First beer from Brouwar Fortuna of Poland! It’s a good one, too: Komes Raspberry Porter. This is a bottom fermented Baltic Porter mind you, and the bottle tells me it is Brewed with raspberry juice, lagered with vanilla and chili peppers. This is my first Komes beer and a raspberry Baltic porter from Poland seemed the perfect beer to toast the legendary Beer Hunter Michael Jackson on what would have been his 83^rd birthday on Maarch 27^th of 2025. So that’s what I did.

I also bought a bottle of Komes Imperial Stout when I bought the Raspberry Porter, and I almost drank that to toast Michael. That beer, however, is a formidable 14% alcohol by volume in strength, and I had to work the next day. So, the Raspberry Porter it was.

In Poland, this beer is known as Komes Porter Malinowy.  It is listed on the brewery website, but the page was non-responsive and I could not pull it up. The US importer, D & V international, has this to say about it:

Komes Raspberry Porter is a multi-dimensional, bottom-fermented beer. At the maturing stage, it is enriched with raspberry juice, Madagascar vanilla and Indian chilli peppers. It offers a unique combination of sweetness from the porter and vanilla and fruity notes of raspberries, topped with a slightly spicy finish. Despite its strength, the beer is extremely drinkable and reminiscent of chocolate and vanilla ice-cream. Over time in bottle, it changes its profile to increasingly mild when the notes of the roasted malts transform into dark fruits, reinforcing the beer’s fruity aspect.

I drank mine rather young, so I will have to pick some more up to see how it ages as they suggest.

Komes Raspberry Porter has an alcohol content of 8.5% by volume and I paid $6.99 for my half liter bottle from Half Time. I have never seen it here in Georgia, but a quick check on pride at the Total Wine website says you can get this beer in a 4-pack of 11.2 ounce bottles for $16.99. Not much less per ounce than what I paid. My bottle is marked LOT NUMBER 55/10/24/1. I am assuming this was bottled in October of last year. It also says:

When Komes is stored for 36 months, it changes its taste. Now you can decide, how long your Komes will mature.

I need to buy some more to see for myself.

Komes Raspberry Porter pours to a jet-black color with a moderate spritzy tan head and a nose of dark chocolate and bright raspberry fruit. Taking a sip, the beer is thick and medium to full in body, packed with dark chocolate notes and brighter raspberry fruit than the nose promised. The vanilla is the lightest element here, but it is there, and just a hint of the chili pops a subtle peppery note on the tongue in the roasty bitter finish.

Komes Raspberry Porter is a very delicious beer indeed, and I am glad I finally found some. I’ll be on the hunt for this one again, and for more Komes beers. There’s nothing like a good beer hunt to honor Jackson’s memory, after all.

Glad I tried it?  T

Would I rebuy it??