Trillium Sinister Kid

This is Trillium week on Hoppy Boston, with a beer review today leading into the second entry in my brewery overview series (hopefully posted tomorrow). It is a fortuitous coincidence that the week I had selected to feature Trillium they come out with some huge news. If you missed it, Trillium is planning on opening a second location in Canton, see their statement HERE. Local beer geeks have always been willing to put up with the lines, tight quarters and occasionally difficult parking situation to get their hands on Trillium beers, so I think the number one frustration has been their limited capacity. Opening the new brewery will allow Trillium to make significantly more beer. Once they are up and running you might even find their bottles of the shelves of your local bottle shop more often than not. As many of you know Trillium needed to shut down for almost a month this winter due to a licensing issue, so having the brewery re-open followed by this announcement has generated a lot of enthusiasm in the local craft beer community.

I am sure that the license snafu was a very challenging situation for the brewers. These types of breweries are small businesses and even very successful businesses can’t afford to go for a month generating minimal income. I stopped by the brewery right before Christmas and it was great to see the community coming out in full force and welcoming them back. As a Christmas present to myself I bought a bottle of nearly every available variety of Trillium. Now I feel like I have a much better grasp on their beers than I did before. While Trillium is best known for their hop-forward ales like Fort Point Pale Ale and Congress St. IPA, they also make a number of Belgian style brews including their eponymous Farmhouse Ale. Their Belgian collection also includes Sinister Kid, a Belgian Strong Dark Ale. Trillium Sinister Kid is available on a rotating basis on draft and in 750 mL bottles.

Trillium Sinister Kid pours midnight black with a moderate tan head. The scent is a mixture of roasted malts with some fruity esters. The flavors derived from the yeast are the first thing you perceive as you drink, notes of clove, sour apple and pear. There is also significant dark malt character, touches of plum, raisin and a little dark chocolate. The dark fruit flavors from the malt form a pleasant interplay with the estery flavors from the yeast. The beer is medium bodied and goes down very easy for 10% ABV. This is a very solid version of a Belgian dark. I tend to focus on porters and stouts in the winter but it is really nice to mix in the full bodied Belgian styles too. Hoppy Boston score: 4.25/5.

Previous Trillium Reviews:

Trillium Congress St. IPA, Trillium Farmhouse Ale, Trillium Wakerobin Rye