Tag Archives: Friedlieb

26 Jul 2016
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Home brew reviews

The Friedlieb, Coffee Porter IV – Review

The Friedlieb is a beer Chas has been working on for a while. Back in the middle of 2015 he made the fourth version of this beer. No write up on the brew day, but I can say that the changes to the recipe were more of a slight alteration rather than any significant.

The Friedlieb IV for drinking

The Friedlieb IV ready for drinking and review

Before starting the review, I need to admit I had this beer for about eight months. Got it in June 2015. Drank it in February 2016. The flavours had settled down a fair bit and the forward hops softened to almost nothing. Now that’s out of the way, onto the review.

This is a big coffee porter. It comes in at 10.2%, the strongest version of this beer yet. You can see from the photo it’s very dark. You can’t quite see that it’s not very cloudy.

There’s a smooth coffee aroma. Has a push of smoke towards the end and slight very soft rounded yeast aroma.

The beer starts with plenty of smoothness. Dark malt from start to end. Smoke and coffee giving this lots of complex flavours that keep it lively and interesting. The yeast flavours are present the whole way from the middle. This yeast is a bit Belgian in style, rounded and with some slight tropical fruit to it.

There’s heaps of flavour here and character. Body is good with only a tiny bite from the alcohol.

For food matching this would go well with big winter food. Think mixed flavour stew. Or rich tasty sausages. Or super slow cooked red meat, lamb or beef. Anything hearty and deep flavours with pleanty of protein would work a treat.

This beer has heaps of flavour, but not a big thick body. So you need something to eat with this, or you get overwhelmed by the end. Really good beer, with a slight tweak this would be a great beer.

Chas has been working on this recepie for a good few years. I’m hoping he’ll return to this and brew another batch. Would be more than happy to help give a hand in the quality testing of the final product.

-Mikey

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8 Oct 2014
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Home brew reviews

The Friedlieb, Coffee Porter III – Review

Way back on 29 July Chas made the third version of The Friedlieb, his coffee porter. This latest version is an all grain. And it’s pretty bloody good. All the relatively fresh coffee that went into this helps drive this beer.

The Friedlieb coffee porter III

The Friedlieb coffee porter III ready for drinking

The aroma is simply great. Big coffee and molasses hit in the nose. Good smoke end to the aroma, long and lasting but not harsh. This really draws you into the beer.

Up front this beer is a little deceptive. The dark malt feels somewhat light but the smoke is there. Plenty of peated malt. Chocolate is there at the start and coffee too. The rye malt is a little harder to pick up. Slightly overpowered, but giving some backing to the rest of the malt. The hops are not really there, but more to help balance.

There’s a big mouth feeling to this beer. Small bubbles give it a sort of creamy hint to it. After the first impressing the smoke and coffee take over. They’re mixing around and washing together. The alcohol in this is 6.8%, though you don’t really notice any of that anyway. The smoke and coffee cover it very well.

All the peated malt takes over and this does get slightly too much. That’s when it’s cold. Once this beer warms up there’s more of a slight sweetness to this. The chocolate malt comes out a bit and the brown malt flavour comes out a lot more. There’s a biscuit/toast flavour to it. But it’s the coffee that really becomes the king flavour and reminding you that there really was a LOT of coffee put into this beer.

The downside for me is the smoke from the peated malt. When I reviewed the second version of The Friedlieb I mentioned that Chas was really looking for this. It’s too much for me. Chas really wanted to push this, and I think it’s something he really likes. Don’t get me wrong, this is a well made beer with good complexity, nice body and long lasting flavour. For me one bottle is enough.

This is a beer for the end of the night. At home, settling in for the night and have next to a fire. Don’t need anything to eat because this beer is full of character and flavour. Maybe not the last beer, ‘cos the coffee will keep you going. But a good solid flavour hit to slow things down.

-Mikey

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23 Dec 2013
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Experiments

The Friedlieb, Coffee Porter II – Review

What an amazing beer. Best beer we’ve ever made? Pay attention and you’ll find out.

The Friedlieb II is the second coffee porter from Chas. The first one was done back in June and turned out pretty good. I had some issues with the sweetness and Chas wanted more smoky-ness. This version didn’t address the smoke but sorted out a few things.

The Friedlieb coffee porter II

The Friedlieb coffee porter II ready for drinking

Now, I’m giving away a bit here, normally I will have a glass of this beer with me when I type up the review. But for this one no such luck. I wasn’t around when Chas bottled the beer and he only brought around one beer when we tasted it back on Sunday 15th. So, I’ll go by my notes and memory.

First up there’s a huge coffee aroma. There’s some hints of chocolate and sweetness as well. This beer smells like exactly what you would expect from a coffee porter. That’s a big plus. Flavour. A dark creamy hit on the palate is the first thing you notice. Plenty of coffee the whole way through this beer from start to end. Lots of full body and big dark malt flavours. So smooth across all the flavour. There’s a chocolate builds up from about the mid point which works well with the coffee and dark malt. And there’s just enough bitterness to hold it together without any noticeable hop flavours.

The beer came in at 7.3% alcohol. Quite a respectable amount. With the coffee in there and so much grain flavours it could of gone any way. Lucky for Chas it worked out a treat.

Matching this beer to food is really hard. Not because it’s a dark beer with lots of coffee and hints of sweetness. It’s because it’s so amazingly good. You really want to drink it by itself. It could work with any rich or roasted food. Dark meats or big robust vegetables. Something with a dark sauce like red wine or gravy. Other option is to have this as a dessert beer. Possibly the perfect dessert beer.

So, is this the best beer we’ve ever made? I think the answer is a resounding YES! (Chas, bring me some more!)

-Mikey

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