Gingerbread Stout - American Single Malt
Hardywood Park Craft Brewery

Look: It pours dark brown with a tan head with very low head retention.

Smell: It has chocolate aromas with bourbon notes in support. There are some ginger and mint like notes in support with cinnamon.

Taste: It has strong ginger, chocolate, mint and cinnamon flavors with bourbon in close support. There are touches of roast in the background.

Feel: It has a smooth texture with some moderate bitterness and strong alcohol warming.

Overall, nice flavors and I am not sure where the mint came from, it may just be my taste buds, but I like it.

The beer pours a very light brown head that dissipates very quickly. The beer itself is a dark chocolate black that looks very nice.

The smell is mostly GBS notes (cinnamon, ginger, light honey, dark chocolate) with a fruity hint of whisky around the edge.

The taste is also mostly GBS notes but better blended and not as intense as the base or in other variants. There is also a fairly present sherry note throughout the whole thing that makes it taste fruitier and works well with the GBS notes. The sherry note lingers through the finish and is a fine end to it. It's very good and sophisticated.

The feel is extremely smooth and silky with very little carbonation. The body feels medium and it makes a fairly easy sip.

Overall, the beer is pretty good. It's more of a sipping beer than anything since it takes time for the sherry to develop and come out on its own given how subtle it is.

Pours near black, with a modest head that becomes a thin ring that does find a way to produce a few spots of lacing. The nose is spiced chocolate that meets expectations given the base beer - a little less spicy due to the chocolate. There is a whisper of whiskey in the nose.

The taste yields a more fruity version of GBS, which I am guessing is the ASM influence. I wonder if some of the whiskey barrels used were ex-sherry barrels, as I could see some of that berry fortified wine vibe in this beer. It may just be a coincidence.

Given that, the taste is tame, especially with respect to the ginger. There is a fairly rich, somewhat silky feel to this beer though, that makes the experience feel a tad more decadent. I like the overall composition of this variant.

12 oz bottle, dated 10/23/23. Stubby bottle

pours black, with a tan colored head that fades. Pleasant mix of ginger spice, dark chocolate, and boozy, oaky, whiskey in both the aroma and the taste. medium to fuller bodied.