Dominion Brown Ale

Formerly brewed at Old Dominion Brewing Co.
Style: Brown Ale
Dover, Delaware USA

The Old Dominion Brewing Company of Ashburn, VA has an outstanding little brewpub attached to the brewery. This really is a small and cozy place, with great pub grub, and is the place to be if you want to taste Dominion’s offerings. Beer lovers from around the country have made the trek to Virginia with the sole purpose of trying Old Dominion brewed beers. There is always about 22-26 taps of beer flowing from the taps, along with two beer engines, great beer and great variety is a hallmark of this brewery. What is great about the brewpub is, there are a few special beers that can only be found at the brewpub. One such beer is Dominion Brown Ale. This beer is an American brown ale by style, making it a bit more flavorful and much more hoppy than its British counter part. Dominion Brown ale is a fantastic example of this style. This beer is dry hopped with Cascades to get that signature citric, piney, hop aroma in the nose, and bittered with Galenas. Three malts are used in this beer, including caramel, carapils, and chocolate malt. This is a sweet malty and hoppy brown ale, one of the best examples of the style I have ever tasted. This beer is available on draught only, but growlers can be filled to go. One will often find this beer on one of the beer engines in cask conditioned form as well. Dominion Brown ale pours to a deep brown/mahogany color with nice white head, and good carbonation. The nose on this beer is very fragrant with piney, citric hop aromas, no mistaking it, it is Cascades. But there is also a nice back drop of chocolate and caramel malt aroma as well. The palate is a firm malt back bone of sweet caramel, and chocolate malt flavors. This beer finishes with more good malt character up front then dries out to a nice, bitter hop bite. Really a complex and flavorful brown ale, and as stated a perfect example of this style. This is a great drinking beer. I would match this with a big juicy burger and a heaping order of fries doused in Dominion All Malt Vinegar. This beer really goes great with a good cigar as well. I’ve been known to smoke a Te Amo or two in my day, and a growler of this goes quite well with that cigar.

On tap at Hard Time Cafe - College Park, MD. Bring it out of retirement! It certainly was not the Belgian Brown (well...according to the tap handle anyway). Clear dark chestnut brown, lasting light tan creamy head. A very nice malty nose on this with toasted marshmallow, butterscotch, milk chocolate, with hints of toffee, and a very light nuttiness. Flavor was similar with soft sweet toasted malt getting a nice dose of hoppy bitterness at the end. Real nice balance overall. Medium bodied and silky, soft carbonation, toasted malty finish. A perfect brew to consume in quantity. Nice job as usual...

The color are excellent.The aroma a litle chocolate and coffe.Is a good hoppy porter.

(Draft) Excellent color and a rich hoppy nose. The palate is jammed with malt, chocolate, coffe, and nuts. The finish is long sweet and hoppy. Very good. A must try.