Midnight Still - Ube & Tahitian Vanilla
Holy Mountain Brewing Company - Interbay Brewery + Taproom

 

An unusually matte black builds a chocolate brown head that, under sunlight, reveals its mauve purple hues.

Uniquely earthy without being roasty, it's still quite punchy strong, where vanilla coaxes vanillin and perhaps the ube into simulating waffle cone!

i still have never had the original midnight still, a shame that i need to correct when i can, but it was rad to get to drink this variant anyway, weirdly enough not the first beer ive had with ube in it, a purple potato-like tuber that seems like an unlikely beer ingredient, but here we are. this is also done with some high end vanilla, a cool combination. i am immediately surprised at the color, this shows a little pale purple in the head and even a violet undertone in the body, the base beer is not black, its quite lively, and it looks a little sedimented and dense. the nose is crazy, its like oily and greasy and there is a buttered popcorn thing, some deeply earthy soil-like minerality, sexy elegant vanilla in high proportion, and somewhere in all of this a roasty sturdy stout of fine quality, coffee and smoke come in too, drier than expected with the vanilla to my nose, truly bizarre mix of smells here, but im into it. palate coating immediately, rich vanilla, a honey sweetness but some bitter roast too, there is balance to this. its starchy and thick, almost a milkshake texture, dry cocoa, raisin, definite potato, no kidding, raw potato weirdness in this, uniquely compatible with the vanilla, and there is an almost berry element, fruity, fragrant, and good with the chocolate notes. very strange beer, meaty for a minute too, almost smoked, jerky, its crazy. smooth and full, odd the entire time, tasty, but challenging. one of their weirdest stouts ive had...