Blog #91. Foundry Brew Pub - Canterbury Nitro Stout. (Tasting session 4/5).

During my brief stay in Canterbury, I visited the Foundry Brew Pub on Stour Street, just behind my hotel. It is a fantastic pub-come-brewery with a huge selection of beer to try (16 or 17 I believe they have on tap - all brewed on site) and in our mid-morning exploration, we wandered into the pub (COVID safe and well organised) and I had a half of their IPA (read this review here). We then started our pre-dinner drinks here as well.

Little did I know, or read properly, that they offer a 'taster tray', five different 3rds of their range for £6.95 (£1.30 for any beer over 6% - fair enough). My eyes filled with excitement. My pregnant wife sighed with pain as she had seen this on the menu previously, but had forgotten to mention it to me. I wonder why. Anyway, I chose five of their range and away we went.

This is the fourth beer I sampled: Canterbury Nitro Stout.

I am bang into my stouts at the moment. It does seem, especially after bickering and wingeing on certain FaceBook forums about what the max score of different types of beer can realistically be, stouts can be given that holy grail of all scores - a 10. read on.

This stout, called a nitro stout (not quite sure why - hopefully Foundry can inform me) is meant to be dry, however I found it to be exceptionally creamy and smooth.

To smell it is rich with chocolate and vanilla on the nose - for me not much coffee comes through. To taste as I mentioned above it is creamy and full of lovely silky mouthfeel, with vanilla taking control with chocolate poking its head out and coffee saying hello towards the end, but Mr Coffee disappears very quickly as there is NO bitterness to speak of. Yes!

This is a good'un and is so easy to drink. Above I mentioned that stouts are 'allowed' to reach the nose-bleeding score of 10/10, so does this? No, but it is close. What would it need for it to be a 10 for me? The chocolate to show more and maybe caramel to tie the chocolate and vanilla together. It is probably in there, but I was starting to get a bit hazy at this point, but the score that tipsy Ben gives stands, so I have to listen to him.

8/10. Smashing beer.

Cheers,

-Ben.