Info

Beer Advocate
Beer School
MnBeer
The 86 Rules of Boozing
Thrifty Hipster
Twin Cities Beer Map
Twin Cities Imbiber
What Ale's Thee?

St. Paul Bars

The Glockenspiel
The Happy Gnome
The Muddy Pig
Sweeney's
Señor Wong

Minneapolis Bars

The Blue Nile
Memory Lanes
Stub & Herb's
Town Hall

Breweries

Bell's
Flat Earth
Flying Dog
Furthermore
Leinenkugel's
New Belgium
Rogue
Surly

About

This is my personal drinking blog: don't take it too seriously.

Previous Posts

Furthermore: Furthermore
Festival of Hops
Winterfest highlights
A fridge full of New Belgium
Flashback
Darkness and the last Porterfest
Barry's B-day at the Pig
Happy Hour at the Blue Door Pub
In which sweetness is a weakness
Flat Earth Porterfest: Xanadu

To Dan Drinks

To Dan's Webpage



Website XML feed

Delicious Bookmarks

My delicious site feed

Flat Earth Porterfest: Xanadu
Friday, November 14, 2008   10:20 AM

Yesterday after work Barry and I drove over to the Flat Earth Brewery for growlers. It's Porterfest for the next two months, and this Thursday's special was the Xanadu Porter, Cygnus X-1 infused with orange.

The bouquet on this beer is amazing: I wasn't expecting so much orange and it totally knocked my socks off. I haven't had more than a tasting glass yet, but my initial impression was that the front is very good, the middle is a little weird, and there's a bit of that roasty/smoky porter back that I don't particularly like.

Announced Porterfest beers so far:

11/20 - Red Barchetta - Cherry infused Porter
11/26 - The Trees - Hazelnut infused Porter
12/23 - Snow Dog Porter - Peppermint infused Porter

Barry and I talked about going back every Thursday to try these. It may be a thing.

We tried a few other beers. The Belgian-Style Pale Ale is still too bready for me (I want to say that it was too "brett" but I'm still not 100% sure what that means) and the Rode Haring, their Flanders Red Ale, was delicious but a little too dry at the end for my taste. That may be the style; I've never had a Flanders Red Ale before and they sound complicated.

They poured some Black Helicopter and while I'm not sure I could drink too much of it, I was shocked by how much I liked it: I've tried this once before and absolutely hated it, and Oatmeal Stout has been on my list of no-go styles for a while now. Nor do I really like coffee-flavored beers.

I think the difference this time was #1. It's winter and I'm in the mood for darker, roastier beers (this one actually has caffeine: hilarious!), #2. It had the mouthfeel I was missing from the other beers and, #3. I've been into beer pairings recently and couldn't stop thinking how good this would be with a nice chocolate dessert.

(Incidentally I have no idea what to pair with an orange-infused porter. Some sort of smoky cheese? Pheasant?)

Barry wanted to get the Curly Tail, but they sold their last growler while we were standing there. I'd been warned to get our growlers first and not dawdle, and now there'll be no Curly Tail until April. We both got a growler of Xanadu.

I'm looking forward to next week: they have a Winter Warlock Barleywine that I don't think I've ever tried, and 'tis the season. Plus now that we've bought our first growlers we can get in on the savings.

Labels: , , , , , , , ,


Leave a Comment