Frayja
Anchorage Brewing Company

500ml bottle from Tavour. Black pour, beige head fades to ring. Vanilla in the aroma is superb. Taste is sweet, roasty malts, barrel notes, heaps of vanilla. Smooth, silky, luscious.

 

 

It's strange how variable my experience with vanilla in beer can be. Too often it's a sticky sweet mess, so I tend to shy away from them. Here though, the vanilla is earthy and kind of woody. It pairs extremely well with and probably actually enhances the chocolatey base beer. The bourbon presence is quite potent and a very welcome addition. Almost drinks like a stout, but there is a nice underlying nuttiness keeping it in porter territory. I'm enjoying this even more than expected.

 

Pours out dark brown, looking a little sticky on the pour. Mildly translucence. A nice finger of khaki head forms.

Nose is strong malt forward. Getting salted chocolate pretzel, which is quite fun and interesting. Bready and toasted. The bourbon is present and accounted for.

Taste follows through with the chocolate. The malt is strong on the taste and the roastiness of it combined with the hop bitterness keep it from being anywhere close to sweet. This is balanced well. The bourbon plays nicely with this brightening it up a little. Adding brown sugar flavor and sweetness.

Mouthfeel is medium to full-bodied. A little dense and sticky.

Overall a really good brew. I can't distinguish this from a stout because apparently its a porter, but whatever. Highly enjoyable but not quite worth the $33 price tag. At a lower price this would be a stronger contender.

 

Dark black body, tan head. Dark chocolate, cocoa, brownie batter. Vanilla not present on nose but follows through on the backend, giving a bit of a chocolate swirl flavor. Medium whiskey warmth on the backend, a bit of a slight boozy bite. Med full body.

No bottling date. Bottle to snifter.

Look: Pours pitch black with a beautifully thick golden brownish foam.

Smell: Boozy and sweet bourbon notes up front. Subtle hints of chocolate and licorice lingering in the background.

Taste: Sweet bourbon and vanilla followed by milk chocolate and coffee with a slightly bitter finish.

Feel: Full bodied with a creamy mouthfeel and a perfect minimal but foamy carbonation. Thick and syrupy.

Overall: Very good imperial porter that could just as well be categorized as imperial stout. Typical taste of a (well executed) bourbon barrel aged stout. Madagascar vanilla is hardly detectable and overshadowed by the already vanilla-like boozy bourbon notes. The real stars here are the phenomenal creamy mouthfeel and the long-lasting foam on the dark black liquid. Very nice and warming experience.

375 mL bottle. Pours thick but not quite black. Smells of strong vanilla, whoa. Sweet chocolate and bourbon. Tastes of bourbon and vanilla throughout. Fudgy chocolate and very rich. Heavy and very boozy. It doesn't taste viscous and chewy like a lot of other Anchorage beers, but it hits just as hard.

 

 

 

 

375ML bottle with luminescent light blue wax that comes off easily. I fed my wife a Mocha Noir so I could hoard this to myself. Hope it’s worth it.

Pour as black as any stout with a nose is rampant vanilla & bourbon. Like.

Frayja is soul coating & mind numbing. The greeting party consists of deep malty sweetness, ground vanilla, booze with bits of black licorice & chocolate & whiff of smoke. Then the finish – oh, the finish. A flood of bourbon hits the palate & obliterates the memory of every other taste I’ve ever tasted. Holy bourbon. Those Woodford barrels might have still been a quarter full. Full. My first sip turned into four. That’s drinkability, baby.

You better like barrel if you wade into Frayja. Luckily I do. A brute & a very good beer bordering on excellent.

 

 

 

 

Ink black body topped with a thin yet creamy, khaki colored head. Intense aroma of fudge, cocoa and milk chocolate; richly sweet and alluring. An outstanding taste tracking along the lines of the smell; sweet and boozy with a hearty all-around chocolate character; vanilla adds depth to the chocolate; very light bitterness. Heavy body; smooth and almost gooey in texture; immensely pleasing residual sugars coat the palate; alcohol warmth coursing beneath the sweetness.

Anchorage just nailed this Baltic porter. From a great appearance to an incredible combination of smell, taste, and mouthfeel sensations, this is one beer to die for. The barrel aging seems almost tame compared to other barrel aged beers, but in this case, the subtlety and an excellent nuanced complexity are added to the overall sweet character of the beer.

Poured at 53 °F; no bottling data found.