Full Sail Black Gold Imperial Stout Bourbon Barrel Aged

Brewed by Full Sail Brewing Company
Style: Imperial Stout
Hood River, Oregon USA

Thanks to Chuck for the sample! Has a pretty nice coffee aroma, with a little alcohol noticable. Black body with a thin beige head. Flavor is nice, bitter, coffe-flavored. Decent body and texture, and lively carbonation. Overall, this is a good beer.

dark black pour w/ a tall thick tan head and some great lacing. Aroma is vanilla and roasted malt some light coffee notes with a light bourbon finish to the scent. Palate if full and well coated and has a nice coat and a light creaminess. Flavor is a big buttery bourbon oaky roast malt aroma with lighter notes of vanilla and coffee. This is pretty good but may be better w/ some age, I’d like some more.

Thanks to Harlequinn for the trade. I like the commercial decription. Black. Large, dense, frothy brown head settles quickly leaving some nice lacing behind. Nose: roasty vanilla, oak, licorice, vanilla cream, smores, burnt malt, subtle coffee, and alcohol. Flavor: smores, vanilla, oak, whiskey, roasty malt, bittersweet chocolate, and an alcohol laden anise finish. Burnt smores aftertaste. Full, rich, smooth body; livened up a bit by the alcohol burn. Great imperial, should be even better with few years of age.

Small, gone-in-seconds off-white head; fully black beer. Superb nose of Bourbon cask, vinous, cherries, and other black fruit. Superb (again) vinous, just-not-sweet malt taste, with lots of licorice, woody, and vanilla infused oak. Retronasal however the hops strike back to a pretty harsh, quinine-like flavour. Rich, velvety MF, alcohol without the burn. Creamy, even cobwebby texture. Superb stout, one for the records. Another thankee to my great friend DonGS from Seattle.

Dark, murky and brown-black. Creamy dark tan head with sticky and lingering lace. Aromas wafted heavily from the surface. Muscular mouthfeel was just wonderful; still had a sensitive side, too. Huge, lofty aromas of fresh-cut coconut, almonds, vanilla beans, rum-filled chocolates, and sauteed raisins. Faint background notes of plantains, sweet wood and flowers. Happily, the bourbon/whiskey elements were much more restrained than your typical smack-you-in-the-face bourbon barrel aged beer. Nice balance between the sweet and bitter. Warming in the throat gave the beer a nice set of brass balls. Overall, I thought it was an excellent brew. If it were me a few years ago, I might’ve given this a 5. But after experiencing a fresh bottle of the first batch of The Czar and then right-off-the-line bottles of Mephistopheles’ Stout, my personal impy bar was raised pretty high.

Black as black pour with brown head. Wood bourbon aroma. Vanilla up front on the taste with hints of chocolate, wood, bourbon and light roast. Just a hint of hops on the finish.

Any first impressions?
-A bubbly head bobs over opaque black.
-Bourbon sweetness and wooden dryness monopolize the nose.
-Chocolate sweets, coffee beans, and malt roastiness decadently take over the palate; a pleasant surprise.
-The smooth and quiet carbonation leaves plenty of room for the maltiness to express itself.

What if you dig deeper?
-The sweetness is multi-layered, starting off chocolatey, then reaching a vanilla character, following into star anise/licorice territory.
-There is some warming from the alcohol, but it never intrudes with the wonderful flavors at play.
-There is no barrel aggression here, this is a well-supervised experiment.
-A very intelligently conceived bourbon-barrel imperial stout which deserves a round of applause.

Bottle; December ’05.

Poured pitch black color with a large brown head that lasts a long time. Bourbon aroma. Big vanilla, wood, milk chocolate, light roast. It smells creamy. Flavor starts with chocolate and finishes with vanilla. Bourbon notes in the milddle almost cover up the roasty malt. Semi-dry and woody finish with a mild bitterness and nice warmth. Acidic bite on the tongue during the finish. Medium body, that I thought would have been thicker. I actually might be drinking this a little on the warm side so I am chilling the second half of the bottle.