Night Howler
Baerlic Beer Company

12oz can. Bottom date stamp is '09/18/24'.
Black colored body, with a mahogany brown back lit edge. One thick finger of light brown head, which recedes to an interrupted cap and high ring. Leaves behind strings and spots of lacing.
Aroma of roasted bread malts, coffee, and bitter chocolate.
Taste is a reflection of the nose, with roasted malts with a bit of char, dark roast coffee, and chocolate. The first burst of chocolate has a bit of sweetness but then dives to a dark and bitter tone. Brief appearance of vanilla in the early tasting stage. Char takes over in the aftertaste.
A little thinner than medium for mouthfeel, but has some silkiness. Dry finish due to the higher ABV%. Very much numbs the tongue. Good carbonation.
Solid hard core stout and without adjuncts.

Pours an ever so slightly turbid, chestnut/mahogany with 2 fingers of mocha colored head. Average-ish head retention, better lacing

S: Very roasty, some cocoa notes, iron once warm

T: Cocoa, Baker's Chocolate, roastyness & a little iron up front, traces of vanilla & woody hops. Roasty notes, chocolate, leafy hops & dryness as this beer warms up. Some smokey & char notes in the finish, along with dryness, Baker's Chocolate &woody hops

MF: Medium body, creamy carbonation

Just a lovely a no-nonsense Imp Stout, nice drinkability

Canned on: ???
Many thx to muchloveforhops3 for this can!

A - Pitch black pour with dense, creamy toffee colored lacing.

S - Chocolate char with roasted cocoa and some coffee and viscous nice legs on the sides of the glass.

T - Bitter chocolate, chocolate char, coffee, and some alcohol.

M - Nice silky body with a little bit of warming on the way down and dry on the back of the tongue.

O - This Imperial Stout is really solid!

L: Black body. One finger dense light brown head.
S: Fairly light, sweet upfront but generally bitter. Notes of toasted marshmallow, caramel, and toffee, with leather and cocoa.
T: Cocoa upfront, bitter baking chocolate, a little caramely sweetness, burnt malt flavors, and dark roast coffee. Lingering nutty, marshmallow notes. More and more roasty, coffee flavors as it warms.
F: Smooth, low carbonation, masked ABV.
O: I am realizing how I yearn for big stouts that aren’t sugary barrel bombs. Masterfully balanced. Really fantastic. No BS.

 

Night Howler from Baerlic Brewing. Received from @woemad in NBS BIF #15. Stored at 40 degrees after receiving. Reviewed 27/05/22. Note that I use DD/MM/YY protocol.
Undated can. Served at 60.4 degrees in a hand washed and dried Jester King snifter. Final temperature 63.6 degrees.
Appearance – 3.75
First pour – Amber brown (SRM 18), translucent.
Body – Ruby Brown (SRM 24), opaque. When rear-lite, ruby at the edges.
Head – Average (Maximum four cm, aggressive center pour), lion, high density with small rocks, average retention, rapidly diminishing to a 0.5 to 0.7 cm undulating crown and a thin, rocky cap. Lots of lacing remains as the head contracts.
Lacing – Fair. Narrow bands of tiny bubbles, connected by thin columns and having a few small stalactites.
Aroma – 3.25 – Weak roasted malt and a hint of coffee. No yeast, no hops.
Flavor – 3.25 – Begins with bitter chocolate bordering on sour. No yeast, no hops, no coffee. No ethanol (10 % ABV as marked on label) taste or aroma. Immediate gastric warming occurs. No dimethylsulfide or diacetyl. Ends less bitter.
Palate – 3.5 – Medium, short of creamy, soft carbonation.
Final impression and summation: 3.25 (After deducting 0.25 point for an undated personal container) Generally weak flavors and aromas combine to produce a weak example of an impy stout.

Sampling a cellar temp 16 oz can poured into my snifter. The beer is courtesy of a swap with @zdraco thank you!
The beer pours a jet black coffee color with a dense, yet fluffy looking head of easy 3 cm . Almost tops my glass. The foams fades slowly and leaves some fractured lattice as it slides down the side of the glass. Even at the end of the sampling there is a thin surface coating of foam, nice staying power.
The aroma is dark chocolate, roasted malt and mild coffee grounds. NO hops, no sweetness not really boozy either. 10% ABV is hidden pretty well on the nose.
The first sip reveals a medium body with fine and tingly carbonation. The texture is smooth and the beer drinks pretty easy for a bigger brew.
Flavor is similar to the nose, I get a lot of roasted malt notes and almost charred wood. There is also some dark bakers chocolate note and hints of coffee ground again. No sweetness and the roasted notes are sort of bitey and bitter like a black coffee. No real ABV presence and the hops dont show up at all.
This is an imperial stout from a different time, no additives, not sweet and I enjoy it a lot. Nice straightforward big beer!

On tap at John's over on SE Powell today

The beer pours the expected blackish brown color with good head retention and lacing. On the nose I'm picking up a considerable roasty aroma, with noticeable dark chocolate, light coffee and licorice as well. The flavor profile replicates the nose, in what is a fairly dry, roasty and somewhat bitter impy stout. Mouthfeel is medium bodied to full, with a fairly long, albeit fairly dry and bitter finish. Alcohol is very well integrated into the flavor profile, though there's enough "ooommpphh" in this beer to let you know the abv. is up there a bit.

While nothing earth shattering, this is still a pretty decent, enjoyable impy stout.

 

2019-11-19
16oz can served in a big snifter. Canned on 09/??/19.

Pours black with a medium to large head that fades fairly quickly to a ring with a couple clumpy islands. Smell is roasty, anise, and coffee.

Taste is roasty, super duper bitter, coffee, and lots of anise.

Mouthfeel is thick and chewy. Overall, good beer.

 

Received from @woemad in a BIF box. Canned on 1/7/2019. Poured into a malty beer glass. It pours ink black with a large, fluffy, light khaki-colored head and thick lacing. Its nose features roasted malt, milk chocolate, black coffee, caramel, nuts, char, and a whiff of tobacco smoke. The taste is on the bitter side with burnt coffee grounds, bakers chocolate, burnt nuts, earthy char and ash. There is virtually no sweetness; only a faint taste of caramel on the tip of the tongue. It's dry and slightly astringent at the finish. This Stout is medium-bodied with low/medium carbonation, and you can feel the warming 10% ABV. Overall, this is a basic Stout without any distracting adjuncts. If you like marshmallow or pastry stouts, then I'd avoid Night Howler. Conversely, if you like a bitter, burnt stout, then you'll enjoy it as I did.

 

16oz can purchased at Community Pint, in Spokane, WA, for $4.99. My first from Baerlic, which doesn't normally show up around here. I suspect TJ has made another Oregon beer run in a large vehicle. Canned January 7, 2019, per the stamp on the bottom of the can.

Poured into a snifter-tulip combo-ish type glass, this was viscous at the pour, while looking black as crude oil. Roughly an inch or so of mocha colored head that left lots of lace on the glass.

Bitter, oily, coffeeish aroma that is a bit astringent. There are notes of dark chocolate as well.

Taste is a little more well-rounded than in the nose. Bitter, roasty, almost soy saucy notes collide with a slightly sweet, rich dark chocolate flavor. While hop bitterness is stated as "mellow" in the description on the can label, it still stands out enough, along with a slightly tangy mineraly taste that combines to make the finish more dry than the start of the taste would have led one to believe.

Medium-full in body, with a mouthfeel both creamy and oily.

More bitter than a lot of imperial stouts, this actually reminds me of Thor's Thunder, a beer made for the old Viking Tavern by now long-defunct Lang Creek Brewing to a recipe crafted by a Viking bartender, although that clocked in at 8.3%. This, at 10%, is a bigger beast to deal with, which is why I'm enjoying it on a night when windchills are expected to be between -10 and -20. Would hit this again, and would be happy to stumble across it on nitro. Like Old Rasputin, this has enough flavor to stand up to the normally blandifying nitro treatment.

 

 

Can:
Thanks, Lingenbrau!!

The beer has a near black body and a medium light brown head.

Nose is more of a slightly astringent dark roast coffee, with some burnt bitterness.

Taste is so nicely balanced with what the brewer claims is a “mellow hop influence.” This is a nice, more traditional roasted notes of coffee on what we’ll call the “malty side” and dark toast on what we’ll call the bitter side, even though both of these notes seem to come from the dark malt bill. Specific hop notes are lost to me which would seem to indicate their integration is pretty well done.

So we have a nice, somewhat dry stout here, it’s probably about 6-7%, right? Nope. This 10% imperial stout has a nice medium body, not too thick from sweetness or extra light attenuation, not too thin from going light on the malts (sorta obvious at 10%). Not creamy but not watery. Throw in any other contradictory feel descriptions, this one just felt right for its flavors (makes sense to me).

So anyhow, if your looking for a little pop in your beer without extra sweetness or burn, and want a more classic roasted malt stout, give this beer a whirl.

 

 

Nearly pitch black with walnut highlights, and clean enough to bounce back my reflection. Night Howler is capped by a thinner than expected heavily tanned head that's creamy looking with decent surface coverage and a great sidewall of film.

Smells surprisingly like a regular old American stout. Very roasty with a touch of semi sweet chocolate, a touch of nuttiness and metallic or mineral water likeness. No indication of it's elevated abv.

Once again a huge influence on the roasted grain. Heavily burnst brown bread adds a dash of brown sugar like sweetness before a monster of bitter chocolate comes in and finishes it off. As it warms, the chocolate note seems to smooth out and become more integral to the whole.

As the can indicted, this is rich, low hop presence, and remarkably bitter. A smooth and creamy start leads into just that dab of sweetness which does develop more as it warms, before the intense bitterness and dry end come in. The alcohol warmth is minimal considering its 10% advertisement.

We have a winner here. A solid, non barrel aged of any sorts Imperial Stout. Delicious and unforgiving for those seeking out sweet and mellow. On a personal note, this is right up there with, and kind of a blend of the two, Old Rasputin and TenFidy. Cheers.