Mount Skull
3 Floyds Brewing Co.

 

750ml bottle poured into a snifter.

A: An aggressive pour yields two fingers of brown head that sputters out relatively quickly. Not unusual given the high ABV and barrel aging. No lacing to speak of and the color of the liquid itself is a sheening black.

S: Cinnamon is potent up front. Barrel mingles with strong barrel aromas of woody vanilla and light coconut shavings, along with bourbon. Smokey. Blackstrap molasses and fudge sauce. Nutty coffee begins to pull through with warmth.

T: Follows the nose. Cinnamon is most apparent up front. Barrel is also front and center. Bourbon ball candy- chewy dark caramel, chocolate, and nougat. Fudge sauce. Coconut shavings and vanilla. Warm oak. Lots of bourbon, with a bit of heat. Acrid smoke. Coffee is a bit lost in the shuffle, but pulls through middle to end with some nuttiness. Finish is cinnamon spice, bourbon heat, fudge sauce and caramel.

M: Full and hefty. Viscous, chewy, and coating. Definite sense of weight. Ample carbonation prickles and lifts enough to keep things from getting overbearing and syrupy. Plenty of bourbon warmth and mild tannin.

O: It's all brawn and no complexity, and the cinnamon and barrel are a bit too amplified. Not to say it is a bad beer. If you like that "balls to the wall" approach, you'll enjoy it. It just isn't very refined or nuanced, though. It's a drinker, not a thinker.

Pours a black foamy 1 finger fizzy head with low retention as it fades quickly, no lacing, but paints the glass with inky black beer

Nose brings tons of roasted malt, coffee, espresso, fudge, dark chocolate cocoa, nougat, a bit of candy bar, caramel, nutty notes, layers of vanilla and barrel, whiskey and barrel juice, baking spices and cookie dough, hint of cinnamon, a ton going on

Taste also comes on with loads of coffee, dark chocolate, roasted malts, into some toasted coconut, layers of dark chocolate, fudge, vanilla spice and vanilla ice cream, some whiskey and barrel juice, vanilla and toasted oak, cookie dough as well with more baking spices, cinnamon flavor and a little tingle, a bit of espresso and roasted malts on the back end, mild bitterness mostly from roasted malts, perfumey alcohol, sticky sweet finish with some hot alcohol

Mouth is super rich full bodied, thick chewy, plenty of hot tingly alcohol, lower but OK carb

Overall quite good, a lot better than I expected although 3 Floyds knows how to make great stouts I was just worried it would be a sweet bomb and pastry stout like, but great base, good barrel characters, additives come though nicely including the barrel