Central Waters Brewers Reserve Bourbon Barrel Cherry Stout

Brewed by Central Waters Brewing Co.
Style: Imperial Stout
Amherst, Wisconsin USA

Bottle… Mostly clear, chestnut-colored ale with an orange tint and a small, creamy, khaki head. Good retention. The aroma is a bit grainy, but is otherwise a marriage of bourbon, cherry, chocolate and caramel with undertones of brown sugar and cinnamon. The fruity, woodsy flavor is all tart cherries, sour mash and oak. Medium-bodied with an acidic, dry finish. Kudos to nflmvp for providing the bottle!

Dark reddish brown beer, with a minimal head - quite a tart aroma, with strong cherry and oak, and a mellow but present bourbon character - fairly tart and mildly acidic, with some light notes of chocolate and dough - very mild oak - subtle but spicy alcohol - much more tart than I expected, but decent.

Cloudy dark red and plum, near-brown in color with a tan, foamy head. Has a faint nose with some lactic cherry notes, and the first taste is syrupy sweet, highly carbonated chocolate and cherry cake frosting, lightly boozy in the finish. Decent, but overall it’s a confused beer and a little weird. There’s a bit of an alcohol bite on the back as well, and overall I don’t think the body on this is very good, but it is different than most of what you find.

Deep brown body, thin tight buff head. Echoing the comments of the previous two reviewers, the buttered popcorn characteristics dominated the aroma in particular, washing out the vanilla, oak, and cherry notes. Tannic body dominated by roasted malts, vanilla, and oak, the cherries being tart but not overpowering or even dominant. The diacetyl reappeared in the finish, and became cloying over time, despite my attempts to ignore it. A flawed but intriguing beer.

Bottle. Pours black with a thin beige head. Some off white floaties in there. Aroma of tobacco, smoke, some cherry, bourbon and oak. Wow, taste is a total 180 from the aroma. Roasted malt, bourbon and smoke up front, good sour/tart bite from the cherries in the middle, bourbon finish with some lingering cherry. Interesting to say the least.

12oz bottle.
Pours a dark brown-black that lets plenty of light through around the edges; a big poofy bubbly head forms and then rapidly dissipates to near-nothingness with a fizzing sound as if this were a glass of Pepsi, leaving zero lacing all the while. Weird. Aroma has all the goodies of a proper bourbon-barrel-aged stout: vanilla, molasses, bourbon (of course), and roasted grain, with a touch of tart cherry thrown in for good measure. Flavor was much the same as the aroma, in somewhat subued fashion -- which is not a bad thing, since one of the things I like about CW’s standard bourbon-barrel stout is that it does not smack you in the face with the bourbon/charcoal flavor like some other bourbon-barrel beers do. However, I would have preferred a bit more of an edge on this one; the cherry flavor was particularly subtle, which is better than oversaturation but still not quite in balance. It’s still a fine-tasting beer and my relatively low score has more to do with aesthetics (such as a soda-pop-like carbonation and palate) than with flavor. Still, I’ve only had one other bourbon-barrel-aged cherry stout (from the Carlyle brewpub in Rockford IL) that just plain blew this one out of the water. A very good beer that both could be better but also will certainly not hurt Central Waters’ reputation as a quality brewery.

A beautiful ruby brown color with an aroma filled with cherries combined with a hint of bourbon.

STOUTIE RATING #850 and like StFun below I drank this in a side by side comparison with the Bells BB Cherry Stout I just got from Sean (thanks dude), just when I thought I had an original idea someone beats me to the punch... ;-) ... oh I have had this before but did not rate it since i had a full bottle to contemplate... on to the rating: Deep brown with reddish highlights topped by a fading tan head and left oily legs upon the glassware. The aroma has notes of chocolate and vanilla covered cherries along with some oak and bourbon booze, herbal and grainy vapours too. The taste has a hint of a sweet malt stout but is still mostly cherries and bourbon. A hint of lacto sour milk and a unique Creme Brule undertone. The mouth feel is sticky but still seemed a tad too thin IMO. Not bad but the Bells version put this one to shame.