Cēsu Christmas Porter [2008]
Cēsu Alus Darîtava

500 ml bottle from Riga

Pours dark brown with brown head that recedes to a dense layer in half finger thickness. Some patchy lacing. Aroma is quite sweetish, strong molasses and licorice with roasted malt background. There is no information about ingredients on the bottle and in brewers website, but I suspect the beer has been very lightly spiced, as it notes something about 'typical Christmas spice'.

Taste is slight bittery roasted and spicy (very faint, some hints of cinnamon) malt with sweet coffee finish and very sweet aftertaste. My overall feeling that beer was somewhat too sweet. However, when it warms up towards the end of the glass, sweetness is subdued, bringing more of that nice bittery notes out.

Even worse is that the beer label says the beer should be cooled before drinking and has one of those printed indicators that appear at near 0 temperatures. Still, it is a very good attempt from a brewery that produces mostly less than average quality beer.