Fortune Favors the Robust
Penn Quarter Porter - DC Brau, Washington D.C.
First off, this beer is simply fun to say out loud. The P-Q-P phrasing is super satisfying, and I’m definitely gonna say it in a funny voice next time I’m talking to someone about it. Like in a Boston accent, “qwatah pahtah...ya want wan? Oh c’mon! ya’d love a qwatah pahtah!” Sorry to all two of my friends from Boston that you have to live with talking like that. It really rolls off the tongue and after pouring it, I couldn’t wait to roll it onto my tongue. Wink. Regardless, I’m back at it with this fresh new porter from DC Brau that I’ve never tried. Earlier this week I found out about a beer festival in March that’s being hosted at their brewery. After immediately buying VIP tickets to the event, I thought it would be appropriate to buy one of their limited release beers to prepare.
This porter is labeled as a robust porter and includes a little history lesson on the side of the can. It reads “Penn Quarter is most famous for Ford’s theater, where President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated, and his coat and hat can still be seen to this day”. I went to Ford’s Theater a little over a year ago to see “12 Angry Men”. The play put me in awe because I had no idea what it was about. If you’re unfamiliar with the plot, it is about a jury that is responsible for deciding the fate of a young African American man who has been accused of murder. The acting was just as robust as this porter. Guess that’s the reflection portion of today’s beer.
The coloration of the can implied to me that it was going to have a strong coffee flavor. They used minimal coloring, but it was enough to get the point across. This was enticing to me because if I’m not enjoying a beer, I’m probably enjoying a cup of coffee. Both have fun physiological effects on your body - one speeds you up, the other slows you down, and both give you rough sh*ts if you drink too much. See, fun! Wouldn’t have it any other way. At 5.5% ABV, this is not a high gravity beer, but drinking multiple porters in a night can still feel pretty heavy because of their density. They’re practically viscous. Also, just because it’s 12 IBUs, doesn’t mean it isn’t bitter. The color reminded me of the 2 cups of dark roast I had earlier this morning, which made me even more excited to drink it. The reaction I had after the first sip was: VERY rich, chocolate, dark chocolate, coffee, and burnt but in a good way, i.e. the aforementioned dark roast. The burnt really brought that all the flavors together because it kept it appropriately bitter. I also got a deep dark chocolate aftertaste, which was delicious and lingered for just long enough. As I kept drinking it those initial tastes faded away (duh) but the aftertaste kept coming in strong.
This is not a beer I would recommend to someone who doesn’t enjoy powerful flavors. They didn’t go wrong by labeling this as a robust porter because it is exactly that. It occasionally felt like the dark chocolate took a bit too much control but that was probably due to the aftertaste and it honestly wasn’t unwelcome. If you do like porters, I would highly recommend this beer, especially if you like coffee. Imagine melting a bar of 85% cocoa into an ever-so-slightly burned cup of coffee and that’s what this felt like. Damn delicious. I feel like I’ve been seeing a lot of vanilla-centric porter flavors recently, so it was nice to get back to the dense. If you get the chance to try this beer or see “12 Angry Men” at Ford’s Theater, take the chance. Both are only available for a limited time!