Bricks and Mortar

Show me a 650mL bottle of a coffee porter brewed in Ontario and I'll show you a damned easy sale. Such was the case with Bricks and Mortar, a coffee porter brewed by Toronto's Left Field Brewery. I saw it, and I bought it. No hesitation at all.

At 6% alcohol, this dark ale was a near black with handsome amber highlights. It poured with a bedeviling layer of sudsy, cream-hued head. According to the bottle, this beer was brewed with freshly roasted coffee beans from a local Toronto roastery: Pilot Coffee Roasters. The result is a rich java bouquet, complimented nicely by roasted malts. The flavour is also coffee-fueled, with both bitter espresso and mellow mocha represented in equal measures. While the coffee notes are the star, the dark beer flavours that make up the foundation are also worthy of praise.

I couldn't come up with much by way of critique of this beer, other than the fact that, unlike Left Field's other offerings, this one lacked a baseball theme. One of the better coffee/beer hybrids I've ever tasted.

Rating: 9.0 out of 10.