Barrio Smoked Porter

Brewed by Barrio Brewing Co.
Style: Smoked
Tucson, Arizona USA

This beer arrives in a pint glass from the tap with a creamy, half-finger thick, lightly browned, tan colored head. The beer is a dark brown hue that shows some amber notes around the edges of the glass. The aroma has a sweet smokiness to it as well as some toasted malt character that mixes in towards the finish. The finish also has a hint of smoky, plastic-like phenolics, some band-aid notes (these last two are a bit stronger than I might prefer) and a hint of roast character under that smoke that adds a perceived dryness to the aroma.

The smokiness adds a sweet flavor to the front of this beer, but it quickly becomes harsh with an astringent roast grain note and plastic like phenolics. The body has a nice medium fullness to it despite being fairly dry tasting. The band-aid and plastic phenolic notes really linger on in the finish for quite some time. Burnt grain notes and roaste character add some sharpness to the profile as does a prickly, biting carbonation that, while not at an aggressive level, still adds significant carbonic acidity.

It is really unfortunate how the smoke and dark malt character have combined into a ligering, burnt plastic and band-aid dominated character; I double checked to make sure this wasn’t a tap problem by getting multiple pulls of this. I am not a 100% sure what has caused this, but it is likely the new Cherry Wood Smoked malt from Briess has something to do with and as it stands this beer is really not very good. I was actually excited to try making a beer with this new smoke malt and now I am definitely quite wary of doing so.