BrewDog Paradox Longrow (Batch 018)

Brewed by BrewDog
Style: Imperial Stout
Fraserburgh, Aberdeenshire, Scotland

Pours a dark brown with a small tan head. The aroma is full of charcoal and smoke. The flavor is dry and off putting. The oak is present, but just not that pleasant. This beer really doesn’t work for me.

Bottle. Pours a very dark brown with a thin light brown head. Exceptionally peaty aroma and flavour, with campfire smoke, caramel, chocolate all hovering at the edges of the palate. Medium-bodied despite the 10% ABV, and no sign of any intrusive fusels or harshness. I agree with Saavy1982 that this comes across as more of a scotch ale (imperial scotch ale?), but is still very tasty and enjoyable.

Holy scotch batman! This beer smells and tastes like a glass of islay scotch poured dirty. Big smoke, oak and peat permeate the taste aroma and palate. My only complaint is that is all i can and taste, the stout is drowned out by the intense flavours given from the barrel aging. Of course that’s a very mild complaint as i still rated this beer quite high. This beer is fantastic, and if they were going for what they got out of this, then well done sirs! I can’t wait to try this after it ages for a couple years. ----I retract what i said earlier about the aroma... after this warms up and opens up a bit, you can get red fruit and licorice. There is definitely some imperial stout behind all that smoke and peat.

Bottle, shared with Macadem. Pours very dark cola brown, with a thin head and no lacing. Nose is very nice, root-beer, cola, chocolate, and bourbon all mixed together, lovely complexity. Palate is very big on the scotch, unfortunately, almost overwhelming the beer. Still some beer to be found, though the scotch flavor is very well done. Nice fruitiness, and well-integrated alcohol to be found here. Overall a nice beer, but not my favorite Imperial Stout, this was more like a Scotch-dominated Porter.

Bottle from cgarvieuk, thanks Craig! Deep dark brown color. Iodine and peaty smoke in the aroma, pushing away the obvious caramelly and chocolate aromas. Malty sweet caramelly flavor with iodine, peat, smoke, whisky. Alcoholic, almost boozy, but a lovely balance and oozing the quality of a good Longrow malt. I just miss a bit of chocolate.

330ml brown bottle, my bottle appears to have been intended for Japanese export, since half of it is in kanji (?) Opaque, deep, deep brown to black colour, when held up to light some deep brown highlights appear. The head is modest but leaves behind some pleasant sheets upon the surface of the glass, no real head left on the surface of the beer. Whisky cannot be ignored in the aroma, but isn’t powerfully intense, rather it is pleasant and warming, revealing a soft peat character. The base imperial stout is underneath there as well, roasty with very light chocolate note. To me, this does not seem very phenolic, as other raters have noted. Flavour is quite peaty, salty, warming alcohol,whisky notes play off this. Beer finishes roasty, dry, earthy, some woody tones. Full body, moderate carbonation level. Really quite drinkable for 10%, if you enjoy the base componenents, and I do.

Bottle. Sharp strong dark wood scents. Smokey cloudy dark peat flavour. Dark beer with strong alcohol and sour whiskey peat.