Monday Beer Review

I didn't post my normal Friday beer review because the Smitty family was heading to stay with some friends in Chicago over the weekend. I had planned to visit Three Floyds brewery in Munster, Indiana, which is kinda on the way.

Well, due to various reasons, we didn't make it there, but that's okay, because when we arrived at our destination, I was greeted with this:Wow.




Oh, wow. Just...wow.

Not only is it a "limited" burbon barrel aged stout but is it capped, corked and waxed:

(yeah, yeah, a marketing ploy I know but still pretty cool...) And, of course, to prove it's limited-ness, it's numbered on the side, bitches:





This, my friends, was an astounding beer. It's from Emmett's Ale House in Downers Grove, Illinois. It's a 2006 release, so it's had a few years to mellow and age. I was astounded by this beer.

The nose was a huge blast of chocolate with bourbon underneath (usually, it's the other way around). Following in the speedboat wake of chocolate and bourbon is coffee and molasses, but they are almost afterthoughts. And there, as if a backbone, was a great pine-and-citrus hop aroma.

The taste is every bit as spectacular. Huge chocolate balanced with a strong shot of sweet bourbon leads off, making this interpretation of an Imperial Stout much more sweet than its competitors. As always with this style, the ever-present burnt-toast-and-molasses flavors form a good base to keep the beer bitter and strong (and, um, dark). The hop presence is a scant orangey and piney flavor distantly in the background as the bulk of the bitterness comes from the roasted malts, but it serves a nice citrusy balance that I think goes very well with the bourbon and chocolate flavors. Of course, the bourbon taste tricks your brain into thinking there's more ABV here than there is, but it's still substantial at 9.5%, and adds an almost floral cooling to the beer.

To call this beer "big-bodied" is like saying 2-stroke engine oil is "kinda thick." This is a huge-bodied beer that poured nary a scant cappuccino-colored head. Very little carbonation certainly didn't get in the way of the huge, sweet taste of this amazing beer. It was really pleasantly different in that the bourbon didn't dominate like in other bourbon barrel aged beers, and that the chocolate was really in the forfront. That may not be exactly appropriate if I were judging this beer for an award. But judging this beer on my own preferences and biases...I'd buy a whole case.