Ghost Train
Hell's Basement

 

 

A- This one pours with a one finger thick toffee colored head that is soapy looking, but then settles down to a thick layer over the brew...it becomes dense and creamy in character. The color of the beer itself is dark cola....almost black and it is semi-opaque. Carbonation is way too hard to see and the lacing is quite nice, with lots of foamy patches clinging to the side of my glass.

S- Definitely some charred, smokey notes initially, with dry, burnt black and chocolate malts present. Dark cocoa, coffee, Scottish oat cracker, mellow mocha, hot chocolate nuances and a finish that is Earthy, of dry oat flakes and slight hop bitterness. Very nice for the style!

T- The flavors follow suit to the aromas rather well.....oat/biscuit dryness, somewhat bitter dark chocolate, freshly ground cocoa beans/powder, black coffee with a hint of mocha and cappuccino characteristics, some muted yeasty bread, heavily toasted malt sweetness, and small levels of smokey char. The finish lingers somewhat but otherwise a clean mellow tasting Oat Stout.

M/O- Medium-full bodied and smooth carbonation best describe this one, with dessert like qualities about it. Overall this is heavy in the hardcore deep chocolate notes, with well hidden alcohol and an easy drinking stout that provides no problem enjoying more than a one in a sitting! Great with beef dishes! Will buy again, if I don't make it over to the brewery first!

 

1L howler from Sherbrooke Liquor store. Apparently the 'normal' version of this oatmeal stout is coffee-tainted, so this one should go by the 'non-coffee' moniker, in a reversal of the regular way of doing things.

This beer pours a fairly solid black abyss, with scant basal amber cola edges, and three fat-ass fingers of puffy, loosely foamy, and bubbly tan head, which leaves some layered cirrus cloud pattern lace around the glass as it slowly but surely sinks away.

It smells of roasted caramel malt, bittersweet cocoa powder, day-old coffee, a hint of black licorice, ephemeral black stone fruit, and some very tame earthy, leafy, and floral green hop bitters. The taste is bready and doughy caramel malt, some free-range char, sugar-free cafe-au-lait, still kind of pithy chocolate wafers, a fading generic dark fruitiness, and more understated leafy, earthy, weedy verdant hoppiness.

The carbonation is quite light on its feet, via its dulcet frothiness, the body a decent medium weight, and generally smooth, with a minor creaminess that falls short of the ideal one might be expecting from something made in the oatmeal grain vein - yeah. It finishes off-dry, the roast, cocoa, coffee, and mixed graininess playing us out into the waiting streets.

Overall, Ghost Train does well to provide a balanced, gentle stout experience - not too much of any particular aforementioned metric, and an oatmeal quotient that spreads itself around to a certain degree. Easy to drink, and whose name I might just have to do some research on while I wile away the second pint here.