Afternoon Beer Break: Left Hand Brewing Flamingo Dream Nitro

Left Hand Brewing is a brand you are likely familiar with if you’re into stouts, as their Milk Stout seems to be available all over the place. This brewery calls Longmont, CO home, a city I’ve actually visited (but not the brewery) as I’ve got family out there. I had gotten in touch with their media team, and that opened up an avenue for us to explore some of their offerings in this series. To that end, today, we’re talking about the Left Hand Brewing Flamingo Dream Nitro.

As soon as you see “nitro” on a can of beer, you know it means one thing – when you crack the can open, you’ll get a pressurized hiss coming out, and you’ll get an interesting, creamy head when you pour it out into a glass. For most folks, you commonly would run into that with your normal Guinness, but it is popping up other places. The pout of the Left Hand Brewing Flamingo Dream Nitro had another surprise in store – it’s color.

When I poured the Left Hand Brewing Flamingo Dream Nitro into a glass, you’re greeted with a deep, dark pink, not something you’d expect from a beer. This is more pronounced as that nitro-induced head collects at the top, and makes the whole affair look almost like a jello cocktail of sorts. Why this color? Well, in the ingredients, you’ll see that you’ve got blackcurrant and raspberry showing up, so that berry combo is coloring things, quite literally.

With the tarter berries in there, you might expect that the Left Hand Brewing Flamingo Dream Nitro would be on the sour side of things, but that is far from the case. While I wouldn’t call it a sweet beer, it’s definitely closer to that than a sour (and that’s a-ok in my book). On the nose, you do get that hint of berry, and then that’s the first thing the tongue picks up as well. With the nitro in the mix, it’s a very smooth texture in the mouth – almost flat, actually – with not much aftertaste lingering. With the combination of flavor and smoothness – and 4.7% ABV – this does seem like a good summertime sipper. Perhaps not something you’d have in regular rotation, it would certainly be an interesting option to offer to someone who doesn’t care for the flavors of a standard, say, lager or IPA. As my kids say, it wasn’t my favorite, but it was still an agreeable tasting. Be on the lookout for that bright red hand in your local store, and keep an eye peeled for our next Afternoon Beer Break from the brand. lefthandbrewing.com