The Session #26: Passive Smoking

So; first Friday in April, it's The Session, The Session is about smoked beers. You know the last bit on Radio 5's Fighting Talk, where you have to defend the indefensible? No? For shame! But for those of you who still have a clue what I'm alluding to, here's why "I think smoked beer is the best beer in the world. Yes, better than Thornbridge Jaipur".

It smells of lovely sticky bonfire toffee

You know, the bits left in the bottom of your pocket after you've been stood occasionally too close to the bonfire. Rounded caramel and sweet notes singing their little saccharides off. Surprising lack of burnt pork. Huh.

It tastes of Parma Violets and washy coffee

Parma Violets - Derbyshire's finest! An interesting hop profile, coffee interrupted by the wafer-thinnest hint of smoked hop. Not smoked ham; here be smoked hop. Or is it hop smoke?

It's the perfect accompaniment to chocolate pudding.

White chocolate. Milk chocolate. Gummy dark chocolate. And then a big slurp of nearly figgy-hoppy slightly-creamy nearly-liqorice slowly-smokey fun. And then chocolate. And then that fig-hop-cream-thang. Lather, rinse, repeat.

It's really rather quenching and yet still particularly yum-ga-lummy Drinkable by the gulp. Not difficult drinking. Yet still able to be sipped and savoured (nay, even savoury?)

Shoot, I've almost convinced myself. But, in the same way that Steve Bunce often folds in the last round like a cheap hooker punched in the stomach, I can't quite carry off this lie. Most smoked beers suck. They suck a big fat smokey sausage that's been smoked til smoke leaks out of its annoyingly smoky skin.

OK, tonight's beer wasn't the best beer in the world. In fact, it wasn't even a tribute. But it was perhaps the most drinkable smoked beer I've had. And, fair play, it's not a smoked beer but a beer that happens to be smoky. Ladies and gentlemen! I give you.... Stone Smoked Porter. So, Almost Smoked. Just like my last cigar...