Rio Bravo Brewing is a fairly new (less than a year old) brewery to the Albuquerque scene, but have definitely made their mark with events, advertising, and even some distribution. The venue and location are both great; located just off I-40 on 2nd street near several other breweries, this industrial-style brewery could be a great place to hang out. It's never been very crowded when we've gone before, and even with their release of a limited Piñon coffee porter, the building is so large and open, it's difficult to fill. If you like sitting at the bar, you won't be disappointed here; the bar top is enormous and wraps around pretty much the entire floor space. The patio in the front gets pretty beat up by the sun, but there is a beer garden out back as well, just in case they didn't have enough space already. Overall, the venue is very impressive.
The flights were also very impressive and we had to order them in sets in order to fit them on the table! The first set of flights included the year-round brews:
Karl's Weizen
Ryan's Irish Red
Black Angus Stout
Dirty Rotten Bastard IPA
Rio Bravo Amber
Snakebite IPA
Munich Fest Marzen
Duke City Pils
Karl's Weizen was very filtered and crisp, very unlike a traditional German Hefeweizen which we were expecting. It smelled very banana-y like a hefe should, but the taste was more of a blonde ale and had a slightly lemony flavor. This was a good wheat beer and a great beer to start a palate with.
Ryan's Irish Red was a little hoppy for an Irish red, but there were good malt, coffee, and smoke flavors that balanced it out. This was a decent red ale and had some good flavor to it.
The Black Angus Stout had a good meaty and smokey aroma to it which translated to a very meaty and smokey stout. The flavors were good and represented the style and the name very well, there just wasn't anything particularly special about this stout.
Dirty Rotten Bastard IPA was not a very good Indian Pale Ale. It had some hop flavor but was also a little sour, just didn't taste right. Dirty Rotten is an appropriate name for it...
The Rio Bravo Amber was very easy to drink but it was on the weaker side for an amber. The malt flavor was there, but only just barely. Not a bad beer, just lacking some style. There just wasn't much to it.
The Snakebite IPA was a little better than the DRB, but not much. It was very watery and weak in flavor, the hops were hardly noticeable and just all-around not very good.
The Munich Fest Marzen completely made up for last few beers. This German-style Oktoberfest beer had plenty of flavor and was very well balanced. The malts were very prominent and delicious while the hops were subtle and complimented the style totally.
The Duke City Pils was another disappointment. It had a slightly wheaty flavor, but that was hard to discern from the sour, dirty flavors that overpowered the beer. Not recommended, especially with the other wheat from earlier in the flight available.
The second set of flights included all seasonals, several of which were porters. If you find you do something well, stick with it! There were also a few strong beers that can really mess with your palate, so best keep those for last:
Magnum 44 IPA
Bad Ass Barleywine
German Sommer Bier
NM Piñon Coffee Co. Limited Release Coffee Porter
Rio Bravo Barrel-Aged Porter
1912 Vanilla Porter
Old Town Porter
Belgian Strong
The Magnum 44 IPA was definitely their best IPA. It was much hoppier but not too much so and really a decent IPA. This IPA ought to replace both the regular menu brews.
The Bad Ass Barleywine was pretty sour, like a barleywine typically should be, but maybe just a little too sour. For the style, this barleywine was spot on, sour with a bit of sweetness, and very strong. The alcohol content for barleywines are usually pretty high and that is apparent in this one.
The German Sommer Bier was a very pale color but packed a ton of wheat flavor. It was very crisp and refreshing and tasted like wheat straight from the farm. This German Wheat was full of flavor and very good.
The Coffee Porter was a limited, special release in collaboration with a local coffee roaster, NM Piñon Coffee. It's unfortunate this porter is so limited, because it was absolutely delicious. It was very creamy and had a coffee and chocolate flavor that made for a great, sweet stout...oops, I mean porter!
The Rio Bravo Barrel-Aged Porter, at 9% ABV, tasted less sour than the barleywine, but had similar characteristics. The alcohol was very prominent, but still easier to drink than the barleywine as well. The flavor was almost a mix between the stout and the barleywine and brought out the good flavors in each.
The 1912 Vanilla Porter had sweet flavors of both coffee and vanilla, and was very light in color. This was an easy porter to drink and could be a very good gateway beer; gateway to the darkside! If it weren't for that Coffee Porter, this would have been top of the dark beers so far.
The Old Town Porter tasted very much like the Black Angus Stout, so much so that we had to get another sample of that one to try them side by side. The Old Town Porter was less smokey than the stout but still very meaty in flavor. Overall, it was a good porter and a stronger quality beer than the stout, another that could very well replace the regular menu brew.
The Belgian Strong was very strong indeed, but not too much. This was a very smooth ale and had very similar flavors to the barleywine and the barrel-aged porter. The color was much lighter and reddish, and it smelled slightly sour like that barleywine and strong ale style ought to.
Megan's overall opinion: I love the venue, it's very impressive, I just wish there were more of a crowd and something a little more entertaining there. It seems like RBBC is constantly putting on events, so I will need to check one out and hope it draws people in. The beer started off not so great; I really enjoyed the Marzen, but the rest of the regular menu beers could really use some work. The seasonals were great and really showed what this brewer is capable of, my favorites were probably the Coffee Porter and the Vanilla Porter. I was extremely disappointed with the IPAs, for having two regular menu options, I would hope at least one is good! I liked their exploration into the strong ales and all the porters, I do think it's good to focus on what you're good at, but it would also have been nice for there to be a little more variety in the seasonals. My favorite beer overall was the Marzen, it's an easy beer that I can order every time and it won't get old. My least favorite beer was the DRB IPA, it just didn't have enough hop flavor and just tasted bad.
Randy's overall opinion: First off, yes, the inside venue is large and well thought out. Outside front patio, not so much. Blazing sun all day and in the middle of a parking lot. The outdoor space where the beer garden will be is a different story though. That is huge and during the summer nights, I bet that place is awesome! Too bad neither one of those areas are open right now because of licensing we heard, but soon.... On to the beer.
Since they opened, the beer offerings have grown substantially. It was 4 or 5 at first but now at a flight of 16, that's impressive. There were a few of the staple brews that really need to be better to have on the menu all the time. The IPAs were hardly desirable and the Pilsner has a funny aftertaste. Where this brewery fares really well is on the darker side. The stouts were good and the porters were very good. We got a special treat as they tapped a Coffee Porter that they worked on with Pinon Coffee which was amazing! The Vanilla Porter, fantastic! They have a few different styles which are appreciated such as Barley Wines and Barrel Aged options, they just aren't my flavor.
Rio Bravo is one of those breweries that you can tell is trying to get involved with events and the community which is really a great thing. The brewery itself is huge and they have a canning system which is cool too....just don't know when we will see any in stores.
Over the almost year that they have been around, so many improvements have been made that it will be interesting to see what the future holds.
Here's how I ranked them:
1. Coffee Stout 9. Magnum 44 IPA
2. Vanilla Porter 10. Snakebite IPA
3. Old Town Porter 11. DRB IPA
4. Marzen 12. Duke City Pilsner
5. BA Stout 13. Karls Weizen
6. Amber 14. BA Porter
7. Ryans Red 15. Belguim Strong
8. German Summer 16. Barley Wine
http://www.riobravobrewing.com/
https://nmpinoncoffee.com/
No comments:
Post a Comment