Arguably the best thing about the onset of crisp fall weather is the foods we have been waiting all summer to eat. Stews, braises, all things hearty and satisfying that just don’t seem quite so alluring when it’s 90 degrees out- who wants stick to your ribs food when your hair is sticking to the back of your neck? The same principle applies to America’s favorite quaff as well- lagers, ales, and hefeweizens dominate the summer bar scene, and patio-sippers are uniformly light in both color and weight, and served ice-cold and in copious quantities.
Now, seeing as I always want to try something new, and am seldom in the mood for the same thing two nights in a row, my favorite way to buy beer is in mixed six-packs. Not all places will let you do this, but even if it’s not advertised, it’s always worth asking. Trader Joe’s is great about allowing you to mix and match, and while their selection is not exhaustive, there’s certainly enough for a few go-rounds. When I think of fall beers, I think of dark, heady brews with a thick layer of foam and pungent, bitter aromas. That being said, I am by no means a beer expert, so when I found myself picking out both a stout and a porter from the Sierra Nevada Brewing Company, I knew they both fell well into these parameters, but couldn’t tell you exactly why, or how they differed from each other, for that matter. Thus, with the usual suspects of curiosity and an insatiable hunger for seemingly useless knowledge driving me (plus the need for an excuse to drink two beers at once), I set out to learn a bit about porter and stout, and taste them side-by-side.
Imagine my chagrin when the first fact my research turned up was that the official difference between stout and porter is…nothing. Well screw it, I thought, I’m still drinking them both. Apparently, back in the 1800s, the term ‘stout’ simply meant that a beer was strong, while a weak beer was described as ‘slender’. Under the umbrella of porters, which were all relatively dark, there were ‘brown stouts’, as opposed to ‘true’ porters, which were lighter in style and alcohol. Throughout the years, each brewery developed its own style of porter and stout; often this manifested in the use of chocolate malt versus patent malt, respectively, or roasting the barley for stouts, but none of this was official or regulated in any way. While there is no universally defined difference between the two, they are indeed distinct- otherwise there’d be no money to be made by selling them both. I further focused my exploration on the Sierra Nevada company, since these were the brews which were to characterize my comparison.
Both Sierra Nevada’s porter and stout are made with top-fermenting ale yeast, but the porter is made with a blend of deep-roasted barley malts (Two-row Pale, Munich, Chocolate, and Caramel) and has 32 bitterness units, whereas the stout is made with Caramel and black malts and boasts 50 bitterness units as well as slightly higher alcohol. Mmmmkay, so how the hell does all that translate into the enjoyment of your beverage? That’s where the tasting portion comes in. Pouring both beers into clear glasses, the first thing I noticed was the relative darkness of the stout; it was almost black when the light wasn’t shining through it, and had a frothy head the color of café-au-lait. The porter was a deep russet-brown, with amber highlights emerging in the light, and a creamy head.
Next thing I did was poke my sniffer into each glass and take a whiff. In the stout, aromas of coffee, smoke, and molasses hit me right away, while the porter’s more subtle nose layered nutty whole-wheat with grassiness, and a bit of fruit akin to fermented or bruised apple. On the palate, the stout was creamy and full-bodied, loaded with a pleasant bitterness that hit the sides and back of my tongue. The lighter body of the porter made the bubbles more prominent in the mouth, and accentuated by the bright acid, the overall effect was crispness, with smooth caramel in the background.
The consensus: different? Definitely. Equally good? While I enjoyed- and finished- them both, I found myself saving the stout for my last sip. Anything with bitterness and smoky tones gets a pass in my book, and I felt that the overall depth and rich textures just made for a more complex beer. That being said, I’ve enjoyed pretty much everything I’ve tasted from this brewery, and would probably even *gasp* buy a whole six-pack of either one of these offerings- if I happened to find myself in an establishment that forbade my beloved mixing and matching, that is.
So until we take the turn into full-on shank-braisin’, pie-bakin’, frost-bitten New England autumn once again, celebrate this fleeting period of limbo, when a sweater makes open windows possible, and a cold beer still seems appropriate, but leave your summer swills behind and embrace the swarthier side of beer. You can’t go wrong with a stout or a porter- hell, have both and you might not even need that sweater.
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