Coffee Cake
Trillium Brewing Company

 

 

Underwhelming.

Had on tap in Canton. Pours opaque, dark brown in color with on third inch head. Taste is big coffee, brown sugar, dark chocolate and cinnamon. Heavy body, low carbonation, roasty . Makes for a really interesting and nice stout. Plenty flavorful and not over the top. I like this.

 

Drank from a 1 pint .9 fl oz (500 ml) bottle purchased at Trillium Brewing Company, Boston, MA
09/10/21
Served in a tulip

Jet black appearance. Oily and viscous in the glass. The body was topped by a small, frothy, saddle brown mass that dissolved relatively quickly. There was no lacing whatsoever.

The aroma was really impressive and definitely reminded me of coffee cake. Cinnamon came through big time. Good dose of vanilla as well. Brown sugar was also noticeable. Bit of coffee. Creamed and sugared coffee perhaps. The coffee intensified as the beer warmed. Touch of roastiness. All in all, the beer was sweet but not excessively so for a pastry stout.

The flavor profile was similar to the nose but finished exceedingly harsh. Quite malty and robust up front. Lots of brown sugar sweetness. Vanilla also came through strong. Moderate amount of cinnamon. There was a faint espresso quality too. Roasted malts appeared on the back end and crescendoed in the finish. Some acrid char and a metallic quality trailed after the swallow. As the beer warmed, the roast mellowed a bit and the metallic notes subsided.

Terrific rich, full bodied mouthfeel. Really creamy and dense. The liquid contained a fine, subdued effervescence that turned the beer fluffy and smooth on the palate. At 12.9% ABV, the alcohol was well buried.

Minus the bitter, acrid roastiness on the finish, Trillium’s Coffee Cake was a terrific, and surprisingly well balanced, pastry stout. With a lighter roast profile on the malts (and perhaps the coffee too) this could have been stellar.

 

 

Pours black with two fingers of mocha foam that has a used motor oil sheen to it. Aroma is cinnamon, vanilla bean, raisins, coffee, bread, caramel, and roasty and toasty malts. It smells like you're putting your nose in a baker's glass counter, if those racks were full of coffee cake. Coffee is mild, accentuating the vanilla and cinnamon well. Lovely delicate pastry smell that isn't overly sweet or syrupy. Flavor profile is driven by roasty, toasty, and caramely malts, with thick layers of cinnamon, vanilla bean, and coffee creating different stratospheres on nuanced flavor. Chocolate and toffee add a little extra sweetness. Once again, it has a pleasant, balanced pastry sweetness, as opposed to something sticky, heavy, and sugary. It's that balance that keeps this drinkable without reserving sips, or creating tension in the jaw from overpowering sweetness. Some of this balance is lost as the beer warms. Mouth feel is medium-thick when cold, warming to a thick, full texture as it warms to cellar temperature and past. Some light chewiness to it, but really it's just reserved enough to not be a full meal of a stout. Overall, a decadent stout that falls into 'pastry stout' territory, although it doesn't cross into firm "dessert" stout territory - or at least not overly sweet. It's like drinking a pastry from a quality bakery, if you added some hearty roasty and toasty malts underneath.

Served in a 15.5oz Speigalau tulip from a 500mL bottle.

 

Pours jet black. Aroma is an excellent balance of cinnamon & vanilla with a coffee kicker. Taste is cinnamon forward with some dark chocolate follwed by the coffee and vanilla. Medium mouthfeel. Incredible stout. Age this stout in bourbon barrels, and it would be a very special beer.

Nice bold coffee. Just the right amount of vanilla & cinnamon. It’s gotta get warmer than fridge temperature to get the vanilla & cinnamon. Thinner stout. Well carbonated. Not boozy.

 

A- Black as can be pour from the bottle to a becher. Small dark brown cap with a foamy texture and sheets of lacing.

S- Cinnamon off the top for sure with vanilla up next. The coffee is very much noticeable and those three things are huge with some booze and roast grains in the backdrop. Suggests moderately high sweets. Brown sugar notes round out that coffee cake feel.

T- The cinnamon still up front with a spicy and fruity flavor but damn does some super strong fruity dark chocolate becomes huge here. Coffee and vanilla more secondary here with a hint of booze and roasty black barley.

MF- Thick and syrupy beast. Slick and super oily and ends somewhat warm. A bit puffy and medium low carbonation.

The flavors don't quite come together in the taste as well as they were represented in the aroma and even then it was a bit blunt with big cinnamon and dark chocolate without much more complexity.