Douse: Double Drum
Cinderlands Beer Co.

 

2022 version, a blend of three stouts aged on Blanton's, Heaven Hill, and Buffalo trace. Bottle pour.

Pours opaque black, dark tan head is finely textured and dissipates slowly to a rin and then to nothing. The beer is visibly viscous.

Aroma is coffee and cocoa up front, molasses and honey and vanilla bean follow, resolves into pecan, oak, and high quality bourbon.

The flavor is heavily vanilla off the bat, then gives way to the bitter notes of coffee and dark chocolate, followed by distinct maple syrup noted with an underscoring of molasses and maybe even a bit of tobacco. From here the bourbon notes come through. Finished with oak and more bourbon.

Full viscous body, carbonation is mild but a distinct alcohol sting gives way to boozy warmth going down.

So many layers to unpack in this beer. If I had one complaint it would be that the notes follow one another but don't really spend much time overlapping, so you get all these interesting flavors but not a lot of actually mixing of them. Like a band where each musician takes a turn rather than playing ensemble. For some that's probably a plus since it presents such a long evolution, so more of a personal taste thing for me. But ignoring that, there's nothing to complain about here. Everything is good, everything is welcome. Drinks super slow obviously. This is a beer to spend an hour with. One of the better stouts I have had in a while, definitely worth trying while you can, and definitely worth cellaring too.

 

 

 

 

This beer would fist CBS in a blind tasting. Unreal. If voodoo put this out it would be manbearpig of pappy black magick level.