Stout
The Kernel Brewery

 

Chocolatey, with loads of fudge. A bit smokey. The sweetness doesn't kick in for a while but it is sweet enough. Not too bitter either. A touch of orange marmalade. It's pretty good.

Picked this up at The Kernel Brewery while on vacation in London. Pitch black pour with a nice two finger caramel-colored head with nice retention and great lacing. The nose is nutty, sweet, and chocolaty with hints of coffee, subtle roast, and cocoa. The taste follows suit with rich dark chocolate the star along with hints of tobacco, licorice, espresso, cocoa, nuts, and a nice subtle hoppiness as it warms. The mouthfeel is thick and creamy with a touch of oiliness and a smooth as silk finish. Overall, this is not as roasty as other Kernel Stouts, but it's rich and flavorful and highly drinkable. Will definitely look for this again.

Purchased at the Kernel Brewery in London; bottle-conditioned in a 330ml brown bottle, bottling on 04/03/2013, BB 04/03/2015, served faintly chilled in a short-stemmed tulip-shaped sniffer.

A: pours a pitch black hue, coming with very mild carbonation and a thin khaki thin head.
S: rich, oily, jammy, vanilla-ish chocolaty, more so than the roast-mlaty and coffee-ish notes; the aroma is so lively that it’s at the same time sweet and the alc. content makes itself felt. It’s also lightly spicy (almost chilli-ish even), deeply nutty, mildly date-ish, with a wonderful support of hops… Altogether the smell suggests a bigger/bolder stout than its alc. content 6.6%abv. would lead me to expect.
T: richly roast-nutty and also sweet malty, with lots of fruitiness and chocolaty undertones to boot, while being chewy hoppy-bitter at the same time. The aftertaste suggests some acidic prune-ish fruitiness, more burned nut aroma, and some liquorice, leather, leaving the dry-ish, herbal, chewy and raw-ish bitterness to linger freely. The beer tastes much lighter on the palate than it is on the nose, by the way.
M&O: softly carbonated, medium bodied, deliciously composed, balanced even, this is an Export Stout type of dark ale so well made that it’s almost quaffable. Overall a feel of “un-finished business” somehow exists, making it much less rounded for full enjoyment. This is perhaps the only criticism I’ve got. That said, this is still a really lovely beer.