Didn’t we just do a whole week of Shorts Brewing reviews a few months ago? You bet we did! Is that too much? That’s not for us to judge – all we know is that Karl was holed up in Traverse City, Michigan under about 31 inches of snow and he burrowed his way to the corner store for a pick-your-six survival pack. These are his Donner Party style dispatches from the Great White North, with less cannibalism and more beer drinking.
Shorts Says:
This highly coveted beer employs the largest amount of grain out of any other beer in our portfolio. It happened by accident, but we’re going to keep it that way. With roughly a handful of peanuts in every glass, this beer generates a rich aroma of peanuts, chocolate along with other caramelized and roasted grains. It’s uniquely satisfying and very popular.
Shorts “Uber Goober”
Oatmeal Stout, 6.5% ABV
Karl: Oh, peanuts. While your allergens can kill lesser mortals, you do seem to be able to make a pretty damn good stout. Now, this is technically an oatmeal stout — a style of beer that I’ve been less than enthusiastic about. But from the first pour to the polishing off, you won’t have a hint that anything steel-cut or resembling porridge went into this brew.
As the Goober exits the bottle, you’ll be hard-pressed to imagine there’s not a little widget of nitrogen in there. Smooth, rich and smooth (did I mention smooth?) the Goober is dark, hefty and you get a nice healthy whiff of peanut butter and that slightly bitter cacao scent that so many other stouts embody. Other than that, the scent is pretty mellow.
The taste is similarly restrained but still embodies a buckeye — one of those chocolate covered balls of sugar-sweetened peanut butter. I’ve made buckeyes before, and they’re fairly labor intensive. From here on out, I’ll try to opt for the Goober. It’s just easier…and there’s booze in it. The peanut flavor isn’t gargantuan, but present and enjoyable, backed up by a deeper nuttiness and slight milky sweetness, as though someone had a bowl of Peanut Butter Crunch cereal and bottle-conditioned this brew with that sugar-milk mix left at the end of breakfast.
For perspective: In the course of the last week I have polished off the last of a carton of Reese’s Pieces ice cream as well as one of those economy-size peanut butter cups. Even after all that chocolate-peanut debauchery, I’d still happily open up one of these little nutbombs. Just don’t bring it to a public school or anything because you might kill someone, which would be bad.