Goose Island Breakfast Beer Stout

Brewed by Goose Island Beer Company (Brewpubs)
Style: Stout
Chicago, Illinois USA

Serve in English pint

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This is stout infused with the intelligensia gi house blended coffee beans. On tab at the brewpub into a snifter...A dark brown color with a light tan head, not particularly attractive, not much head or retention...The aroma and taste are essentially the same and I feel comfortable in lumping them in together, as this beer is a one noter. You might as well go buy a cup of coffee chill it to 40 degress and serve it without any cream or sugar. It is all light coffe, freshly brewed, its not a bad smell but just super boring. I’m not a coffee lover, but maybe a big coffee lover would love this. Its incredidly difficult to drink. Not anything that I would recommend even though you can drink this at 7.4% pretty easily.

Draft at the brewpub (Chicago, IL). Pours a pitchblack dark hue, opaque, with moderate light brown head that laces ok. Aromas are a nice blast of vanilla, heavy roast coffee, a touch of mocha, espresso, a touch sweeter. Initial is smoothed out, coffee grounds and espresso, a touch of sweet vanilla and varying cocoa and coffee. Good roast and bitterness, dominant but inviting, with a touch of cream and vanilla following behind. Very nice with good flavors, decent balance, good body without being over the top.

On tap at Clybourn, into a snifter. This is the coffee-est beer I’ve ever experienced. Smells like you stuck your nose in a bag of ground espresso (with a little bit of buttery, butterscotch malt underneath). Pitch black in the glass with a tight head of light brown, dense foam that dissipates into a thick ring around the outside. Flavor parallels the aroma: coffee. Lots of it. And it’s not a "note" of coffee, or an accent to otherwise beery notes -- it’s the flavor. Most coffees and espressos I’ve had haven’t tasted as much like a roasty, smooth draught of java. If there’s a complaint, it’s that this is too one-note (which keeps it worse than The Shit or Java Jacks), but a pretty delicious note it is. Lightly sweet, it’s the sweetness that lingers longest in the finish after the chocolate-covered espresso-bean roast has worn off. A bit watery, too, and the sweetness is strongly lactic, which might turn off some (it kind of turns off me). My initial impression of this beer was much higher than my rating, but as I got acclimated to the light body and lactic sweetness, I kind of got tired of it. Still, a pretty tasty beer.