Kyoto Kuromame Ale
Kizakura Sake Brewing Co., Ltd.

Poured from 330mL bottle into a dimpled mug. The label says "roasted black beans flavor with smoky taste" ... let's get into it!

Appearance: medium orange hue with a light haze and a good apparent effervescence. There are also some tiny floaties in the beer, and head is a thick finger of frothy ivory foam. Looks good to me!

Smell: the aroma is quite interesting, like a cross between a porter and a pale ale. There's light malt and fruity hops up front, but then a roasty element with a very coffee-like quality and, yes, just a hint of smoke. Weird, and I like it.

Taste: malt flavor up front is a bit on the sweet side, with an earthy and slightly fruity hop character. This then fades into that more coffee-like character from the aroma. Reading a little about kuromame, it's a sweetened black soybean dish, so I think the sweetness here agrees with what the brewer is trying to do. Ok, at the very end, I get a distinct flavor that reminds me of dried edamame -- there's your soybean for you! There are notes of toasty bancha hojicha tea here as well.

Mouthfeel: medium body with a good carbonation and creaminess.

Overall: this is definitely one of the strangest beers I've had -- I think the novelty is what really appeals to me. It's a really complex and unusual flavor, and while I don't think I would drink this everyday, it's a very interesting and welcome treat.

Very interesting! The smoke sadly masks a lot of the interesting bean flavor, so it's mostly just a solid brown.

 

Kiazkura Kyoto Kuromame Ale, the weirdest beer I could find at Uwajimaya this week. 330ml bottle stamped (I think) "YB.6.YF" and a peculiar pull-tab top that I don't think I've ever seen before. Served in a bulb glass for some reason. Pours a nice pumpkin amber color with little head and good clarity. I'm not sure why but I expected it to be darker, like a smoked porter or something. All I get in the aroma is a bit of sweet malt, nothing out of the ordinary at all. A whiff of smoke as it warms. Flavor is something different from the appearance though -- there are big roasted flavors here. I'd expect roasted barley or chocolate malt or something like that, but based on the color we're not dealing with anything more than some crystal 80 (just a guess, to be clear). Do those roasty flavors come from roasted beans rather than malt? Pretty wild if that's the case. There's gentle smoke and toasty malt, but despite the copper color and malt profile it's doesn't taste at all like Munich.

Evaluated as a brown ale or stout this would stand up quite well, and then the color is just mind-blowing.

 

Bought a single 11.2oz bottle Don Quijote $5.29
Smell of smoky chocolate, coffee
Hazy brownish color
Medium-heavy mouthfeel
Medium carbonation
Taste of smoky black beans, a little chocolate
Overall this is a very interesting beer in a good way. First one I've had with black beans and that smoky flavor works well with it.

brown 11.5 oz bottle into 16 oz mason jar

look: opaque orange brown, 4+ inch billowing, light khaki head, fine bubbled, fades slowly, intricate lacing.
smell: malty, nutty breadiness, slight piney hops, and brown sugar

taste: nutty malt, coffee overtones, some piney hoppy bitterness. slight sweetness

feel: medium low carbonation, full bodied mouth feel.

overall: a respectable craft brew, that is in its own style. It’s a nice flavor, nice beer to review, so try it if you can!

 

A very interesting brew. The best way I can describe it is that it looks like a really watery brown ale, but tastes like a great, rich coffee porter. Excellent. Smells like black bean mochi, coffee and a hint of brown sugar and milk chocolate. Tastes like a coffee porter with a slight hint of black bean, but feels very rich almost like a milk stout. Very impressed.

 

Poured into a Fremont small snifter. Pours a medium orange brown, nearly tea colored, with a one finger off-white head with good retention and lacing. Aroma of light biscuit malt, faintly bean component that actually kind of smells like coffee, mild cocoa and nuts; interesting. Flavor is dark malt, earthy bean, mild coffee and nuts with a light sake-yeast note and a light bitterness in the finish. Medium bodied with light creaminess. To be honest, knowing that there is bean paste in this, I can taste it, but the overall profile is very much like a brown ale, with nutty, earthy coffee taste. An overall roasty note becomes more clear in the finish. The yeast has some flavor indications of the sake orientation of the brewery, although this a quite malty beer. Different and quite drinkable. I like it.

The bottle indicates this is made with roasted black beans, “with smoky taste.”
I’m curious. Let’s find out.

Capped top with a pull tab that pops open after the slightest tug. Pours with a healthy head, light amber tan capped by creamy faint cocoa foam. The aroma is intriguing. There’s definitely a black bean earthiness to the nose, with a faint smokiness. The smoky black bean character comes across on the palate, matched by some musty hops. It reminds me of the sweet bean paste inside of mochi, almost. Effervescent, but falls flat in some regards.