Bells Cherry Stout

Brewed by Bells Brewery
Style: Sweet Stout
Kalamazoo, Michigan USA

Serve in English pint

8870 Black pour with a small tan head. Sweet aroma of roasted malt and coffee. The flavor is what you would expect if someone spilled some Kool Aid in a dark roasty stout. The cherry tartness is something that sounds like it would put an added amount of complexity to this beer, but appears tacked on and doesn’t blend well at all. Sweet and malty at first, but opens up into a watered down cherry thing that becomes tart and leaves a small trace of a real stout in it’s wake. I didn’t care much for this, probably won’t drink again.

Draft. Pours pitch black with a creamy, dark brown head. Pretty powerful nose full of dark cherries, dry roasted malt, a little coffee, and some booze. Medium-low carbonation with a rich mouthfeel. This one is definitely confusing. At first you get a nice, sweet stout on the tip of your tongue, then BANG! a big pile of sour cherries. Lots of big tart dark cherries, coffee, chocolate, earth, and mineral on the palate. Talk about bizarre. It’s like a sour and a sweet stout mixed together. Medium-short, slightly dry finish. Very entertaining to have once, but I am not sure I would want this on a consistent basis.

Bottle. Pours black with a medium brown head. Aroma is very chocolatey with some cherry presence and a slight coffee aroma as well. Flavor is chocolate and cherry with a coffee finish. Very thick beer. Very unique. One of the best beers I’ve had to date.

Pours a very dark black with a very thin tan head. Aroma has a pronounced tart cherry presence, chocolate malty character, a modest bitter roast character also seems to come through and a light coffee note. Flavor starts off with a hefty tart cherry taste, a very smooth middle of chocolate malt, sweet cherry kicks in, a smooth coffee bitter and the brew finishes with a tongue puckering dryness. The beer is very very dense with it moving like oil in your mouth with the low carbonation really accentuating this mouth feel. Overall a fantastic beer. No flavor dominates and they seem to meld very well together. Dryness at the end really seems to make the stout as you generally don’t get this characteristic in them. A bit price but definitely worth the money.

Dark, oily pour. Some head quickly dissipates. Smell is strongly of cherry and malt. Taste is tart cherry, sour apples. Chocolate, malt. Tart overshadows any hop character. Overall, a great brew.

Black pour with a thin dark brown head with very little rentention. Overwhelming nose of brewer’s licorice, which also dominates the flavor. Both the aroma and the flavor also have good amounts of overripened dark cherries, with a strong tartness cutting through the finish. Give me Kalamazoo Stout over this any day!

Bottle thanks to kmyers8807. Pour is black with almost no head. Aroma is very tart with lots of cherry and a light roasted malt backbone. Flavor is very similar to nose. There is a lot of tart cherry up front with faint malt notes and a touch of chocolate. The first time I had this was years ago and I did not like it then, but this was much better than I remember. Much more balanced, the cherry does dominate but the malt balanced it out enough.

Pours opaque black with a bit of tan head. Aromas of cherry, and sweet, dark roasted malts emerge. The flavor is somewhat simple, but nice, sweet, tart cherry plus creamy roasted malt flavors, ending with a bit of coffee like bitterness. The mouthfeel is smooth and thick. Overall, a nice stout.