Midnight Sun Arctic Rhino Coffee Porter

Brewed by Midnight Sun Brewing Company
Style: Porter
Anchorage, Alaska USA

Pours black with a sizeable light brown head. Aroma of roasted coffee, chocolate, and vanilla. Kind of a Cafe Mocha thing going on in the flavor - the sweet cocoa plays well with the acidic coffee that becomes more prevalent in the finish. I am one that believes the strong flavors of Imperial Stouts do best as a base for coffee beers, but Midnight Sun does a nice job pulling it off in a porter. Very nice.

Date: 02/25/2006
Mode: Bottle
Source: Blind Tasting

dark ruby red, big tan head, nice roasted coffee aroma, creamy body, nice roasted flavor, light sweetness
-------- /> Date: 05/12/2007
Mode: bottle
Score: 2.9 to 3.4
Words: liquid solutions

black, creamy tan head, streaks of lace, sweet smokey chocolate aroma, creamy body, rich dark chocolate flavor, bitterness with components of coffee, dark chocolate, and roasted malts, touch of sweetness adds some balance, the roasted coffee character grows as it warms but the rich chocolate keeps the balance,

Aroma: 7/10; Appearance: 7/10; Flavor: 6/10; Palate: 8/10; Overall: 13/20
Rating: 3.4/5.0
Drinkability: 7/10
Score: **+/4

Very dark brown/near black pour. A tall, creamy and rocky chocolate mousse tinted tan head rises and recedes incredibly slowly. Lacing is scattered widely about. After a while the receding head and color look like a chocolate ice cream root beer float. The aroma is of dusty caramel and lightly bitter chocolates, coffee, macadamia nuts, walnut and bold yeast. It’s an unattractive combination that doesn’t seem centered around any particular component, just scattered thoughtlessly about. mild fig and earthy notes, as well as an herbal minty quality finish off an unsuccessfully assembled aroma. The flavor is marginally better but the dusty notes and a strange yeast taste swarm the tastebuds and form a tight grip. Coffee is most notable, followed by semi-sweet caramel and indifferent chocolate. sweetness is medium to medium-high, bitterness mild, acidity low(though it still seems too high for this style, it surely detracts silkiness from timid malt). Roastiness is mild to medium and underscored by coffee notes. Astringency is also too high. The finish is lightly bitter, lightly to mildly sweet and littered with stale coffee and burned malt notes. the mouthfeel is brimming with carbonation, medium-full bodied and forgettable, just as this beer as a whole is. Throughout drinking this there is an ever-growing presence of foul, contaminated water - that’s not the case, but this particular ingredient combination and recipe cause a calculated mess across my palate, so much so that while it’s not disgusting, it’s not that easy to finish either. This is the second bottle, from different batches, that I’ve tried and neither was worth the price of admission. What a shame, for this is typically a wonderful brewery.

Pours black with a huge, fluffy, well-retained light brown head. Nice looking. Big, roasted coffee and dark malt aromas fill the air. Some mild chocolated and burnt charcoal are noticeable as well. The flavor is alot of the same. Big roast and malts. The coffee is there, but it isnt an overwhelming coffee taste. The carbonation is big, maybe a little too much so. I get just a hint of some metallic flavors that kind of turned me off some. The bitterness in the end was there mixed in with the coffee. Kind of a mess of a beer. Not terrible by any means, but flawed for sure.

I liked the overall flavors in this porter. Fordest was nice enough to share this one with me after he returned from his trip in which he was minutes away from my favorite brewery and he didnt go.

Bottle and served in my Stone IRS snifter: Pours a deep brown with ruby highlights topped by a fading creamy beige head and left spotty lace upon the glassware. The aroma has a big noticeable component of Italian coffee and anise along with some chocolate, caramel, tobacco, walnut and fig esters. The taste is pure bittersweet with a layer of fruity goodness under it all. Midesection is dominantly nutty and a tad herbal. The finish is a tad metallic and smoky (ashy) with some lactic sourness popping in and out throughout. The mouth feel is an aggressive shot of espresso/charred dryness and bitter twang over oily lushness. Well hardly a deep beer, it offered more than the basic porter. Grew on me more I drank it.

Now to get my hands on the Berserker Imperial Stout!

22 oz bottle picked up at the Bierstien in Eugene, OR. Lots of coffee aromas coming off this black beer with a really nice tan head. Flavors were more coffee and chocolate with a bitter coffee finish. Pretty good stuff.

Bottle split with BossHossBikes in a blind tasting. Black. Man, all three of these beers are equally black with the same shade of tan heads. It’s not all that viscous and spotty lacing is noticed. The nose has distinct, defined coffee with hints of figs and licorice. However, I get some vegetation too that I’m not digging that much and some weird herby scents. The flavor is more appealing with the coffee and defined ash up front with suggestions of toasted oats. The finish reminds me of vegetables and a rubber hose though. This is similar to Atwater’s Java stout. There are appealing flavors but also weird off notes that subtract from the overall drinking experience. I could use a bit more coffee here, at least.