Kelham Island Brewery

A few weeks back, I posted this article waxing lyrical about The Hunter's Inn, a pub that truly made my day. More particularly, a certain beer that I enjoyed there made my day.
Kelham Island's Brooklyn Smoked Porter really knocked me for six. I have tasted beers with the word 'smoked' in the title before and found the majority of them to be shocking. If you're going to accentuate a smoked aspect of a beer, then it's got to be balanced; I find this small, yet vital, point is missed all too often,. There's nothing worse than a pint that tastes likes a packet of Bacon Fries.
But this is balanced. Wonderfully so, in fact. The smoke comes through the initial bone-dry coffee and bitter chocolate hit - not on top of it. As you would expect form a porter, it packs a hefty 6.5 abv - although you would never know from the taste. Give me a pint of this and a slice of Chocolate Brownie on a cold day ( a strange thought to have on a summer's day but bear with me) and I'm laughing.
I know taste is subjective, but this truly was a gorgeous pint - and surely a flagship for this well-known Sheffield Brewery. Seek it out.

* By the way, any brewery that has a couple of beers named after Springsteen songs are OK with me. Whoops, just outed myself as a fan of The Boss.