Smoked Porter
Highlander Brew Co.

At my lady Pamela's house; canned and chilled, 473mL in a pint glass. From my favourite LCBO at Tecumseh Mall in nearby Windsor. My second beer distributed by Toronto's United Craft Inc., and first made from North Bay, Ontario's Highlander Brew Co.

A very nice Porter. Strangely subdued aroma, I was expecting a bit more punch. Pours well, nice foaming head that settles to a patchy lace after a few minutes. Taste is pleasing and at first complex with a competition of the malt vs coffee that relaxes to a chocolate tone.
Feels clean in the mouth and avoids the tar afters that can blight some smoked beer, finishes well and leaves a pleasant lingering smokiness on the tongue.

I dislike when this happens (issue with canning), but I have to go off of my can. From other reviews I’ve read, it’s a lot more carbonated than mine, and mine isn’t that old, so I’m not sure what happened. Pours a deep dark brown, with no appreciable head.

Unfortunately subdued aromas. Mild roasted malt. Coffee and chocolate. I can’t say I get much smoke, if at all.

Taste follows the nose pretty tightly. Mild roasted malts, a little bit of dark chocolate, some coffee bean taste. Would’ve loved a stronger smoke taste, which I cannot find in appreciable quantities here. There is a mildly savoury quality that I chalk up to the beechwood smoking.

Light-medium bodied, my can was a bit thinner with light carbonation. Gently prickly on the tongue, I honestly couldn’t taste the alcohol whatsoever. On that end, it was incredibly smooth.

This is the second Canadian stout/Porter I’ve had an unfortunate run in with, the first was a nitro beer that had a broken widget resulting in a horrifically flat and boring beer. I was really looking forward to this, Canada does make great dark beers, like St Ambroise Oatmeal Stout or some of the real great chocolate milk stouts (there are many) but this was just so underwhelming. I may look for this again and buy one that is as fresh as possible to give this a second go around to be more fair.

For now, just understand the rating was tempered by some sort of error in the canning/carbonation process. And I really have to ding them hard, if they were going for. Smoked Porter style, they missed the mark. Not that you can’t have subtlety it any beer style, but I don’t think anyone goes and picks up a smoked Porter named ‘Smoked Porter’ and thinks ‘I hope for super mild smoke flavour from this one!’. Really unfortunate

Poured a 473ml can into a pint glass. a two finger tan head on a reddish black. The head diminishes to a thin layer that sticks around. Some patchy lacing.
Coffee and chocolate in the nose.
Interesting flavour profile. Besides the expected coffee and chocolate there is olives. Subdued smoked malt.
Medium body and carbonation.
An interesting porter. well worth a try.