Bold? Brown? Robust?: Chocolate Lab Porter by Wisconsin Brewing Company

Ten years ago Carl Nolen was president of Middleton's Capital Brewery and he was quoted in an article in the Wisconsin State Journal about the brewery's perseverance and longevity, "I think one thing we can be real proud of is that we stuck to our roots. We started out as a German lager brewery and we've morphed into a traditional Wisconsin lager brewery."

A year or so later he decamped to Verona to found the Wisconsin Brewing Company and took Braumeister Kirby Nelson with him. Since the brewery was under construction, Kirby concocted his test batches at the Great Dane and Vintage Brewing. With the "traditional Wisconsin lager brewery" having given their very tasty Bavarian Lager the boot plus a hoppy cream ale and a beer called Hopbock having been introduced as late-tenure brews from Kirby at Capital, it wasn't totally surprising to discover that, in addition to an amber lager, a couple of IPAs were amongst the test brews. A porter rounded out the line-up.

While it was not surprising to see the IPAs here – this was, after all, the time of the IBU arms race when hopping beers to death with bitterness was all the rage – it was disheartening. My plea to WBC to not abandon us lager lovers on the questionnaire served along with the test brews proved to be a mainly quixotic skirmish in my Kulturkampf with hop fetishism.

But the amber lager was tasty as was the porter. It seems that in its test phase it was known as "Bold & Robust Porter" but became "Brown & Robust Porter" when it graduated to production at the brewery and was bottled. When WBC's marketing stratagem was changed to give their brews a more rural identity/use names that went beyond style descriptions, it became Chocolate Lab. And somewhere along the way, I'd swear it went from being an American porter to something more English.

Chocolate Lab is a lovely clear mahogany and my pour produced a small tan head that seemed content to stick around for an average length of time. The first hint that something unexpected was in my glass came when I took a whiff. A bit of malt sweetness and stone fruit – think plum – were the most prominent aromas followed by some roasty grain smells. And here I was awaiting a more intense roastiness steeped in coffee and dark chocolate aromas.

A medium fizz played well against a nice smoothness – are there oats in this stuff? Where I was expecting the almost fuliginous, bitter flavors of coffee and dark chocolate my tongue received moderate malt sweetness like caramel and milk chocolate. A modicum of grassy hop taste also provided a mild bitterness.

The hops took on a slightly spicy hue at the finish which boosted the bitterness a tad. This combined with the fizz made for a goodly dose of dryness.

I sure hope I am not hallucinating the changes to WBC's porter over the years. Otherwise I am going to feel foolish. Regardless, this is a very tasty beer. I appreciate its moderate sweetness, smooth chocolate flavor, and the grassy hop taste.

Junk food pairing: Chocolate Lab goes well with taco flavored Doritos – the kind in that ugly 70s bag.

If you have a hound with you, it can get in on the action with Porter's Biscuits, dog treats made with spent brewing grains from batches of Chocolate Lab.