Before the Dawn
Logsdon Farmhouse Ales

 

 

Poured into a Fremont small snifter. Pours a very dark mahogany brown, appearing opaque black in the glass with a thin dark khaki head that dissipates to a thick film with solid lacing. Aroma of dark toasted malt, chocolate, bourbon, woody oak and a little coffee. Flavor is dark toasted malt with light char, cocoa, drip coffee, bourbon and lightly woody oak; lingering bourbon-cocoa finish. Medium bodied with light to moderate creaminess. A fine, full bodied bourbon barreled stout. Somewhat subtle at first, but reveals great barrel qualities as it opens and finishes with a slightly dry and oaky character with lingering chocolate and bourbon notes. A stout that leaves an impression of being greater than the sum of its parts.

Poured into a 14oz sniffer, this was surprisingly light colored for the style as it poured into the glass with a fairly medium shade of brown. Once things had settled down in the glass it took on a very dark brown, almost black, color, with a modest, khaki colored head.

Big, boozy nose to this. Bourbon with a side of cocoa is what this smells like.

Pretty raw. Big, boozy bourbon punch up front, with a cocoa like sweetness accompanying the vanilla notes From the oak barrels. Lots of alcohol "heat." Finish is sweet and bitter, a kind of chocolate meets coffee thing, but the bourbon flavor is strong at the beginning, middle and end.

Fairly full bodied, with a coating, sticky mouthfeel.

This is not a subtle beer. Not a lot of refinement here, just a big ol bourbon-y beer. Definitely a sipper, I'll be working on this for a while, I suspect, but at least it's in a relatively sane serving size. A bomber or crowler of this would be too much. This might make a pretty good campfire beer, but I wouldn't pare it up with anything remotely resembling delicate flavors.

Ink black body; thick, fairly creamy light khaki head. Semi-sweet aroma infused with roasted grains, coffee grounds, and caramel nougat. Rich, darkly sweet flavors cut with a restrained bit of bourbon taste; milk chocolate and cocoa. Heavy body; smooth and slippery; marked alcohol heat and dryness counterpointing the residual sugar presence; a touch of wooden dryness.

This is a straight-forward barrel-aged imperial stout with no apparent adjuncts such as coffee (which I still think part of the smell comes across with), maple syrup, and other gimmicky things. The Heaven Hill and Buffalo Trace is certainly present in the taste, but seems to work with the beer's inherent ABV and makes itself felt more in the mouthfeel. A simple yet intriguing imperial stout.