At Verdant, we always focus on maximum flavour coupled with consistency and quality. We are most famous for Hazy IPA’s and fully saturated hop flavours, however we love all beer styles and approach each one and the same manner: to produce world class offerings.
When Origin Coffee reached out to us, asking if we would be keen to work on a second collaboration beer together, of course we said yes! It was a pleasure to collaborate last time around on a Coffee Stout, and always great to find and befriend likeminded people… especially with both companies being based in Cornwall.
When deciding what style to brew for this new collaboration beer, we instantly thought about our existing cask Porter Burnthouse... with an added coffee twist! We shared this idea with Origin and met them at the Roastery to pick the perfect coffee to add to the beer. Just like we did for our first collaboration, we tried a few different coffees using the "cupping method" (in simple terms this is where a certain quantity of freshly ground beans are placed in a glass or cup, a set volume of water is added at a set temperature, it’s stirred and then it’s left to naturally settle and cool down a bit before being slurped loudly via a suitable spoon. This is the exact same method of tasting employed by the coffee farmers, that connection and consistency being very comforting.)
We tasted both natural and washed coffees, discussed their amazing nuances and differences and thrashed out some ideas as to how best to add these flavours to the beer. In the end, we settled on a fruity coffee from El Salvador called "Las Brisas", which highlights how innovative approaches can unlock unique flavours from unexpected sources. With an abundance of tropical and citrus notes, this fruit-forward coffee complements the depth and character of our Burnthouse base Porter recipe, lifting classic notes of charred bread crust, dark chocolate, and caramel for a brilliantly characterful pour.
For this very special collaboration, we brewed our base Porter recipe, but elevated the abv to 5.5% for a bit more body and backbone fore the coffee to bounce off. The coffee beans addition is done just before packaging by recirculating the Porter (cold) through a separate vessel with the beans in. We see tasting the beer over the coming hours until there is the right level of coffee infusion and then stop the recirculation.
Burnthouse (Coffee Edition) is tasting amazing and is now available on the webshop!