Yukon Porter
Yukon Brewing

 

 

After a cliche of a hard day at the salt mines, a pint at Edmonton's Urban Diner southside location, apparently the only place in town to get this stuff, or so sez their sign outside.

This beer apppears a clear, very dark golden chestnut brown hue, with two fingers of dense foamy, somewhat creamy beige head, which leaves a fine sedimentary rock crossface pattern of solid lace around the glass as it slowly sinks away.

It smells lightly of roasted caramel malt, a thin milky sourness, and soft leafy, earthy hops. The taste is semi-sweet toasted caramelized malt, a soothing oily nuttiness, some dry, flinty chocolate, an understated, kind of generically fruity tanginess, and dusty, earthy hops.

The bubbles are a tad punchy, but more in a fine frizzy manner, the body a sturdy, somewhat palate-clingy medium weight, yet quite agreeably smooth. It finishes off-dry, the chocolate creeping up to take charge over the now limpid caramel, with the waning sour edge and lingering hops providing the proverbial yang.

A rather enjoyable old-school version of the style, done up dead-on by the good folks up in Whitehorse, who seem to have a predilection for these kinds of beers. The malts are big and flavourful (piss off, Yankee spellcheck - I want that extra 'u'), and the sour undertones and supporting hops don't overstep their bounds, nor even strain at them, and yet it is somehow a-ok, eh?