where notes of espresso and dark chocolate linger before fading out.
