For today’s Advent beer pick I wanted to select something not from the U.S. and I realized that by and large, Italy has been fairly under-represented on the Advent calendar and there is some amazing beer being brewed in Italy these days. Naturally the first Italian brewery that comes to mind is Birra Baladin and their lineup of amazingly creative and unique beers.

Each year Baladin brews their Nöel beer and in recent years they’ve been varying the recipe (in the craft brewing tradition). This year’s offering is Nöel Cafè, their special Christmas beer infused with coffee:

It is brewed at the end of summer to give it the time to ferment and mature slowly in the bottle for a long period of time, so that it is ready to express all its complex aromatic scents once opened. The persistent head enhances the complex aromas of dried fruit, biscuit, chocolate and, this year, coffee! We have chosen no ordinary coffee: its name is “Terre Alte” and is a very sweet blend with spicy and fruity flavors. It is the result of the combination between two fine indigenous mountain coffee plants –  both Slow Food Presidia – from Guatemala (Huehuetenango) and Honduras (Montagna Campara). The coffee is wood roasted at the Turin detention facility, thus completing an approach based on solidarity and sustainability.

With 9% abv and the added coffee this would be a delightful warming sipper on Christmas morning!

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