Beer Guy: The dark is rising

by Peter Bailey

The pandemic proceeds, the days get short, the nights grow long. We need solace in these dark times. We need dark beer.

As Dubliner Flann O’Brien wrote in the dark days of 1939:

When things go wrong
and will not come right,
Though you do the best you can,
When life looks black
as the hour of night –
A pint of plain is your only man.

A pint of plain in Irish pubs of O’Brien’s era may have been a pint of stout, but for decades previously it would have meant plain porter. Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries porter was the most popular beer style in England and Ireland, and it spread to North America with exports and emigrants. Born in London in the early 1700s, porter was a darker, richer version of English mild, a brown ale. The style first found favour with London dock workers or porters, gaining the nickname porter beer as a result. When Arthur Guinness founded his brewery in Dublin in 1759 he brewed other ales, but by 1803 Guinness brewed only porter and was exporting it around the world.

Guinness and other porter brewers developed a bigger, bolder porter called stout porter, which over the years became known simply as stout. The child outshone the parent, with porter declining in popularity in the 20th century, falling completely out of favour by the 1960s, while stout, specifically Guinness Stout, established a place with beer drinkers all over the world. Then, the rebirth. Beginning with Anchor Brewing’s Porter in 1974, North American craft brewers took hold of the nearly extinct style and reinvented it, making new world porters robust, full-flavoured beers. Guinness Stout served as a gateway beer in North America, helping to sell beer drinkers on the idea of dark beer, and prodding craft brewers to develop their own stouts. It took some time in Alberta, but today there are excellent homegrown porters and stouts from brewers all over Alberta.

With nine months of winter and three months of tough sledding, dark beers fit Alberta well. Both porter and stout are full-bodied, top-fermented dark ales, with a unique roasted flavour and black colour that comes from the use of roasted raw or malted barley. The roasted grains give these beers distinctive coffee and chocolate tones, making them brilliant dessert beers, ideal accompaniment for a cold winter’s night by a fire with the remainder of the Christmas chocolate. Rich and flavourful, stouts and porters are comfort beers, pairing nicely with the comfort foods of winter like hearty stews.

The pandemic will end. The sun will return. Summer will come again. In the meantime, remember its better to pour a delicious porter than to curse the darkness.

Rising dark six pack

Only a few years ago Alberta was a dark beer desert. Today we can choose between dozens of great porters, stouts and other dark beers, either at the breweries or from fine beer shops around town.

Click images to zoom

Medicine Hat Brick & Mortar Porter, Medicine Hat Named after the historic clay trade that put Medicine Hat on the map, this porter is a slightly smoother, sweeter version of a robust porter, with elements of the lighter London style. Chocolate, coffee and caramel notes with a lightly sweet finish. Gold, 2020 Canadian Brewing Awards.

Establishment Fat Sherpa Robust Porter, Calgary Fat Sherpa established the brewery as the real deal, winning Establishment their first gold medal in the Alberta Beer Awards. Establishment was named Brewery of the Year at the 2021 Canadian Brewing Awards. This porter is incredibly rich and roasty, with deep layers of malt, chocolate and coffee.

Canmore Chocolate Maple Porter, Canmore Longroof’s Troy Wassill calls this sour “a beauty brewed in the waning days of the lockdown.” The brew teams from all seven Happy Beer Street breweries got together virtually through Slack and Zoom to collaborate on this sour. It’s a tasty and refreshing beer that is guava forward, with orange and herbal notes on the nose with flavours of stone fruit.

This delicious and sweet milk stout is a perfect beer to transition from summer to fall. Omen Brewing are dark beer specialists, so know how to make a great stout. Omen’s Andrew Oswald says, “with notes of coffee and chocolate, this one drinks like an espresso with a shot of cream.” Balanced well between roasted malt and sweetness.

The Growlery Golden Ticket Vietnamese Coffee Stout, Edmonton On a sunny but chilly late fall afternoon I had a pint of this stout on nitro on The Growlery patio. Totally worth the cold hands. Smooth and sweet, rich and roasty, this delicious stout is brewed with lactose and locally roasted Vietnamese coffee from Edmonton’s CRW Orient Coffee.

SYC Invierno Winter Stout, Edmonton A big, bold, full-bodied Imperial stout made with the frigid Edmonton winter in mind. At 9 per cent alcohol, this rich stout will warm you up après ski, après curl, après skate or après walking to the liquor store. Fun fact: invierno is Spanish for winter.