Orkney Dark Island (Bottle)

Brewed by Orkney (Sinclair Breweries)
Style: Old Ale
Stromness, Orkney, Highlands & Islands, Scotland

They’re also not telling us something about the smoked malts that permeate this gorgeous brew. On revisiting, the chocolate character emerges a lot. Quaffable and sippable at the same time.

Bottle- Pours nearly opaque with a greyish beige head. smells bready, plums, chocolate, sweet sugar and coffee. tastes earth, cherries and some chocolate. slight smokyness in finish.

16oz bottle. Pours Dark Brown with reddish hints on the edges and a small tannish head. Nose is heavy on chocolate and caramel and coffee and a touch of smoke. The taste is quite similar to the smell. Very full bodied with a silky mouthfeel. Dark chocolate and caramel dominate but this is a very smooth beer. Reminiscent of a porter but without the bitter hops bite. This is a true malt heads dark beer. Its not the most complex but its very tasty. Well done.

Sampled during Cellar’s Wednesday beer tasting evening. Pours a semi-clear dark reddish amber brew with a thin off-white head that quickly dissipates to a fine film and off-white ring. Aroma of smoky roasted dark caramel malt, some flowery hops and a touch of peat. Taste is medium bodied, with flavors of roasted caramel malt, some smoked wood, plenty of peat character and a touch of yeast. Finish is semi-dry with a lingering smoky peat aftertaste that easy to remember. Not quite a rauchbier, but pretty decent and solid beer.

[bottle] Pours a dark red/brown with a small off white head. Taste is a little bit of smoke, malt, and some roastiness on the finish. Decent but not great.

Not a big fan... This one is listed as an Old Ale, but may be better described as a Scotch Ale or a wannabe Rauchbier. Regardless of what you want to call it, I think it fell short. The pour showed a nice ruby red or brownish color with a decent head on it. But the aroma was really weak and the flavor was just totally out of balance. If you’re going to have that smoky/peat flavor in your brew, you need to balance it out with some strong malty notes to finish the job. This one fell short. Not sure if it was watery or just overdone on the attempt to smoke this one up, but the brewers just didn’t quite pull this one off. Maybe I just got a bad bottle. I always try to give brewers the benefit of the doubt, you know?

Chocolate, malt, barley, coffee and hoppy. Pours a dark reddish/brown coloured beer with big foamy cream head. Hops, minerals, salt, coffee. A touch watery. Listed as an old ale but tastes like a hoppy imperial stout. Not as nice as the cask version.

The highlight of this is the flavor -- very noticeably smokey, gritty. (I’d give it an 8.5 if I could.) The rest has an obviously Scottish character and rather mild or even bordering on weak in the body and finish. There just isn’t the sharpness that is provided in the flavor. The aroma is recognizably Scottish but definitely not attention-grabbing.

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