Southern Tier Jah-va

Brewed by Southern Tier Brewing Company
Style: Imperial Stout
Lakewood, New York USA

black, which isn’t surprising since its part of their imperial/black water series, with a caramel colored head that quickly fades into nothing. The smell is strong - coffee. Besides that I can sense some hints of dark malts, chocolate, and sweet hints (probably caramel). Taste is very heavy on the coffee, interesting and very good.

It pours out a very black color, like an imperial stout, with a slightly tan rim. It’s also completely opaque. It smelled a lot like coffee. It had some dark malts thrown in there with a few scents of chocolate and sweetness (sugar). How did it taste? Amazing. An overwhelming taste of chocolate and coffee with what seemed like a slight hint of licorice. The coffee taste was quite strong though - almost like Starbucks coffee. I couldn’t tell if the strong taste was from the alcohol or the coffee but whatever it was, it was pretty well masked from its true identity. The texture was extremely smooth with a very nice flow of flavors. There was hardly any bite from the coffee or alcohol and I noticed the drink produced a very nice warming effect.

I really have a problem with ST’s overly sweet and straightforward imperial brews. Its just maltsweetness and whatever they add, in this case coffe. Extremely sweet and not nearly as dry and bitter as I’d expect from a imperial coffe stout.

Very dark brown with a small beige head that settles rather quickly and leaves some lacings. The smell is of roasted malts, wood, powdered chocolate, some notes of coffee and some strange notes of leafy peppery hops, blue cheese and cardboard. I suspect that there’s something wrong here, perhaps it’s on it’s way to oxidation and infection. There’s restrained strange flavors as well. The taste is very sweet, and I mean really sugary sweet with lots of coffee and chocolate notes. The flavors are not very rich, and I don’t get a genuine espresso feeling from the coffee. Roasted malts and some notes of dark fruits. Hints of cardboard and leafy hops. The finish is very bitter with notes of warming sweet alcohol, coffee and blue cheese. This is one messy beer. Full bodied and smooth. The mouthfeel is the highlight of this one. Hard to tell if this bottle was ok, or if there was something wrong with it. Something seemed wrong, but it wasn’t a horrible mess. It was just edgy and strange with some odd flavors and aromas. But either way, it doesn’t seem to be a good imperial coffee stout. Serving type: bottle (Copy of old Beer Advocate review)

dark brown, small light brown head. aroma of hops, roasted stuff, coffee, caramel, brown sugar. flavor of coffee, chocolate, roasted grains. ends bitter and roasted, but also sweet and chocolaty. 11% alc fitts it well, doesn’t stand out or in the way.

Bottle from Januaryish 09 4 pours a less viscous/syrupy dark brown, black coffee like, with a frothy foamy tan head. 8 slightly oxiidized but in a good way dark chocolately rich malty light crisp hops light espresso but really not a strong coffee aroma, plesant alcohol 7 sweet cloying, again not as sticky syrupy as the others in the series, dark chocolate, hops, espresso, coffee mostly faded, lingering hops are nice 4 not as syrupy as before but just as sticky, low soft larger carbonation 14

Black, with virtually no head. Smell of coffee and dark chocolate, maybe some dark cherry. The taste is bitter. Like biting into a coffee bean covered with unsweetened cooking chocolate, and something like a peanutty finish.

I have to say I am quite disappointed in this one. The aroma is burnt coffee with acidic leaves and earth as well as a bit of chocolate and toffee. The appearance is dark brown almost black with a tan foamy head. The flavor is like the aroma with a pronounced acidity and earthy character. The finish is very coffee like. The palate is very smooth and almost thick. Overall a beer that I want to like but i just has too much funky bad coffee in the flavor.