Jake's Vanilla Bean Porter
Paw Paw Brewing Company

Jake's Vanilla Porter
12oz. Bottle ($1.79 from Copper Vine), no date, poured into a nonic pint

A- A normal pour creates 1 finger of light brown head. The body is very dark brown, near black. The head keeps to a medium film and leaves awesome rings.

S- Roasted dark malts mix with vanilla to create a French vanilla coffee aroma. Hints of dark chocolate.

T- Pretty flavorful. Roasted and charred malts with light vanilla sweetness. Hopping is lighter, but comes across in the end as slightly minty.

M- Medium full body. Moderate carbonation. Pleasantly grainy.

O- It's a really solid porter. With vanilla on the lighter side, it's an easy drinker, but it doesn't set itself apart. I might not choose it over an Edmund Fitz, Bell's, or Founders, but it's not too far off.

4.25 4 3.5 3.75 3.75

12 oz bottle from Michigan.

This vanilla porter has about as much dark roasted grains and nearly as much chocolate as vanilla in the flavor. Despite some hints on the aroma, there are no off flavors.

Medium body and near medium carbonation.

Thanks to whomever threw this in as an extra like 5 years ago. Looks like I drank it the morning of the Frankie Edgar/Urijah Faber fight that was an international card playing here in the morning.

Pours black/dark brown, brown head 1/5". Aroma was mild in terms of roasted malt and vanilla. Nothing off, just pretty muted.

Taste is fine, its got a decently smooth mouth feel, even if the vanilla doesn't amount to much in the sensory areas of aroma/taste, it does seem to provide a smoother beer, but that also could be from the lower roasting/heft of the malt, maybe more chocolate malt than something black patent or higher roasting/scorching. Lacks some of the hopping/bitterness that American Porters tend to be distinguished by.

All in all, its a good beer. No off flavors. When spring starts to warm up, its nice to kind of have a few beers of this nature and strength around to start the day off before it gets too hot for porters.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

With almost every brewery in Michigan producing at least two porters, Jake's falls deep towards the back of the back particularly in the vanilla porter category. In general, this beer is lacking but perhaps a start towards something better in development. Right now though, it's the C/C- student in the class.

First impressions are decent as it pours a rich, black color. You get hints of that vanilla bean but it's faint, too faint. I'm a huge fan of the use of vanilla bean versus extract in porters but I want to smell and taste it. In fact, the whole beer is like that in that nothing really stands out and it ends up a pretty standard porter in most respects.