Big Bend Brewing Company - Number 22 Porter

This deep brown porter offers some pretty red flashes when held to the light. Look for deeply caramelized malt aromas with notes of brown sugar and a little spice. Coffee grounds and bitter chocolate make an appearance, too, along with telltale wisps of mint from the Northern Brewer finishing hops, along with a bit of tea. It opens on the palate with the sweeter caramel notes, expanding into a hint of nuttiness and big roasted notes that build and then linger in the finish with a coffee-like quality. That minty and somewhat earthy and woody hop note provides a nice foil, while moderate hop bitterness ensures the light malt sweetness is knocked down and dried out in the finish. Big Bend recommends pairing with roasted or grilled meats & vegetables, wild game, and sweet foods – we think it would be a nice counterpoint to a sweet dessert like chocolate cake, as it would complement the flavors while the drying notes in the finish would contrast and clear the palate. Cheers!

Big Bend Brewing Company was founded in November of 2012 in a most unlikely place: the rugged, mountainous, and wind-swept region of West Texas known as Brewster County. Home to a population less than 9,300 despite an area larger than Connecticut, the county includes the town of Alpine, which is about 150 miles away from the nearest city. The brewery’s founders, including brewmaster Steve Anderson, saw Alpine and the rest of the relatively untouched West Texas region as much more of an opportunity for their new brewing enterprise than other areas of Texas, such as the craft beer saturated capital of Austin.

Steve Anderson and his brewing team are focused on bringing an old-world brewing style to their beer, maintaining the philosophy of keeping most of their beer unfiltered and naturally carbonated. Anderson is considered by many to be a sort of godfather of Texas brewing, having co-founded Texas’s first brewpub, Waterloo Brewing Company in Austin in 1993, and he spent about 10 years afterwards as brewmaster for Austin’s Live Oak Brewing Company. Anderson guided Big Bend to 800 barrels of production in their first year, but a limited amount of space and equipment meant they were constantly running out of beer to sell. With demand so unexpectedly strong, they were forced to immediately expand their facility by 6,500 sq. ft. to provide up to eight times the capacity. Their beers have found a ready market in both the locals as well as the increasing numbers of tourists to West Texas (including visitors to Big Bend National Park, where stores sell 6-packs of their beers), and demand has been strong all the way to the Mexican border, including draft accounts in El Paso – a city not previously known for its interest in craft beer (but that seems to be changing).

Big Bend currently cans five year round brews. For more info on the beers, or brewery tours, give ‘em a ring at 432-837-3700 or visit www.bigbendbrewing.com.