BJCP class week 5
Sunday, March 2nd, 2008Class this week ran long. We started a little after 7pm and didn’t get out until about 11:30pm. It’s not like we dilly dallied around either, we just had a lot of beers to taste. Good thing it was a family of beers I like.
This week the class is covering the porter and stout family of beers. These are two lineages of beer that are very similar, so similar in fact that it’s hard to tell the difference sometimes. Historically, the porter was developed first. It wasn’t so much of a style than it was a blend of different beers at the same time. The porter style was given its name based upon those who mainly consumed it, the river and street porters.
Stouts were developed as stronger porters. Initially, a strong porter was referred to as “stout”. After a while, “porter” was removed from the name and stout stuck.
You can read up more on the history of porters and stouts here.
| Style (Example) | Aroma | Appearance | Flavor | Mouthfeel | Overall Impression | Total |
| 12A Brown Porter (Samuel Smith Taddy Porter) |
10/12 | 3/3 | 18/20 | 4/5 | 8/10 | 43/50 |
| Notes: Another English variation of this beer. It tasted to style and was very good. It reminded me of a more flavorful Newcastle. |
||||||
| 12B Robust Porter (Black Butte Porter) |
10/12 | 3/3 | 17/20 | 4/5 | 6/10 | 40/50 |
| Notes: While this beer was basically to style, I smelled something in the aroma that reminded me of cigarettes. It was early on in the nose but disappeared soon after. I’m guessing that it was the burnt malt coming through, although I don’t think “lightly burnt black malt” is supposed so smell like that. |
||||||
| 12B Robust Porter (Jim’s Homebrew) |
7/12 | 3/3 | 14/20 | 5/5 | 9/10 | 38/50 |
| Notes: A second, homebrewed example of the style. I wasn’t sure whether or not to include this one because it’s a homebrew and not really accessible unless you know Jim. I found this beer very good but not exactly to style. A little too roasty and the unexpected hop aroma warrant some docking of points but since it’s such a good drinking beer, it made up for it. Another interesting thing is that Jim used grains of paradise in this particular batch of beer. |
||||||
| 12C Baltic Porter (Baltika 6 Porter) |
7/12 | 3/3 | 19/20 | 5/5 | 8/10 | 42/50 |
| Notes: Up until this class, I had never tried this beer before. I felt this example was a little out of style with regards to how it smells but man, it was spot on everywhere else. From what I’ve been told, it’s a very inexpensive style as well. |
||||||
| 13A Irish/Dry Stout (Guiness) |
10/12 | 3/3 | 18/20 | 4/5 | 8/10 | 43/50 |
| Notes: As soon as I saw the beer in the glass I had a good idea it was Guiness. Once I tasted it, I knew for sure. There’s nothing quite like a Guiness, really. It’s dark as the night, yet creamy in body. The nitrogen infused Guiness is unmistakable, really, and a prime example of this style. |
||||||
| 13A Irish/Dry Stout (Guiness) |
8/12 | 3/3 | 16/20 | 3/5 | 6/10 | 36/50 |
| Notes: Since I included a homebrew in the past, I’ll include Eric’s homebrew as an example of this style. This might be the lowest I’ve rated a beer since class began. I found Eric’s homebrew to be too carbonated for the style. It had a lack of creaminess that is stated in the description as well as a noticeable sourness as it warmed up. As a homebrewer, it is almost worth the price of admission to bring you own beers for the class to judge as you get really good and instantaneous feedback. |
||||||
| 13B Sweet Stout (Makeson’s XXX Stout) |
10/12 | 3/3 | 18/20 | 5/5 | 9/10 | 45/50 |
| Notes: This is the highest rated beer I’ve done so far. I don’t recall if I’ve ever had this style before but I am looking forward to having more. Just like its name, this is a sweeter stout. Not super or cloyingly sweet but sweeter than the Dry Stout. From what John said, this is the sweetest example he’s had. I have to remember to add it to a beer/food pairing menu. |
||||||
| 13C Oatmeal Stout (Young’s Oatmeal Stout) |
9/12 | 3/3 | 14/20 | 3/5 | 5/10 | 34/50 |
| Notes: I stand corrected. This is now the lowest rated beer I’ve every reviewed. I was really looking forward to tasting this style but it’s a bit of a disappointment, really. I was expecting more creaminess, more body, more oatmeal flavor but I didn’t get it. Not as complex as I expected. |
||||||
| 13D Foreign Extra Stout (Cooper’s Best Extra Stout) |
9/12 | 3/3 | 17/20 | 3/5 | 6/10 | 38/50 |
| Notes: I found this style to be unremarkable. The description is all multiple-personality disorder as well. When I say that, it just seems to me that the description is a little too broad. The flavor could be sweet but it could also be dry. It could have hop aroma but it’s okay if it’s more roasty. In the end, the beer was deficient in a few categories and so it got the score it did. |
||||||
| 13E American Stout (Sierra Nevada Stout) |
9/12 | 3/3 | 18/20 | 4/5 | 810 | 42/50 |
| Notes: Ah, the American version of a beer style. With a few exceptions, whenever I see an “American” version of a style, I will mentally condition myself to anticipate an explosion of hop flavor. There’s just something about west coast brewers that makes them go crazy with hop flavor. They add it to just about every style they make. Sierra Nevada is probably the prime example of this. | ||||||
| 13F Russian Imperial Stout (Homebrew contest entry blends) |
7/12 | 3/3 | 15/20 | 3/5 | 7/10 | 35/50 |
| Notes: Big beer. Big flavors. This beer is a result of blending two homebrew competition entries together and the result is not up my alley. I found this beer to have a strong peppery (spicy pepper) character in the nose as well as in the flavor (there wasn’t any spicy heat, though). The roasty character was missing initially but once the beer warmed up, it finally came through. |
||||||
| 13F Russian Imperial Stout (North Coast Old Rasputin) |
10/12 | 3/3 | 17/20 | 2/5 | 6/10 | 38/50 |
| Notes: Normally the Imperial Stouts are a style I enjoy very much. I enjoy my coffee black and these beers remind me of that. This is supposed to be a really prime example of the style and I’m disappointed that I didn’t feel it measured up to the standard. There was a lot of alcohol in the mouthfeel. While appropriate, it’s supposed to be a gentle, smooth warming and not the harsh, hot feeling I got. As a result, the overall was docked down in points as it ruined the drinkability for me. |
||||||
