0,473 litre Can, from Systembolaget Strömstad Centrum, at home. Dark brown with beige head. Malts, hops, yeast, Caramel, Roasted, some bitterness.

1 pint can from The Fuss Club. A black coloured pour with a huge beige head on top. Roasty, malty, chocolate, hoppy, citrus taste and aroma. An excellent sweetish, very moreish tasting black IPA from just outside JFK airport.

355 ml can. Dark amber colour with a dense off-white head. Sweet aroma with caramel malts, citrus, fruits, chocolate, and grasses. The taste is light bitter. Medium body. Dry and bitter finish. Fine hybrid.

Sweet, roast, alcohol, woody, coffee, chocolate

Porter from the state of New York, tasted from tap at Bar Beenhouwer. Thin and open, pale yellowish head, dissolving into virtually nothing, over a pitch black robe. Aroma of cold black coffee, roasted walnuts, unsugared black chocolate, brown bread crust, wet leather, bayleaf, minerals, hint dry caramel. Sweetish onset but very restrainedly so with a touch of black olive-ish umami and a hint of dried figs; prickly carbonation, a bit much so for a porter in fact, with strong minerally effects. Smooth, lightly oily, brown-bready, toasty and bitter-chocolatey backbone, remaining fairly low in sweetness and instead growing steadily in roasted bitterness, quite chicory-like, with peppery hops to support it; minerally and bayleaf-like notes in the aftertaste, ending medium dry. Not too much happens here for a postmodern American porter -but it all stays focused and to the point with no unnecessary digressions. Quite old school in that sense – one would even expect a more outspoken hoppiness if ‘old school’ means “eighties and nineties U.S. microbrewing style”, but all the easier to drink and one I could drink gallons of.