Deschutes Black Butte XXI

Formerly brewed at Deschutes Brewery
Style: Imperial/Strong Porter
Bend, Oregon USA

Serve in Snifter

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Bottle 66cl. @ LCRBM 2008, ’s-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands
Clear dark black color with a average, frothy, good lacing, mostly lasting, light brown head. Aroma is moderate to heavy malty, roasted, chocolate, coffee, cacao, cabbage, radishes notes, bourbon. Flavor is moderate to heavy sweet and bitter with a long duration. Body is medium to full, texture is oily - creamy, carbonation is soft - flat. [20081025]

Bottled - tasted blind. A pitch black beer with a thin tan head. The aroma is sweet malty with notes of a moldy ashtray full of tobacco. The flavor is sweet with notes of tobacco as well as an acidity from hard roasted malt, leading to a dry and very roasted finish.Too much tobacco for me.

(Bottle 75 cl) Pours black and opaque with a creamy light brown head. Distinctly burned ashy aroma. Quite full-bodied with sweet burned malts and a malt astringent finish. Big yes but also somewhat unrefined. 260708

From bottle #25 at sk8vikings American blind tasting. Pours dark brown and with a lacing off-white head. Dense roasted and coffeeish aroma. Flavour is spiced and coffeeish with solid acidic touch and hardroasted malt. Solid acidic roasted malt and light tobacco finish. Lingering dark roasted coffee and malt with an acidic touch.

Bottled@SBWF2008. Close to black colour, mediumsized beigeish brown head. Aroma is coffee, syrup, roasted malts as well as some smoked wooden notes. Flavour is hops, grass and coffee along with some ryebreadish notes. If it’s really 11% it hides the alcohol extremely well!

Bottled at Stockholm Beer Festival. Very black, small beige head. Tarry licorice aroma. Fairly sweet with dense compact mouthfeel. Lots of chocoalte and asphalt covered in molasses. Long salty woody bitterness with some burning sweetness.

Bottle at bager. Pitch black coloured with a medium sized beige head. Roasted aroma of chocolate and caarmel with notes of spices. Roasted flavour of chocolate, caramel and alcohol with notes of liquorice, spices and hops. Roasted, hoppy and warming alcoholic finish.

Bottle, 11% at LCRBM08. Vinous aroma, sweet yeast. Black colour, very small brown head. Good flavour, bready, roasted, vanilla, vinous. Very good combination. The alcohol is a bit rough, but all in all very nice.

Draught at the Freakin’ Frog, Las Vegas
Black color, with generous brown creamy head. Strange brew, with flavors of coffee, medicines, liquorice, but all together rather interesting. The body is quite strong and with some sweetness; the final quite balanced and without the ashtray feeling of many Imperial Stouts. Pleasant.

UPDATED: DEC 15, 2009
Name: Black Butte XX
Date: October 16, 2008
Mode: Bottle
Source: Trade
Appearance: black, wispy tan head
Aroma: sweet chocolate a bourbon aroma with lots of oakyness, vanilla sweetness, roasted and coffee
Body: creamy body
Flavor: rich chocolate flavor, lots of bourbon sweetness, big roasted and coffee character kicks in to turn it into a roasty stout, fleeting touch of alcohol in the finish, well balanced complex array of flavors

Aroma: 7/10; Appearance: 8/10; Flavor: 8/10; Palate: 7/10; Overall: 17/20
Rating: 4/5.0
Drinkability: 7/10
Score: ***+ /4

Date: August 08, 2009
Mode: Bottle
Source: Tasting, Ticker
Appearance: black, wispy tan head, streaks of lace
Aroma: sweet dark roasted aroma, mello sweet bourbon, dark fruits, light oak, dark chocolate
Flavor: rich roasted flavor, bourbon sweetness, lots of oak, bitterness follows the oak with a bit of the dark roast, sweet dark caramel comes in to balance the strong oak

Date: November 21, 2009
Mode: bottle
Source: cellar tasting
Aroma: picking up a touch of hot peppery character in the aroma
Flavor: picking up more roasted character in the flavor leaving a bigger bitter presence

Aroma: 7/10; Appearance: 7/10; Flavor: 7/10; Palate: 6/10; Overall: 14/20
Rating: 3.5/5.0
Drinkability: 7/10
Score: *** /4