Hoppy Porter Review

Last spring Dave @ Muckney Brewing sent me a beer inspired by Stone Brewing Company, it was called Dark IPA. I was really impressed by this beer, it was great to drink an IPA that had a lot of porter-like elements. I enjoy porters a lot and have been much more into IPAs as of late. For the late fall, I decided to combine the two and create Hoppy Porter and the Half Bearded Prince. A big shout out to Dave for his input and recipe suggestions.
Hoppy Porter has been in the bottle for close to a month now, and I'm really happy with the turn out. I went more for the porter angle than the IPA angle, and it turned out to be close to a robust porter, with maybe a west coast hop feel.
It pours a jet black with some red hues, and a thick, foamy khaki head. Nice piney/peppery aroma with some citrus hops hidden in there, and a nice roasty backbone. There's some nice sweetness at first with some hints of cocoa, coffee, and maltiness. It's quickly followed by a nice hoppy presence, hardly any hop bitterness, but a nice roasty quality in the finish. In addition to the roastiness, it finishes with some lingering hoppy sweetness. Overall, I'm very happy with this beer and it'll definitely be added to the rotation. It has a great balance of porter with the hops. If I were to tweak it, I might add more hops for dry hopping, to give it just that much more presence. With that said, there was a slight bit of oxidation that I could attribute to the dry hopping. The same slight oxidation was evident in my Green Beard IPA, which I used the same hops in. I only used an ounce (out of a two ounce package) in the IPA and then put the rest in the freezer(in saran wrap) before using them in this beer. I've had that exposure give my dry hopped beers a little amount of oxidation in the past. I digress. Hoppy Porter turned out well, and is nice when I'm in the mood for something dark and hoppy.
Here's the recipe:
1.5 lbs Org. 2-Row
.75 lbs Org. Chocolate Malt
.75 lbs Org. Crystal 120
.25 lbs Org. Black Roasted Barley
.75 lbs Org. Crystal 60
* mashed for 1 hour @ 152 degrees
4 lbs Org. DME
Hops:
1 oz Organic Pacific Gem @ 60
.50 oz Centennial @ 10
.50 oz Centennial @ 5
.50 oz Cascade @ 3
.50 oz Cascade @ 1
1 oz Cascade @ 0

Dry Hop: 1 oz Org. Admiral Whole Leaf Hops
Yeast: 1056 American Ale

Next post will be a review of some more Millstream beers El Jefe brought me up from Iowa for my birthday, and I'll also be reviewing a few more Winter Ale offerings I've picked up.
More to come.
Salud!
Bearded Brewer