Before I start this review of Silt Brown, I just have to say: The Super Bowl is here in town and we all know what goes best with football… Great beer! There are many offerings around the city and it’s been fantastic to see our local craft breweries gaining some face time with football fans from all over the country. Cheers to them! Now to the review…
When I picked up Brazos Valley Brewing’s Silt Brown, I did so while thinking, “Hey, have we reviewed any their beers yet?” Then I realized that Chris has reviewed one, and we also tried a few in our Top 5 IPAs in Houston blind tasting. A few years ago, I lived in Brenham due to a job I took there and it just felt like a struggle to get really good craft beer, especially new craft beer. Maybe 3 or 4 months after I moved to Houston, I heard about Brazos Valley Brewing at a beer festival and man, I was thunderstruck as to how I hadn’t heard about them when I lived there! Seemed to be a testament to how sleepy Brenham can be.
Silt Brown has a simplistic, but eventful label. Brown adorns the top and bottom of the cans with white backing in the middle. I really dig the font used for the name of the beer, as well as the color scheme. Inside a hexagon is a faded picture of what I believe is the bridge over the Brazos River at the Stone City fossil site.
Silt Brown poured smooth and had a color like a roasted pecan. The head was white and there was very little retention. The nose was heavy on chocolate, but in a way that I had yet to experience. It literally smelled like a chocolate malt with caramel swirl. Brown ales were an intro for me long ago as I worked my way up to porters and stouts, but no other brown had a nose like this.
When I took a swig, Silt Brown had a light to medium body. The flavor was slightly roasty with malt sweetness on the front end. Midway through the beer washing over my palate, I tasted notes of caramel and chocolate. It definitely reminded me why I fell in love with brown ales years ago! It wasn’t overly filling either so I was able to kick back and drink a few with dinner.
Overall, Silt Brown is great for the style and I give it 4 stars for its unique nose and turtle flavor profile. Ice cream isn’t the only reason to head over to Brenham, y’all!
So if you took a trip out to the birthplace of Texas, would you be there for the ice cream or the beer? Was a brown ale your starting point to those heavier styles? Let us know below! Beers to you, Houston.
Nick is originally from the Corpus Christi area, but found himself in Houston as of 4 years ago. You can spot him wearing a Hooks hat and drinking a glass of craft beer around the city. He typically prefers his beers to mirror his taste in music: complex, heavy, and dark.
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