Letra C

 The core beers at Cerveja Letra are assigned alphabetical names—A through F. I decided to kick my experience off in the middle of their offerings with their 5.5% alcohol oatmeal stout—Letra C.

In typical stout fashion, my beer arrived dark—approaching black—with a thin tan head. To my nose, Letra C had the expected molasses and roasted malt notes, but also something a bit spicy—a faint touch of chili pepper. This tinge of spice didn’t materialize in the flavour, which was driven by roasted malts at the outset and transitioned into a relatively bitter (20 IBU, but tastes more robust) coffee and cocoa stained finish.

This was one of the most flavourful dark beers that I sampled on my Portugal journey. An oatmeal stout isn’t typically my idea of heaven when sitting outside on a 31C afternoon, but this one really hit the spot. Besides, I was on vacation in Portugal and it was shady in my corner of the beer garden. Bliss.

Rating: 9.0 out of 10.