Coast Range Farmhouse Bourbon Barrel Aged Porter

0.5L bottle purchased at Monument’s Wine and Spirits in C-town (Concord, CA) more than six months ago. When I bought it I noticed there were only 12 ratings. With this rating now only 13. Wow.

It pours out of the swing top bottle almost still with black body. The nose has lots of oak barrel notes and bourbon and is short on the base beer (Porter) getting through. Maybe some faint roasted malts deep in the under brush are just noticed. The taste is much like the nose with bourbon booze boozy sweetness and oak. Some mild tart tannins show though before a brief moment of base beer roasted malts can just be sensed before boozy barrel notes take it to the finish. If I didn’t know the style of the base beer I could never have been able to tell by the aroma or flavor.

500 ml bottle, via STEPHENDR. Pours a clear very dark brown colored body under a two finger foamy brown head that slowly settled to a thin film leaving lots of lacing. The aroma is a mix of heavy bourbon, chocolate, vanilla, roast, and light alcohol. The flavor is clearly bourbon dominated with a slightly astringent burnt malt and anise laced finish. The alcohol is alot more noticable than the regular version. Mouthfeel is medium bodied with a slightly sticky cloying texture on the finish. The active fizzy carbonation is a little distracting. Didn’t have the carbonation issue that alot of the previous ratings have noted, maybe even a bit too much, but this was pretty harsh and tough to finish. This just needs the bourbon toned down a few notches and then you might have something really nice.

(another one sampled with the White boys)black body with no head.woody and some sourness in the aroma.flavor is full of bourbon and a bit of chocolate.also a bit of merlot like qualities.

Bottle; nose of woody coffee, and grapes; brown with a ring of bubbles (FLAT); merlot wine flavored with some coffee, bourbon, and an alcohol finish.

Opaque with no head. Aroma is chocolate, roasty, oak, light bourban. Taste is toffee, cabernet, roasty. Low carbonation.

Courtesy of IrishBoy. Thank you, Richard. Pours very still and lifeless from its flip-top bottle. Dark brown with no head at all save a few die hard bubbles that look like the two or three guys trying to get the wave started in a stadium full of crochety old men. It’s just not happening. Aroma is chocolate, bourbon, massive band-aid notes and a sort of medicinal/chemical note. It doesn’t taste nearly as bad as it smells, but these flip tops have not kept it very well carbonated. Chocolate, oak, bourbon, some fairly strong lactic notes and a dark fruit mash finish. It’s not all that bad tasting, but it is nearly completely flat. Nice thickness to it though.

The aroma is smooth bourbon. OK, there may be some oak. Very smooth aroma. Opaque brown color with no head. It starts creamy smooth, virtually no carbonation, and the flavor takes a mo to develop. The flavor is mysterious. The mouthfeel is medium. There is coffee, some chocolate, some reddish dark fruit, and always some bourbonish alcohol. There’s always a bit of sweet, always a bit of toasted malt, always a bit of hop bitter. As it warms, some vanilla comes forth. Finishes a bit dry. Quite a complex thing. At points it is reminiscent of S. Adams Triple Bock, but not the maple parts.

NorCal tasting Feb 07 - While this is light years better than their Stone Fence garbage, this still was a bit of a mystery to me. I’ve never had a beer with a fresh dill/lactic/sour cream nose AND taste before but this did it. A mineral-like effect on the palate, this was astringent with a whomp of something like it was aged in a pickle barrel, not a bourbon barrel. Strangely though, I liked it somewhat. It was probably infected, which gave the off taste. But I liked it. Not enough to consume mass amounts of it, but it was different.