Big Lamp Summerhill Stout
Big Lamp Brewers

 

Tasted by half-pint at the GBBF 06, served by a hand-pump.

A: black hue with slightly brownish silhouette; thick and fluffy beige beer head with good retention.
S: extremely deep and smooth... lots of cold smoked-beans and charred woodchips and, excuse me, soy-sauce??!! skirted by a salty tinge of dried Japanese wild seaweed, profound and penetrating... oily Italian-roast coffee beans in the background, very intense, while a faintly fruity edge of hops is revealed in a very remote corner. Is it complex or is it complex?
T: a rich flow of coffee and syrupy malt-grist comes forward upfront, chewy and rough in texture, full of black malts, roasted nuts, buttressed by a fantastic sour-bitter edge as a kick-back and balancer. Light, soothing, dryish bitter finish like any great stout should be, with an extra-length of aromatic nutty finish.
M&D: light on the palate yet this is a full-bodied and full-flavoured stout, full of fresh and soft fizziness that witnesses good work on the stillaged casks behind the bar. Overall, a coffeeish and fruity stout it is, extremely quaffable when on form!!

Had this next to a courage Russian Imperial Stout, which was perhaps a bit unfair, but it was still nice. Smokey roasted malt in the nose. Medium bodied, smoky, chocolatey, roasty, with some wood and acid in their at the end, enjoyable little stout (cask- GBBF 03')