Brewery: Ballast Point Brewing Company
Beer: Victory at Sea
Type: American Porter
ABV: 10%
Character: Imperial Porter brewed with coffee and vanilla.
Metal Connection: KORPIKLAANI – Beer Beer
You know, when a brewery makes an awesome beer such as this one, I don’t care if it’s a one off only or made once a year, or whatever, advertise the beer on your website. After doing some searching to get some info on this beer, I noticed that on the Ballast Point Brewery web site, that they only list their year round beers. That’s pretty lame if you ask me. That’s like a band releasing an album, but never putting any info on their website about the album. I guess, I am even shocked that the San Antonio market even carried this beer. This is an amazing beer, and one of my favorites so far here at BMD.com
Poured into a tulip style glass, the beer is black as our Metal souls! That’s pretty damned dark! The head on this thing is a medium toned tan that is very fluffy. The head stuck around a long time here, leaving a sheet of lacing down the glass. If you look at the photo of the beer above, I had to take several shots, so it was actually minutes before I took my first drink. Just look at the head on the beer. It started to settle, leaving the darker tan cap of fluffy foam. What that foam would hit my lips, it felt like whipped cream on top of a milkshake.
In the nose, I get a strong coffee smell that is right up front. Throughout the body of this drink, vanilla comes through like a cream-like aroma, along with other malty smells like brown sugar, or toffee. There is an alcohol background to this beer, giving this a very complex nose, but it really does all work great together.
As for taste, this beer is spot on to their description, being that it is a coffee vanilla porter. Take a good coffee, pour some vanilla cream, and mix in a hint of rum or something to give it that boozy taste and “Bam” you got Victory at Sea! The alcohol taste is at the end, leaving that crisp burn in your throat after the explosion of coffee and vanilla hit you while sipping. The mouthfeel to this beer is thick and creamy, and you can definitely feel the carbonation bite as well. The creaminess probably comes from the head of the beer which as I said before feels like whipped cream on top of a float or milkshake.
I am going to say that this beer is definitely one of my new favorites, and is in my top 5. I really enjoyed this one a lot, and I hope to catch it again. For now I will just have these memories of this deliciousness! I paired this beer to a great beer drinking song which reminds me of the sea, and pirates, and such. Enjoy some KORPIKLAANI and their song “Beer Beer” from their Voice of Wilderness album, released in 2005.
Pirates are in this year, BeerMetalDude!
Beer Metal Media 