Drastic Measures
Magnify Brewing Company

On draught at the brewery. The color is a bit unusual - a muddy mahogany, quite brown when held to the sunlight. It sports a very thin, ecru-colored head and lacing. The smell is aromatic with cocoa, freshly-brewed coffee, roasted malt, and subtle but noticeable hazelnut. The hazelnut is front and center in the taste. It blends well with the fresh coffee and chocolate. The sweetness is balanced well by an earth bitterness and notes of tobacco and leather. However, as the glass warms it becomes sweeter. The mouth feel is thick and creamy with a higher level of carbonation than expected. And it drinks below its 12.5% ABV. Overall, while I'm generally not a big fan of hazelnut it works well in this Stout. It's not overpowering and it is nicely complemented by the other flavors.

 

Sorry to see this is a "one off" as it's right up my alley. A touch more body would have pushed this to a 5 across the board. Hope to see more of the same from Magnify as the seasons change.

 

It's been a long time since I went down to Magnify to buy anything but when I saw that they had this, it looked like something that I wanted to savor here at the house. It was nice to see a change from their usual New England IPA's and the like and this certainly fit the bill as it was sweet, complex, and nuanced; to the point where I really enjoyed this more and more as it fully warmed up!

The pour to this certainly wasn't terrible but I was really surprised at the lack of head and lacing that could be seen. Of course, the hue was a coffee-colored brown with a bit or garnet seeping in around the edges. A few tan spots remained on my pint glass as I worked my way through this as this looked like coffee throughout my time with it. Thankfully, the aroma was more complex as there was bourbon, brandy sweetness, vanilla, and booze in the aroma with the taste being much more palatable than that rough array of flavors. Coffee creamer, mild oak, ashen burn, and caramel stickiness came into the fold with the end result being a beer that warmed me up quite a bit - even on this muggy summer night! The light carbonation only added to this brew's potency as it turned out to be quite strong in spite of it's underlying sweetness and slickness.

I would have toned the alcohol down a notch and wished that this had more of a well-rounded sensory experience to it. As it was, this was solid brew that was worth the effort to obtain and had me hoping that Magnify will branch out in this direction more in future releases. Not completely drastic in nature, this was something that gave me hope that New Jersey will close the gap with surrounding states on the craft beer front, in the near future!