Dirty Chai Stout
Saltfire Brewing

Dark brown color.Big, beige head. Spices, roasted malt, and chocolate in the aroma. Moderately sweet, malty taste with spices all the way through. I am not a big fan of chai.

Saltfire Dirty Chai Stout, 6.7% ABV. Pours brownish black with a nice 3-finger light-brown head that left sparse lacing. Aroma is chai, coffee, and roast malt. Taste is chai and coffee, slightly sweet, slightly bitter, decent creamy mouthfeel, overall excellent.

 

Dirty Chai Stout pours a dark amber color, almost black, with a small, barely lacing head. The aroma is light and sweet, with a light chai note. The flavor is much the same, light, creamy, and sweet, with some chai notes and a hint of coffee. Good body and feel. Overall, creamy and tasty but very light in flavor and body.

 

Dark brown body is clear and shows light; thin khaki head. Earthy coffee and light spicing apparent on the nose, moderate roast quality. The taste shows some nice coffee flavors without too much bitterness, and the ginger from the chai spicing is identifiable but not overwhelming. Decent little coffee stout, different but good.

16 oz can from the brewery store. Born on 4/20/20, and the label says best enjoyed within 100 days. I have probably had it about a month so it was fresh when I bought it. Even if it’s a little past the recommended date it’s still really good. Pours opaque black with a small brown head that settles quickly. Aroma: roasted malt, coffee, spices. The spice is subtle. Taste is sweet malt up front, coffee, with a dry finish. Aftertaste is chai tea. Again, the spice is there and adds to the complexity but doesn’t overwhelm the taste, just a nice addition. Nicely done.

 

 

 

 

SaltFire opened its doors early summer 2018. I have stalked their webpage learning about them. Everything I have read so far has piqued my interest. I finally got the chance to try their beers. I purchased 9 out of the 11. My first SaltFire beer let me start the review. The beer was 50 degrees and served in a tulip glass. The pour on the beer produced a two finger head that has a light tan color. The head is frothy, creamy, and airy with excellent retention. The head slowly dissipated leaving lacing on the glass. The color of the beer is SRM 36 a dark brown nearly black.

The initial aromas in the glass are dark roasted malt and coffee. Next, I get dark roasted malts, toffee, vanilla, grassy, herbal, cinnamon, cardamom, fennel, and bready.

The initial flavors in beer are ginger, dark roasted coffee, and cinnamon. Next, I get toffee, molasses, earthy, dark chocolate, cardamom, fennel, smokiness, char, bready, and toasted bread crumbs.

The mouthfeel of the beer is dry and thick.

The body of the beer is full, medium-low carbonation, and full finish.

The beer has this Irish dry stout feel to it. The coffee is super potent with chai mingle like everyone is friends. The beer has a solid balance and harmony. As the beer warms up more the chai and coffee comes out. The beer begins to take on another dimension. Solid beer with great flavors. Not a bad start to the SaltFire lineup.

i like the idea of this beer, working coffee and chai tea into the same recipe. its a cool beer really, and i think the proportions of the coffee and chai are excellent, both in relation to each other, and also in relation to the base stout, which is dry and almost irish stout tasting and feeling to me, with a deep bitter roast, not much middle malty sweetness or body, and then a fast dry finish with a little bit of appreciable yeast character to it. the coffee smells a little bit bitter here, and perhaps off fully fresh, like its been sitting a minute, although i didnt see a date, trace oxidation, cardboard, and chopped green pepper to it, but its not like that in the taste, its just a bitter dark roast, maybe devoid of some nuance, but its not stale when i taste it. the chai is cool, hints of cinnamon and cardamom come out, some allspice or something too, not overdone, and balanced with the coffee, it really does take on an iced dirty chai complexion, pretty rad mix of flavors too, seemingly quite organic and natural in this, like they want to be here. a little lighter in body and not real well carbonated, but the flavors fade out nice on the swallow, not a long linger, which i often get from chai type spices, especially in robust stouts like this. fun stuff, big thanks to my brother in law for picking this up and sharing it, i was impressed with all of the saltfire beers we had!

edit: cool they are canning this one now! hopefully this means a little distribution in the near future...