Swordfish
Fish Brewing Company / Fishbowl Brewpub

 

 

 

 

22oz bottle served in pub glass. Bottled on date is ambiguously either March 2011 or 2012, though I just bought it from the store recently, so who knows. Beer pours black, with a nice looking light brown head. Strong, immediate coffee aroma. "Cascadian Dark Ale" usually translates as "Black IPA", and "Double" is a bit redundant given that we are only talking about 7.5% ABV and 64 IBUs here, but so far, judging from the aroma that is, this thing is straight RIS -- and a good one, too.

Note that if this beer really is as old as 2012 or even 2011, there is a good chance that any dry hopping aroma has been lost, which is why it smells like stout to me, given that the grain components may be less volatile and subject to loss over time than the aromatic hop compounds. In which case, maybe this review is not totally fair and should be discounted.

But when it gets to my mouth, that's where it gets tricky. The up front flavor is 100% IPA (black or otherwise). Hoppy, even citrusy. Very west coast IPA. But afterwards a totally different flavor enters the palate: roasted coffee, toasted grain. It becomes much more like a stout towards the finish, and a pretty good one, too.

22 ounce bottle, poured into a pint glass

Appearance: Pours an incredibly dark, opaque, black color with a quarter of a finger of white head that quickly dissolved into a halo of foam that gripped the sides of the glass and formed a few wispy clouds that partially covered the top of the beer.

Aroma: Hops and malty at the same time. Very floral in both clover and hops, but also very aromatic in toasted and roasted malt and freshly baked dark bread. Some notes of dark molasses as well.

Taste: A lot like the aroma. Very hoppy up front with some subtle brown sugar-like sweetness. Nice malty backbone with flavors of roasted coffee, freshly baked dark bread, black pepper.

Mouthfeel: Medium-bodied to slightly chewy, with some pretty good carbonation to tickle the taste buds. With an ABV of 7.5%, there is no presence of alcohol on the palate.

Overall: This is a pretty good beer, but is a little too hop forward for my tastes. I like my beers more on the malty side. Hop heads should like this beer though…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Poured into an impy nonic a deep chesnut brown with russet hue,a nice looking half finger light tannish colored head atop.Aromas of dry earty hops and molasses,alot like a porter,faint piney notes as well.To me it's a big hopped up porter with it's dry earthiness and sweetish backbone,on top of the earthiness there is a hefty leafy hoppiness in the finish.I like this beer but it's a hoppy porter alot like alot of the style.Bottled in July 2013.