Goose Island Bourbon County Stout

Brewed by Goose Island Beer Company
Style: Imperial Stout
Chicago, Illinois USA

Yowza! Tap at Churchkey DC. Pours inky black with a thin dark brown head. Huge aroma of vanilla, also some chocolate, malt, and oak. The flavor is all of that - with the emphasis on vanilla - plus caramel, roasted barley, a touch of bourbon, and a little burn from the alcohol. Aged a couple years this will be perfection.

12oz. Bottled on 10/02/09. Appropriately viscous black pour with no trace of head or bubbles to speak of. You can honestly get a whiff of this thing from a couple feet away. Gigantic Bourbon nose hits like a sledgehammer. If you keep your nose down and get past the fact that it smells more like whiskey than beer, you’ll get hints of vanilla, burnt oak and caramel. Not sure that I can adequately describe the flavor, has a bit of everything I would expect in a near perfect stout. Huge malt flavor with roasted grain, cocoa, black licorice, oak, vanilla and caramel. A subtle Bourbon flavor hits right at the beginning. Can’t imagine how they could improve on the palate, sits just right on the tongue with a thick texture that supports the malt, but isn’t overly syrupy. Slight hit of bitterness at the end and almost no trace of alcohol throughout. Very impressive for a 13% beer that was just bottled two months ago. If you can find this one, make sure you pick some up. Simply amazing!

This beer is dark, really dark. And the flavor is very much of the same. The aroma is of vanilla, oak, coffee, chocolate, and bourbon alcohol. This beer is very well done and very smooth to drink, which is suprising with the strong alcohol percentage. The primary flavors are a burnt barley, coffee, bourbon, oak and vanilla. The vanilla flavor finishes the beer very well. If it wasn’t for this beer being $10.99 a 4-pack, this would be a beer I would drink a few times a week. I can’t wait to try this one on tap!!

12 oz. bottle. Awesome bourbon aroma and flavor. Goose Island did a great job with this one.

Pours like oil and is black as oil is as well. Very minimal head with very little lacing to speak of . Ahhh...the aromas of bourbon!!! Smells wonderful!!! Aromas of vanilla, rich sweet caramel, a touch of chocolate and deep roasted coffee. The aroma is simply fantastic and complex! The flavor is incredible!! Tastes of everything the nose delivers, vanilla, caramel, chocolate, the deep roasted coffee beans all come through so easily on the palate. Yet, it’s so smooth and dangerously easy to drink. The finish is long and continues to deliver delicious flavors of licorice and brown sugar. Wow...simply wow.

Perfect! 12 oz. bottle. Pours opaque brown/black, like used motor oil, with no head to speak of. Aroma is rich coffee, sweet sugar syrup, vanilla and oak. Flavor is heavy, sweet, sugary, vanilla, dark fruit, chocolate. Palate is thick, viscous, syrupy, almost no carbonation. This is so rich and flavorful that it absolutely overpowers anything you’ve ever tried. A definite must-have for any beer geek.