Guinness Extra Stout (North America)

Brewed by Labatt Breweries (InBev)
Style: Dry Stout
London, Canada

Bottle. Can’t believe I haven’t reviewed this one yet. It wasn’t terrible, but definitely didn’t do it for me. Pours black with a small beige head, nowhere near as impressive as a nitro pour of Guinness Draught. Aroma is roast, coffee, and chocolate. Nothing special really. Flavor is burnt/roasted malt, weak coffee, a little chocolate, and a strange, sour, almost vinegary note to it. What is this supposed to be, some kind of wild ale? Outside of that though, the flavor is decent. Medium body with some acidity on the palate and average carbonation. Overall, I consider this about average for the style.

Pours a nice amber brown color with a brown head. Aroma is malty, caramel, roast, chocolate, brown sugar, and some spicy notes. Flavor is roast, caramel, toast, chocolate, and a bitter spicy finish.

Refrigerated bottle poured into a glass. Pours a very dark brown with tan head and watery body. Taste is roasted barley, some dark chocolate, with a sour aftertaste.

Weird. Thin and watery with tight carbonation - but with a faint chalky and roasty finish. Dark Guinness color, but not much else in common. None of the smooth creamy mouthfeel.

Appears like the common ’’Guinness" we all know, so we’ll skip visual aspects. Same aroma and taste too, except maybe the hops flavors are more stronger in that ES. Also the great toffee-roasty flavor that made the draught so good is quite masked by ..something...hops I believe.

Pours cola black with a thick creamy head. Nose is of coffee, burnt sugar, and raisins. Taste is fairly sour and acrid, not like a lambic, but there is something sour about it. Thin coffee body, moderate carbonation, raisin puree, very light on roasted barley, strong acrid black malt, not good.

This may be the Guinness that started it all, but it definitely is not the Guinness that many casual beer drinkers worldwide have come to love. GES is too fizzy for my tastes. Without the nitrogenation, it does not have the smooth, creamy texture made popular by Guinness Draught (GD). There’s just far too much carbonation here. While GES tastes similar to Guinness Draught, that great stout chocolate-coffee-roasty flavor is overpowered by the bitterness of the additional hops. Another interesting aspect is that GES is not suitable for making half and halfs or black and tans. As a beer newbie, I wasn’t expecting this. My attempts ended up producing a blackish mass of an odd flavor that was only drinkable because I don’t believe in wasting beer. The worst part of this beer is the harsh metallic aftertaste. While I can overlook all of its other shortcomings, the aftertaste is what turns an otherwise good beer into something less favorable. After a few sips, the aftertaste becomes less noticeable, but it keeps GES from being a beer I could love.

Really pleasantly surprised by this beer. I love Guinness, but at same time i hate stout beers due to majority being very sweet. This beer is nothing like that. It has a bit of a pine flavor to it. Its quite bitter for stout. It has a nice dark brown colour. Foam is light brown and it disappears quickly. That is the only disappointing thing about this beer. It has a light aftertaste and its very smooth going down.