Surly Bender

Brewed by Surly Brewing Company
Style: Brown Ale
Brooklyn Center, Minnesota USA

Serve in Dimpled mug

Can. I can’t remember the last time I had a microbrew in a can. A brown color with a light brown head. A semi-sweet malty, toasted caramel aroma with nuts. Earthy, gritty, and malty flavors are push through this beer. A good body with a lasting malty aftertaste.

This poured a murky brown color with an off white head. Aroma was roasted malts, nutty, and some chocolate. Flavor iwas realyl smooth and blended well with hints of mild chocolate, oatmeal, burnt malts and nuts. Pretty good for the style.

UPDATED: SEP 8, 2009 16 oz. can. Very complex beer out of a Can. Pour is deep brown with tan head. Flavor is oatmeal and malt, and exceptionally smooth. On top of being very smooth, many different flavors are found. Floral, citrus, herbs. Certainly hop in the finish. Very well constructed beer, one of the better I have had in awhile.

16 oz can. Pours up a nice tan head atop a clear, burgundy brown. Smells yummy enough; brown sugar, grapes, dates and spruce. I’m not a big fan of browns but this is good. Burnt caramel and cocoa, clementines with light soap. Fine carb. Body could be a bit firmer but still chewy as is. Lingering vanilla and oats.

16oz. can. Aroma of darkly sweet malts, combined with notes of cocoa, caramel, toffee, and some dark, grainy breadiness. Clear dark brown color with a very fine head. Flavor profile features a nice depth of caramel and dark, grainy breadiness, the sweetness nicely balanced with a drying quality towards the finish and a lingering, faint nutty quality. Smooth and low in effervescence on the palate, body is medium. Nice Brown!

I love this beer. Nicely malt aromatic (bread from the oven, toasted walnuts) with a good hop tinge (a bit of pencil shavings, plus some pine). Looks good, nice head. Medium-bodies, perfect for style. There is some nice oat/chocolate sweetness but never too much and it blends great with a bit of fuggley/funky, plus PNW citrus. Nicely integrated and holds together when warm. I would drink this very regularly if it was availble to me. Great extra from Iowaherkeye.

The Surly Brewing Company had intended from the start to create beers without definitions, that went beyond stylistic boundaries. With their initial releases, they have shown this ambition and realized it well. though we call this an American Brown Ale, it’s much more than that, and seems like a porter at times, which is how the brewer described it as, an Oatmeal Brown Porter. And why not? Burnt sienna body, a crisp mahogony hue, with ruby crimson feet. Warm cocoa-toned head, like a cappocino topping, lasts long into the life of the pint. Aroma is lightly nutty, slightly sweet, some caramel/toffee notes, then reveals itself dry and roasty. Earthy, open, inviting. I like it. The brew boards the palate with confidence and lets loose an array of flavors. Malt is the main ingredient here, and some compelling ones were put into play, several caramels, some chocolate, (to make it more of a brown porter than a robust one) some Belgian Special B (yum, I’m reminiscing on some favorite dubbels at times), and aromatic hops. Chocolate is here, nuts, and toffee, sweet for a second, then dry again, and toasty. The oats add an excellent amount of texture and grit to the mouthfeel that makes every sip something to savor. Body is medium to full, but it’s that texture that makes it memorable. It’s smooth, but substantial, with a long, memorable finish, the flavors echo with every drop that rolls back over the tongue. Here’s a brown ale you can drink, and which makes you think. Rather than pass the time in between gulps of a light, uncomplicated sweetish brown brew, it grabs your attention and your palate and makes you wonder a bit about it, and ponder on what makes you like it so much. It’s an excellent introductory brew for this upstart, as people can reach for it again and again over a night at the bar,("another Bender", you say to the barman, and pretty soon you’re on one!) and still ponder on it’s quality and taste, and come back for more the next night.

On tap at Maproom. Pours a dark dull brown with thick sudsy beige head. Good amount of green hops in the aroma over some chocolate and sweet molasses. Very hoppy taste, chocolate, fair amount of roast, some caramel, on the dryer side. Thicker than Flossmoor’s Pullman Brown and definitely more hoppy.