Xmucane's Imperial Stout
Cigar City Brewing

5 year old bottle with a friend over cigars, and it was great. Deep, slightly thick, plenty of sweet chocolate and vanilla, a slightly assertive spice and spiciness, a mild bitter nuttiness and just a pinch of toasty coffee. I haven’t let it properly warm up because I keep drinking it, so I don’t know how full bodied it could be, but it’s boozy.

Take a winner of a base beer and give it some fun, and it’s great.

Got this from Claaark. Cheers man!

From a 750ml bottle into a snifter
11th Hunahpu’s Day Festival 13 March 2020
Hunahpu’s Imperial Stout with hazelnuts and coffee

APPEARANCE: Pours out like Huna. Pitch black and sludgy pour yields a 2+ finger, medium looking, creamy yet fizzy dark tan head with solid retention. Jet black body with no carbonation evident. Head eventually fizzes down to a ring and faint wisp but quickly becomes completely flat.

SMELL: Lots of hazelnuts on the nose with plenty of vanilla and cacao as well. Hints of cinnamon, chili peppers and a faint touch of coffee is still there after three and a half years. This is Huna plus lots of hazelnuts for sure.

TASTE: Hazelnuts, vanilla, cacao and some definite roasted flavors up front. Some hints of chili peppers as well and lots of roasted flavors and hazelnuts at the finish. Big finish of roasted malts, bitter cacao and roasted coffee, vanilla cream, spicy cinnamon and some light chili peppers linger on the palate. Plenty of flavor here and lots of character. Still beefy after all this time. Excellent.

PALATE: Fuller body and lower levels of carbonation. Creamy and silky on the palate, plenty of weight, goes down slick with a touch of chili heat and finishes quite sticky. Huna at its best.

OVERALL: This is fantastic. It reminds me why I’m such a huge Cigar City fan. I think this is the first CCB stout I’ve had since 2019, so life is certainly good right now. Big, black body, plenty of Huna aromas and flavors with a wonderful hazelnut and coffee combo on top, and then a thick, slick body to support it all. Could drink piles of this, but I could say the same about virtually every CCB stout I’ve had. Thanks again Claaark. Lovely.

 

 

 

I received a bottle from @roguer in NBS BIF @13. Poured into a Cigar City tulip glass. It pours a deep, dark walnut - nearly black. Its medium mocha colored head fizzled out quickly leaving minimal lacing. The fragrant nose features roasted malt, raisin, brown sugar, leather, tobacco, peppers, vanilla, and cinnamon. Wow, this is amazing! It opens with cocoa, fresh coffee, and subtle but distinct hazelnuts and quickly segues into mild pepper, vanilla, cinnamon, and a good cigar. All of the flavors are delicate and they blend amazingly well. It's all subtle - but delicious. The mouth feel is thick and chewy with moderate carbonation, and the 11.6% ABV is amazingly well hidden. I can only say, "wow," this is a tremendous Stout. It is big enough to serve as a dessert beer but lite enough for casual drinking.

 

Picked up a few bottles of this, one from a friend out east & two directly from one of my favorite breweries. 750ML bottle split with my wife to celebrate one more day off tomorrow.

Blacker than the marks on Hunahpu’s skin with a nose of chiles, nuts, roast/char, & a soft chocolatey sweetness. So Huna plus the hazelnut, with a slightly roastier edge to the char.

Xmucane is Huna wrapped in a cool husk of cobnut. The hazelnut comes out in waves as the beer warms out of the fridge, melding with the vanilla to form an almost impenetrable taste wave. Mid-palate the chiles poke their pedicel’s out, along with faint roast & chocolate. No cinnamon evident. Almost as smooth & decadent as the original & the perfect balance of the chili peppers keeps the drinkability insanely high. Though the heat does build to a nice satisfactory level.

Like most Huna variants, the additions (here: hazelnut) dull some of the features that make Huna such an elite-level beer. Still, this is a damn excellent brew.

Got to get my beer even after Hunahpu was cancelled this year. Never heard of this and just scarfed it down a day or so ago. I was hoping to share it but with Covid I wound up doing the whole bottle by myself. Oh poor ME!

Big dark brown head; decent retention for the style and ABV. Body is very dark and inviting.

Huge nutty nose, with hazelnut leading off followed by coffee and chocolate. Peppers, caramel, molasses, and mild char follow, but the hazelnut is quite potent. That said, it's a big, potent, rich, roasty beer on the nose.

Peppers lead the way on the palate, and linger throughout the entire sip, adding very little heat but a lovely vegetal tone; there is a nice spicy bite on the finish. Hazelnut and coffee are inseparably linked, and grow throughout the sip until becoming the dominant flavor. Chocolate up front, semi-sweet, becoming dry and bitter mid-sip. Cinnamon is quite restrained, playing second fiddle to the hazelnut, and accenting the peppery finish with a dry spice.

Throughout, each sip is deep, rich, and rewarding. It's not as sweet as a dessert stout, not by a mile, but there is a rewarding sweetness, emphasized over any amount of roasty char. The hazelnut and coffee are highlighted - hazelnut in particular - but the chocolate and peppers still find a way to make themselves known.

Thick, chewy, unbelievably smooth. Sticks to the gums and lips long after the sip. Minor warming chest heat.

Huge, bold, incredible beer, without the need for spirits barrels. Exactly as advertised, and well worth the experience.

 

 

 

 

Poured a black body with minimal khaki head. The aroma is nutty more than anything else as the hazelnuts are strong. The beer is also nutty, too nutty in my opinion, but does have some coffee as well in a thick, full-bodied beer that has some sweetness underneath and is worth trying.