HopTown Vanilla Cream Porter

Formerly brewed at HopTown Brewing Company
Style: Porter
Pleasanton, California USA

(Bottle from brewer) Pours a dark brown color with a small tan head. Has a wonderful vanilla fragrance. Flavors of (you guessed it) vanilla... ... coffee and semi-sweet chocolate. Best vanilla porter that I can recall tasting.

Bottle from the brewer, had this at the Dallas tasting, MArch 27, 2004. Vanilla coffee aroma, with the vanilla very strong, but the aroma not very complex, just the vanilla and a small amount of coffee and chocolate. Roasty and coffee flavored, some chocolate, but not going much past that. Tastes good, but not deep.

Tap at O’Brien’s: Pours a dark brownish/black color with light head. The nose is huge with vanilla extract, cherry and oak notes. The flavor has an odd vanilla twang to it along with some chocolate mocha roast. Almost like doughy chocolate chips that have had too much vanilla put in. Unbalanced and really not my thing. Finess is not its fine suit but this would probably do well near the end of an exhaustive tasting.

GABF 2005, Rating #2100!

Reddish hued with a creamy off-white head and very good lace. The aroma has notes of mocha and vanilla, taosted and burnt malts, and an earthy quality. The taste has vanilla has expected but it did not overpower the roasted malt, coffee, chocoalte or lightly bitter finish. Nice balance with the porter character of the brew. Better than most vanilla beer I have tried, a heck of a lot better really.

Bomber poured a nearly opaque black with a small lasting brown head. Aromas of vanilla, milk chocolate and a hint of mocha. Palate was medium bodied smooth and creamy. Flavors of milk chocolate, vanilla, some roastiness and a hint of coffee with a smooth lingering bittersweet finish. A very tasty vanilla porter!

Draft. Nitro. Dark blackish beer with a dark cream colored nitro head. Chocolate, slight roast aroma. Nice chocolate/vanilla flavor with backing roast. Creamy nitro mouthfeel. Lingering chocolate. Chocolate dominates and it didn’t have as much vanilla as others have said.

Bottle from the brewer. Over the top vanilla aroma, to the point of seeming sickly and one-dimensional. Roasted, slight coffee flavors made the tasting more orbust, with some smoke and a lactic edge. As I continued drinking, I noted "roasted" once again. Deep brown color. A very good beer once I got past the aroma.

(Nitro Draft: O’Brien’s in San Diego, CA) Right off the bat, the nose is blasted with a vanilla and strong chocolate aroma. Very chocolaty and dark roasted maltiness dominates this brew, sweet, but not sugary, moderately bitter but not hoppy. It tastes so chocolaty, and the palate is so smooth and milky, it’s like drinking chocolate milk. Fairly consitent flavor from start to finish, so no complex transformations here. Body is medium-to-full, but I really can’t get over how silky and creamy the palate is, this is like sex for the tongue. Very dark brown, almost black and nearly opaque. The very creamy tan head is fairly small on the pour, gradually fading to a circle around the glass interior without leaving even a trace of lacing, and that’s disappointing for a beer on nitro. And actually, the heading has always been poor, every time I’ve had it. So except for the poor heading, this is a wonderful beer, one that I order whenever I see it on tap.