AleSmith Barrel Aged Speedway Stout

Brewed by AleSmith Brewing Company
Style: Imperial Stout
San Diego, California USA

Black beer with a nice brown head that dissapated to an oil slick and left nice lace. Wonderful, almost hypnotic aroma of buttery caramel and toffee sweetness. Perceptable alcohol but not obtrusive. Lots of coffee in the beer, which I expected from the Speedway, but sweetened with toffee and spiked with bourbon. Some red wine tanins up front with bourbon barrel in the middle with beautiful coffee in the finish. Such creamy mouthfeel. I did not want to like this beer as much as I did. Thanks a ton to temporrari for sharing his bottle with me.

Thanks to Eyedrinkale. Deep and dark in color. Whiskey aged. It has some whiskey notes in it. Not bad. Malty. Roasty and chocolatety. Thin. Ok.

Opaque charcoal. Small caramel ring eventually find its way to the top. Soft, inky smooth mouthfeel. Extremely still carbonation. Monstrously elegant toasted wood, coffee and vanilla notes, giving way to a rich layer of fudgy, aged malts. Voluptuous toasted wood backdrop with the traditional coffee/tar Speedway character, only with seemingly less alcohol. Tingly plum skin, fudge, and vanilla lead the way into the finish with more toasted wood/caramelized flavors than bourbon. The toastiness thwarts the sweetness and ups the complexity. The wood-aging worked wonders here, though it could stand to be beefier and more complex.

Sampled at DLD. Pours dark brown with a creamy brown head. The aroma has lots of bourbon and milk chocolate, cream and vanilla - quite lactic. Full bodied with soft carbonation. There are lush rich flavors that are well integrated - bourbon, roasted malt, chocolate, cream vanilla, oak and other aspects - quite complex. The finish was smooth and vineous with lots of roasted malt and seemed a bit milky. Excellent impy stout.

Thanks to Eyedrinkale for sharing this at Brewtopia ’04! Very few "wants lists" remain intact when Mike comes around! Bottle #19. This pours black with a weak attempt at forming a head as expected. A complex aroma rises from the surface carrying notes of chocolate, whiskey alcohol, and roast malt. The flavor is very intense and complex as well, playing back and forth between the sweetness and the bitterness from the roast malt. There is a slight whiskey bitterness/sharpness present. The alcohol content is well hidden and the alcohol flavor is pleasant coming from the barrel, not the malt in the beer. Overall, a very nicely done Imperial Stout but somewhat over hyped. Just the same, I’d have another one if it were available. Bottle 84 Spring(ish) Tasting in Knoxville, TN on 3/10/2007. As good as before or better!

750, capped and foiled. ’06. #102/230. Pours opaque black with a thin tan head. Aroma of sweet oaky chocolate, vanilla, smoke. Medium body. Sweet coffee, coconut, prune and bourbon taste. Well worth lingering over this one.

750ml bottle. 2003 bottling, number 12 of 225. Huge aroma of semi-sweet choclate, also features some lighter notes of bourbon, dark toffee and alcohol, with touches of cellar must, faint plum and black cherry. Very rich and full. Solid, opaque black color, my glass was poured with no head formation to speak of at all. Flavor profile is also sweet and chocolatey, full of roasty, toffeeish malt flavor, the middle seeing some dry, dark grainy bitterness coming through and finishing with the coffee flavors coming to the fore at last. Some lingering esters in the background here as well. Palate is very smooth and lacking almost fully in noticeable effervescence, which I did miss a little. Finish is incredibly long and lingering. Body is full as can be. Some alcohol burn to note here, but is slighter in overall effect than I had expected. Good stuff to be sure, but for whatever reason I did enjoy the standard Speedway a bit more. Regardless, big thanks to Chris for the chance to sample this most sought-after brew.

Shared by miketd. Thanks dude!!
Pours black with a light tan head. Smell is roasty, chocolate and bourbon, but not too strong. Taste is almost milder than I remember the regular speedway stout being, at least in terms of alcohol, somehow. Still very mild coffee, and is hardly noticeable, with roasty chocolate and light bourbon. Good stuff.

2003 bottle. Very similar but with tons of coconut flavor that I don’t remember noticing from the other bottle. Like a mounds bar. This one had very low carbonation however and was nearly flat. Still very tasty!