Entirely Different Porter
Written: Jan 15 '03
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: A unique and different porter.
Cons: Green glass bottles.
The Bottom Line: Something different.
|
|
|
| Bruguru's Full Review: St. Peter's Old Style Porter 16.9oz |
Porter is an intriguing beer style. Not simply because it is a unique and delicious beer with many different interpretations on the market, some of which are surprisingly and refreshingly different from one another. No, porter is an enigma because it’s sort of a bastard of the beer world. Nobody is sure who fathered it.
To be more direct, porter is a style whose origins are, to say the least, uncertain. One thing that is probably true is that it was named for the eighteenth century porters of London, who are said to have been fond of it. Most likely, porter originated in 1722 at the Bell Brewhouse of Shoreditch, part of London. At the time, a drink called “three threads” was popular among the clientele. This was a mixture of three different beers, one of them likely a brown ale.
The proprietor of Bell’s, one Ralph Harwood, allegedly got the idea to brew a beer in one fell swoop that would combine the “entire” properties of all three beers in one. The resulting beer became known as “entire” or “entire butt”, and was extremely popular. Or so the story goes. Beer historians disagree over whether or not this is the actual origin of porter, and it may well be that the world may never know. Whatever the true origins of this wonderful style, however, we can be glad that it was invented every time we sip from a glass of this deep, dark, and delicious brew.
Today, the St. Peter’s brewery of Suffolk, England, pays homage to the origins of porter with their delightful Old-Style Porter. I’ll let them tell you a bit about it before I do:
A blend of mature old ale and young light ale creates a porter of historic character, dark color and complex taste. Skillfully brewed in Britain’s most innovative brewery, dedicated to making fine quality beers.
St. Peter’s porter, then, is a blended version, much like the early three threads that led to entire. I found this an interesting notion, although it was not the reason I bought the beer. I didn’t read the back of the label until I had already got the beer home. Truth to tell, just the fact that this was an English porter caught my attention. We just don’t seem to see that many English porters here in the states, at least in comparison to the number of pale ales, stouts, and brown ales that adorn our store shelves.
My luck with St. Peter’s beers had been hot or miss in the past. St. Peter’s Lemon and Ginger Spiced ale was a magnificent beer and my bottle was in excellent condition. A bottle of their Wheat Beer, however, seemed to have suffered greatly from its travels to my glass. Like those two brews, Old Style Porter is packaged in a unique flask type bottle, the glass of which is unfortunately green.
St. Peter’s Old-Style Porter pours to a light black to dark brown color with a huge thick creamy head of towering foam and a big yeasty nose. The color is important here because early blends of this type (and early entire likely too) were probably not as dark as the porters of today. The palate has a pleasant roasted character with notes of chocolate light hints of coffee. Overall, this is a very smooth brew in body. The finish is very interesting, a perfect meld of coffeeish roasted notes and a delightful grassy-minty buzz of hops. These produce a light bitterness that lingers slightly on the tongue.
How much like three threads is this beer? Having not been around London in 1720 or so, I can’t say. As a beer in its own right, however, St. Peter’s porter is a winner, one that I heartily recommend you try.
Recommended:
Yes
|
|
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.