Midnight Sun M

I want to start out with a huge thank you to hoppymeal for trading his only other bottle of M! Looks black or very dark brown from a distance, but when held to light has some very dark red colors to it. Excellent clarity on the beer. The head is tan colored and hangs around well leaving a decent lacing. Aroma jumps out of the glass with burnt sugar, molasses, sour cherries, mint, rum, bourbon, oak, plum, raisins, and Christmas cookies. Intense and complex smell, but everything smells so delicious. Taste is full of brown sugar, molasses, huge amount of caramel, cherries, bourbon, and vanilla. Mouthfeel is full, but so damn smooth, not cloying at all. Low carbonation and full body cause this to slide over the tongue delivering deliciousness to every taste bud possible. A beautiful beer to drink, I could sip on this beer all day, but sadly I don’t ever think I’ll see a bottle again. As much as I had built this beer up in my mind after finding out everything I could about it, I didn’t think it would be able to live up to what I believed it to be. Somehow, M knew my expectations and instead of breaking under the pressure, it stood strongly and proudly saying take it or leave it. Take it, I will. Simply M-mazing!

Huge thanks to hoppymeal, pepsican, badbeer, and iowaherkeye.Low carbonation. Really smooth finish. Lots of fruit. Moderately sweet. fig & currant. Nice caramel, chocolate, slight butterscotch. Plums. Finishes with lots of chocolate & caramel. Some burnt sugar.

Pours a reddish brown with a nice sized tan head. Aroma has a nice bit of chocolate, raisin, cherry, plums, old pears. Flavor was up front chocolate and caramel. Lots of sweet fruits are also dominate, mainly plums and cherries. It definitely has a light amount of sherry and cardboard oxidation that isn’t quite distracting yet, but I could see it getting in the way soon. A bit of bourbon, vanilla, bubblegum, and toffee round this one out. The mouthfeel and finish are damn near perfect. I always want to hate aged beer, but I can’t with this. Awesome.

Pour was very dark brown with a small tan head. The aroma was sugary chocolate, vanilla and oak. The body was medium to thick with low carbonation, which fit well. The taste was plenty of sweet chocolate with hints of port and raisins. Really good stuff.

Bottle cracked open to celebrate my 35th birthday. Pours dark brown with some off white bubbles around the rim of the snifter. Smells dry and oaky with some dark fruit, pepper, earthy, cognac, some molasses. Tastes of sweet malt, some vinous hints, toffee, some nuttyness, dry. Well balanced and enjoyable.

22oz bottle, special thanks to Tim at a BA cellar party. I thought I had missed this one and would never get the chance to try it but happened to be in the right place at the right time with some of the coolest people on the planet. Poured into a tulip at cellar temp, about 4 years old at the time of tasting. Deep brown with a tiny head that swirled around the glass like the milky way galaxy. Aroma was very complex, oak, bourbon, prunes, toffee, caramel. The taste was mostly sweet but was cut perfectly by the wood and alcohol flavors. Not syrupy like I imagined it but silky smooth with mild carbonation, age may be thinning this out to perfection. From the others in the room that have had this before, sounds like it just keeps getting better and still hasn’t peaked. Maybe, if I’m lucky the beer gods will rain down blessings of “M” again in the future. Some beers rate high because of their limited availability and lore but this is not one of them, to date the best beer I’ve ever had.

From my backlog dated September 6th: 22oz bomber shared by an extremely generous individual.

Dark nearly opaque pour with hardly a drop of head. Nearly devoid of carbonation. Ominous. Aromas of oloroso sherry with bits of vanilla. Deep and absorbing. Bizarre flavour. Triple, barley wine and light bourbon barrel stout all rolled into one. Wow. Finally, someone who managed to pull off integrating various attributes of very different styles of beer. Not only succeeded, but really excelled. Deep vinous character that morphed into various layers of complexity. Very nice mouthfeel that just enhanced the experience. Some additional sherry notes on the end that give away its age. Just such a unique beer with very separate and unique components that somehow manage to balance and compliment each other wonderfully.

Many thanks Jason for sharing such an elusive beer.

Thanks to Mojuck for bringing this to the Cleveland Tasting. I have never seen more rare/retired beers at a tasting. Pour dark brown...color of tree bark with a small white head. Aroma of oak, chocolate, toffee, ripe fruit, leather and booze. Tastes amazing...dark roasted malts with complimentary bourbon. Still had a great body and was very smooth. Another beer figured to be overrated, but it was great.