Central Waters La Petite Mort

This little curio of a beer is, per the brewers themselves, a "Belgian-inspired" doppelweizen aged in bourbon barrels.  I have previously reviewed some doppelweizen beers; they are among my favorite styles, and one of the most under-appreciated in America.  I am not exactly sure how one makes a "Belgian-inspired" doppelweizen, but I will play ball.  My readers in the upper Midwest and Great Lakes areas---specifically Wisconsin, Illinois, and Minnesota---should know Central Waters deserves the chance; this is a brewery that knows what it's doing.


La Petite Mort is substantially darker than any doppelweizen I have previously encountered.  Darker than chestnuts and a bit more opaque than many of its cousins.  The degree of carbonation on display is considerably low for a doppelweizen or Belgian-inspired beer, no doubt a result of the barrel-aging.  Foam formation and retention are almost non-existent.

The smell gives no indication of anything remotely German or Belgian.  This is very much a barrel-bomb, with oppressive bourbon aromas of burnt sugar, cherry, wood, and char. 

The flavor follows the nose almost exactly.  Big burst of whiskey at the start, with the signature bourbon flavors of caramel, burnt sugar, burnt wood and a wee bit of smoke.  Some brown sugar and cherry comes out as the beer warms a bit.  A small degree of alcohol warming is present throughout the sipping, though it never comes close to being an obstacle.  At no point do any hints of typical doppelweizen flavors---wheat, clove, bread, banana---peak through the barrel assault.  I would love to try the base beer without any barrel-aging.  Most American attempts at German wheat beers plainly fail to capture those flavors; it's more than possible Central Waters simply missed the mark and the barrel isn't covering up those flavors, they simply aren't there to begin with.

The texture oddly retains some---some---of the fluffiness of a German wheat.  It is also not as thick and sweet as most barrel-aged American beers.  I would rate the mouthfeel a medium-full.

La Petit Mort is an interesting beer that is tasty enough in its own right.  As a bourbon barrel-aged beer that's much drier than most other barrel-aged strong beers, it also benefits mightily by being quite drinkable.  It shares this trait with Central Waters' two barrel-aged imperial stouts, Bourbon Barrel Stout and Peruvian Morning.  That being said, if they were trying to marry the flavors of German and Belgian beer with the characteristics of American whiskey, they plainly failed.  The bourbon barrel dominates everything else.  I am happy they don't openly advertise this on the bottle as a doppelweizen (Belgian or otherwise), as I would have felt deceived.  Nonetheless, this is a worthy beer for any fan of bourbon-barrel aged ales.

Stone Xocoveza Mocha Stout

Another new stout from Stone, and unlike the last one they made I will be very upset if they don't make it again.  Simply put, Xocoveza is the best beer they have ever made.   It's part of a recent fad of so-called "Mexican stouts;" these are stouts loosely-inspired by Mexican hot chocolate (often made with vanilla and cinnamon) and Oaxacan mole negro sauce (which contains some combination of peppers and chocolate).  For this particular beer, stone started with a very strong cream stout base and then added coco, coffee, vanilla, cinnamon, nutmeg, and pasilla peppers.

As was the case with Stone Coffee Milk Stout, a local place had this on draft.  After tasting it once, I decided to come back almost every day until their keg kicked, then I bought two bottles for good measure.  It is that good. 

The appearance is fairly typical for a stout.  A mocha-colored crown of foam rises above a menacingly black beer.  The lacing is excellent and the foam retains pretty well.  All in all, carbonation looks more than adequate.

The aroma smacks of chile, cream (lactose) and chocolate upfront, with a touch of cinnamon.  Faint vanilla and coffee in the background.  No hops, but I didn't expect any.

The flavor starts off with chocolate, cream, and a dash of nutmeg upfront.  Chile pepper comes in mid-palate, where it is met with a flash of cinnamon and vanilla.  The more typical stout flavor of roasted barley makes an appearance here.  The finish is a long wave of mild pepper heat mixed with stronger tones of nutmeg and chocolate.  There is a kind of afterglow of warm chile and nutmeg.  Throughout all of this, coffee is more faint.

As for the texture, Xocoveza is creamy smooth and crazy easy to knock back.  Using a cream stout as the base beer was a wise choice on Stone's part.  Every single occasion I drank this, I had to force myself to slow down and savor it.

Overall this reminds me a bit of Ska Mole Stout, which isn't surprising given they have the same inspiration.  Xocoveza is creamier and fuller than Mole is, with a greater emphasis on the chocolate and other spices; Mole has more pepper heat.  I prefer Xocoveza though.  Yummy all around and if Stone doesn't brew this again I might legitimately need a prescription for antipsychotic pills. 

Stone Coffee Milk Stout

Stone Brewing Company debuted this new beer over the summer.  It is a cream/milk stout, a type of stout to which lactose is added to attain additional sweetness, since unlike most sugars, brewer's yeast won't ferment lactose.  So it just sits there, functioning like an artificial sweetener, except it's natural dairy sugar.  This particular one has coffee added to it.  A local place has it on draft.

Coffee Milk Stout's aroma contains a hefty bit of coffee grounds and a touch of some cream.  There really isn't much else.  I'm not surprised; at 4.2% alcohol, this is the weakest beer Stone has brewed since 1999.   Overall, it smells mild but it smells like the name.

The taste starts with char and roasted barley flavor.  This best resembles a dry Irish stout (a la Guinness) with more char.  Coffee doesn't come around until the finish.  Aftertaste is largely coffee grounds and what I think is black patent malt.  There is a far more subtle hint of dark baker's chocolate.

Now we come to this beer's great failing.  There is almost no discernible cream stout flavor to this.  No , scratch that: nothing about this is a cream stout.  No lactose flavor whatsoever.  Moreover, the texture is unlike any cream stout I have ever had.  It is highly carbonated, light, and dry. 

I did not expect---nor did I want---a powerhouse from this beer.  At 4.2% alcohol, this is not only the weakest Stone beer I have ever had but it is also the weakest cream stout I have ever seen.  Stone openly advertises this as the least alcoholic beer they have brewed in 15 years.  So I went in fully expecting and indeed hoping for a light cream stout with a bit of coffee.    But this is pretty much false advertising.  I can neither taste nor feel the presence of unfermented lactose.  A cream/milk stout is defined by that.  Because it lacks it, this is just too dry and utterly lacks the creamy texture essential to the style.

Stone Coffee Milk Stout simply does not come close to achieving what its name implies.  As a light, dry, session stout, it's good. As a light, dry, session coffee stout, it's serviceable. As any kind of cream/milk stout, however, it is self-evidently a miserable failure. This beer could probably be consumed with ease by the lactose intolerant. Great for them.  However, a cream stout is defined by the addition of large amounts of lactose; therefore, a successful cream stout is defined (in part) by its ability to leave the lactose intolerant clutching their stomachs in agony, cursing fate for robbing them of ice cream and milk 'n' cookies.  Stone Coffee Milk Stout fails that test. 

Founders Dark Penance

The latest addition to the lineup of these Michigan beer gurus is a "black IPA."  For those not up to date on craft trends, the paradoxically named "black IPA" (short for "black India pale ale") is essentially they a stout-black beer as hoppy as an IPA.  Many are impossible to tell apart from IPA's when blindfolded and most in my experience have no stout/porter flavors at all, appearance be damned.  Sometimes they are called black IPA's, sometimes they are called "American black ales" and originally they were called "Cascadian dark ales;" This particular AmeriCascadian dark black IPA ale is close to 9% alcohol and brewed with a touch of mildly roasted wheat.

Dark Penance pours a dark ominous hue that is only barely transparent.  Foam is off-white, with only moderate retention.  However, the foam has excellent lacing.

The aroma contains huge pine resin, bordering on pungent.  It is very reminiscent of a Chinook dry-hopped IPA but not quite as earthy or dirty.  Only a hint of malt peeks through the hop assault, not enough to really specify the type.  I can comfortably say this doesn't smell like a stout.

The flavor profile explodes with the pungency of Chinook and a dash of hop resin.  Although there is a hint of dark malt flavor, nothing about this approaches the roasted flavors of a stout.  Dark Penance very much tastes like an IPA that happens to be dark.  Pretty intensely bitter, and not in a clean way.  The aftertaste is all IBU all the time, lingering for quite a while.  The texture is appropriately dry for a style of beer which zeroes in on hop flavors.



Overall, Dark Penance is one of the more brutally bitter beers I have had.  Pine resin and Chinook coat the mouth and decimate any hint of malt flavor, including sugar.  This one's only for the hardcore hophead, and the old-school kind of hophead to boot.  You won't find any of the tropical fruit flavors increasingly present in modern IPA.

Southern Tier Warlock Pumpkin Stout

Now is the time of year when people start drinking the pumpkin beers.  Though typically a brownish-amber beer ranging in alcohol from 5% to 7% with little hop character, brewers pretty much do anything they want with this loosely-defined "style."  The only constants are pumpkins and a variety of pumpkin pie spices, usually some combination of cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, ginger, brown sugar, and allspice.  This particular beer is an imperial stout, to go along with the rest of the brewery's large collection of insanely spiced stouts.

And for the life of me I struggle to think of a more inhospitably repellent pumpkin beer. 

Warlock does not look any different from a thousand other imperial stouts; I love the style, but jet-black gets boring right quick.  The foam that rises to half a finger in height retains poorly.  Predictably for a stout, Warlock is completely opaque.

As is the case with its cousin, Pumking, Warlock smells like bottled pumpkin pie.  Cinnamon and clove are the easiest to pick out.  There is only a subtle hint of dark chocolate to indicate the base beer is a stout; I didn't expect much stout aroma, but was still hoping for more.  Predictably, hops make no appearance here; hops in a Southern Tier stout?  Never.

Everything goes from bad to worse at this point.

The banality of evil: Warlock looks just like any other stout

 
I recall one time, when I was a child, raiding the kitchen spice cabinet and adding just about everything to...some food item or another.  I cannot remember exactly what it was because by the time I was done using teaspoons of literally dozens of spices, the food item no longer remotely tasted like whatever it started out as.  I imagine many others have a similar experience.

Warlock is pretty much the beer equivalent of that childish experience, except presumably the brewery doesn't employ child laborers at their production facility.  This was made by a professional brewery.  I am not sure what they were thinking.  The beer contains no semblance of any beer flavor of any type.  No barley flavors.  No hop flavors.  No yeast esters, phenols or any other byproducts of fermentation.  It tastes like a child secretly snuck his favorite spices into his mother's gingerbread cookies/pumpkin pie/apple pie/whatever---seriously, it doesn't matter at this point---while she wasn't looking, but having the mind of a child thought he could dump a jar of nutmeg and two jars of cinnamon into it to make it taste better.  No, it doesn't work that way. 

If Warlock was as sweet and sugary as the other stouts from this brewery, there might be some reason to drink this.  Unfortunately it is not to be, for Warlock possesses a bewildering dryness utterly at odds with both its cousins in the Southern Tier lineup and with what this style of beer always entails: the taste of pumpkin pie.  Has anyone ever consumed or created a pumpkin pie made without any sugar, honey, molasses, or any other sweetener?  Why would you commit such a crime?  IT'S PIE.  You aren't supposed to make a pumpkin beer this dry.  The spices, most egregiously the nutmeg, coat the mouth and parch the throat with no relief from maltose, sucrose, fructose or any other sugar.


Warlock is only available in 22oz bottles, or roughly 650ml.  Since I cannot stand the site of pouring even a bad beer down the drain, I decided to recap this after drinking half of it, buy a bottle of Southern Tier Creme Brulee (an imperial cream stout brewed with vanilla beans), and mix the two together the following night.  For those readers who have never tried Creme Brulee, you need to know three things: a) it tastes like a carbonated chocolate vanilla milkshake, b) it is so sweet that science has proven you can acquire every type of diabetes from drinking a case of it, and c) it contains so much lactose that instead of getting sick from drinking it, those with lactose intolerance simply die.  It is the sweetest beer you can get off the shelf.

Even my 50-50 mixture of Warlock and Creme Brulee tasted mostly like Warlock: stupid amounts of holiday spices with no beer.   Don't even try this beer to laugh at it.  Not unless someone gives it to you for free.  I want Southern Tier to lose money on this beer so they just brew more Pumking instead.

Victory Moonglow Weizenbock (doppelweizen)

It has been almost two years since I last saw Moonglow, one of the few all-American doppelweizens widely available in the U.S.  I think many American breweries don't want to even bother trying when everybody can find the real-deal German stuff easily, virtually all of them better than any American version.  Formerly available in six-packs, this 8%+ alcohol wheat beer is now a fall release in four-packs.

Like virtually all weissbier, Moonglow is cloudy.  Very cloudy; the pictures don't do it justice.  The pseudo-brown hue looks darker than many doppelweizens, but the light betrays its true red color when held alongside.  The head is large, fluffy and slightly off-white, with a bit of lacing.

Moonglow's aroma comes closer to classic Bavarian wheat beers than many American takes on the style.  Bananas, wheat bread, and banana bread all strike the nose first.  Caramel follows unexpectedly, with a hint of...cake?  Maybe.  The clove flavor so commonly present in Bavarian wheat beer is there but indistinctly so.  Just a faint spice sensation is all it is, really.  I could just as easily describe it as a pinch of ginger, allspice, or [insert X spice here].  A faint sensation of honey rounds the smell out.

Much of the aroma faithfully translates to the flavor.  As expected, bananas and wheat jump out at the taste buds from the start.  Here the wheat more closely resembles wheat thins or wheat crackers rather than bread.  A hint of warming from the alcohol briefly dukes it out with phenolic spice (and now I can more clearly appreciate clove flavors) before losing to an alliance of banana and clove.  Hops are not discernible, nor should they be expected.  The finish is lightly tangy and dripping with clove now.

Moonglow's largest deviation from German wheat beer is its texture, but even there it's not much of a problem.  It aims for the fluffy character of the best German wheat beers and falls short, but it's among the stars.  The cardinal sin here is a slightly over-thick body that is more filling than I want my weissbier.

This is an American doppelweizen, traditionally made, that you can let your German friends taste without a hint of shame.  It's no Vitus but frankly if that's your basis of comparison you will almost always be disappointed.


Prost! 

Goose Island The Muddy

Goose Island's latest release is called The Muddy, named after Big Muddy.  It is an imperial stout "featuring AMPLIFIED SWEETNESS with LICORICE NOTES," as the label puts it.  Their website elucidates what that exactly means: a stout brewed with molasses, dark Belgian invert sugar and licorice.  Measuring only 32 bitterness units, The Muddy is minimally hopped by stout standards.

Full disclosure: unless it is Finnish salmiakki (or alcoholic libations derived from it) I almost universally despise licorice and anise.  I went into this beer fairly biased against it.

The aroma is not by any means bitter, roasted, acrid or in some fashion suggestive of hops or roasted barley.  "Amplified sweetness" was a choice phrase on Goose's part.  Sweet plums dipped in milk chocolate come to mind, with an obvious bent of licorice.  Belgian sugar is evident.  In short, a fire of sweet chocolate-covered fruits doused with licorice.

The flavor is a little less refined but more than serviceable.  Sugar and chocolate start the day off, with the chocolate flavors now leaning more towards dark (bittersweet) chocolate than the milk chocolate portent presented by the smell.  Sugar is still there, although it no longer screams Belgian.  By mid-palate an unpleasant chalkiness steps forward, though it doesn't last long.  The finish is a strange amalgamation of fruit, roasted barley and ouzo.  Oddly, the licorice/anise/ouzo/rakı flavor gets weaker as the beer warms, bringing out more roasted barley.  Hops here have a presence comparable to the environmental impact penguin droppings have on the Sahara Desert (zero).  I cannot pick the molasses out either.


In the past I have tasted beers brewed with licorice that I absolutely hated with every fiber of my being.  Compared to those, the licorice flavor here is noted but restrained.  An altogether interesting experiment with moderate success that I will probably buy again.