BrewDog Paradox Islay (Batch 001)

Formerly brewed at BrewDog
Style: Imperial Stout
Fraserburgh, Aberdeenshire, Scotland

Thanks to Craig for the bottle (Batch 001)! Poured medium-deeper brown with a short cap of beige head. The aroma opened with fluffy smokey wafts and tobacco from the seemingly smooth whiskey.. vanilla and charred baker’s chocolate behind, but tobacco and peat really stole the show. The flavor was along those same lines.. drier chocolate, tobacco, and wet, grainy earth meet smoked peat and charred coffee grounds.. dried out even more on the back-end, leaving charred darker malts with old barrel and black pepper. Medium-plus bodied and very grainy on the palate.. dry with oak and whiskey-inspired sourness that I noticed as I drank more.. the char factor and graininess got in the way as I drank more. I did like how the whiskey and stout both provided solid elements that played well together.

[To celebrate my 2000th rating] Pitch black with medium beige head. Aroma has roasted malt, smoke and whiskey notes. Sweet flavor with fairly hard roasted malt, caramel, smoke, wood and Islay whiskey notes.

Cask, Leicester Fest 08. Black with a beige head. Aromas are earthy roast coffee with spices and lots of alcohol. Flavours are rich strong bitter coffee with liquorice and medicinal notes. Bitter on the finish. Good but not quite as good as I expected.

Bottle, batch 006. Gorgeous blackish pour, no head other than a fine brown patina of bubbles. Amazing aroma of smoke (like corkboard), leather, whiskey, and peat. Rich burnt malt, chocolatey, smokey, peaty, but then a sweetness reveals itself mid-palate that lifts everything up and adds a slightly fruity element. The finish is long and bitter, and the alcohol is completely unobtrusive and nearly undetectable. Despite the size of this brew, it is compulsively drinakble. Truly outstanding!

Powerful, powerful, daunting nose. Pours oily black with no life - more of a threat. And then the flavour. God damn. It’s freakin amazing. Vinous, rich, deep, dark, and the whole underpinned - unsurprisingly - by a peaty whiskiness that nigh on brings a tear to an old Islay peat dog’s eye. Elements of fresh grass battle with clods of tombside earth to produce a beer that challenges rather than kowtows - and ultimately rewards one for the effort.

Bottle. dark and pored with a small head. Full bodied without the overpowering sweetness that beers of this strength sometimes have. Smooth, earthy and slightly fruity. Excellent

Had batch 006 at the Leicester CAMRA festival, March 2008. As a lover of imperial stouts and islay whisky i was looking forward to this. I was not disappointed!

scura schiuma poca e non persistente senori tipici di una imperial stout caffe tostato liquirizia vinoso poi affumicato legno in bocca molto simile prevale l’affumicato piuttosto viscosa ma l’etilico si nasconde bene