We just received word that Paste Magazine ranked our Joppa Grande Stout #3 in a blind tasting of 67 stouts under 8% ABV.
As the weather gets cold and the Holidays approach, a lot of craft beer drinkers enjoy a darker, richer, more complex brew. Stouts are a natural fit. We at Newburyport Brewing also appreciate a stout’s balanced, roasted malt character – a really well-crafted stout is about as pure as craft beer gets this time of year.
It’s an understatement to say that the stout category of beer – especially craft beer – has evolved quite a bit during the last ten years. Yes, there have always been categories of stouts (Irish Dry, Foreign Export, Imperial), but this particular tasting focused on stouts with an ABV of 8 per cent or less. These types of stouts typically offer brewers opportunities to experiment by brewing/flavoring with coffee, vanilla, cherries, and other adjuncts.
Our Joppa Grande Stout is a straight-up stout – no coffee, fruit flavorings, or chocolate. Just roasted malt goodness. Not that it’s bad to flavor a stout – it’s not – we make a tasting room-only version of Joppa Grande Stout infused with espresso beans from our friends at Plum Island Coffee Roasters, cold-steeped here in the brewery. Anyway, you can read the entire Paste Magazine article for yourself. Be sure to try other beers on this list – there are some great non-Imperial stouts out there!
This is our favorite quote from the review: “Straight up: This is the only beer in the top 5 to not incorporate coffee in some way, so massive props to Newburyport for making the tasting’s best pure stout. This beer…is a hugely flavorful, assertive, roast-forward beer that is as vivacious as it is complex. Regardless, this is a seasonal release begging to be a year-round one.”
Thanks, Paste Magazine!
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