寫那麼一堆ㄈ話 (看左圖)，這酒和夢遊仙境的Alice有甚麼關係啊... 反正就是Brewdog的又一支好作品，不過，自標為Baltic Porter是誤導了...

Brewdog, Alice Porter, 6.2%abv. (Modern Porter)

This is the second dark beer to enjoy on the St. Patrick’s Day, followed by a classic Irish Dry Stout (sorry, no, not Guinness…). Coming in a slim 330ml brown bottle, BB 23/05/2013, served cool in Gulden Draak’s branded short-stemmed, tulip-shaped sniffer.

4/5 Appearance: pours a pitch black hue, coming with a frothy light-tan head with decent retention, while the carbonation level is hard to detect, definitely not too lively.

4/5 Smell: the nose is deeply aromatically fruity&hoppy on top of a more settled malty body, interestingly reminiscent of French red Pineau des Charentes (an oak-aged fortified wine blended with Cognac eau-de-vie), sweet&perfumy overripe dark plum flesh, fig preserve, cocoa&vanilla beans (at times it even rings a bell of American toasted white oak chips), sweet brown toast, liquidy black sugar, with lots of hop aroma to boot… A very light tinge of sour dark fruits stays behind, but only just. On balance the nose is really perfumy, full of American or non-traditional hops hence the dominance of potent hop aroma.

4/5 Taste: smooth on the palate and surprisingly light-bodied, the foretaste is full of mainly ripe dark stone-fruits and lesser brown-bready malts, going smoothly and never feeling quite explosive or heavy, paving the way for a lovely toast-malty aftertaste to linger, where hints of dark chocolate, sweetened burned espresso, burned walnuts and burned sugar all lend their due share of depth/impact to the balance, with chewy hop bitterness and aromatic black malts lagging behind (50-50). The overripe-plum-like fruitiness provides a very pleasant touch of aroma as well as sourness on the balance, too.

3.5/5 Mouthfeel & 4/5 Overall: the mouthfeel is… smooth, a bit too smooth that it doesn’t actually taste quite fresh anymore (anyhow the expiry date is just two months away, so…), but the body remains medium and the flavour profile never actually feels heavy, so all in all a balance is luckily retained. This is a very hoppy and fruity porter (particularly on the nose), and I wouldn’t categorise it as a “Baltic Porter” since this is very much a top-fermented dark ale rather than the Baltic countries’ local adoption and adaptation of good old porter. That said, I would definitely love to try it again, if I could come across a fresher batch, that is!

--Yau (17/03/2013)