Athletic Brewing All Out

ABV: less than 0.5%
Calories per can: 89 (25 per 100ml)

This is a guest review by Phil McClelland, who can be found at his alcohol-free drinks blog Opening the Bottle.

Athletic Brewing have breweries in California and Connecticut, and sell their beers around the globe. They’ve tended to focus on light beers, and this is their first stout/porter.

Like all Athletic beers, this one comes in a nicely styled can: a deep blue night-time scene that’s ideal for a dark beer. The beer itself has a nice black colour and a decent head that lasts (most non-alcoholic beer heads are gone in seconds). I did expect a bit more on the nose, but I did get that deep roasted malt of a dark beer, plus some vague chocolate and toasted coffee tones.

The taste, sadly, is a little disappointing. You can tell it is a dark beer: there is deep malt and an almost burnt taste, but there is minimal caramel or chocolate notes, which is a shame. It has a mild fizz with a thinner texture than a stout. I think, maybe, this is a porter for someone who likes lager: a kind of “porter lite”. It’s an interesting beer without being world-beating and is lacking in the big flavours you want in a dark beer. Once you’ve drank it you probably aren’t going for another one immediately, but you might circle round to it again at another time.