I wasn’t expecting much after the poor showing on their weizen, but this is a good beer. I enjoyed this one at the Inch Bar with Dana and Tarah. Black colour, brown head. Vanilla, milk chocolate aroma. Fruity, oatie, and chocolatey flavour. Surprisingly light bodied. It’s like a latte with extra froth. Slightly bitter on the finish, but not really. Some might find this to be a rather weak stout, but I think it’s quite good.

Excellent aroma, full flavoured with caramel, coffee and a nice slightly bitter finish

A delicious beer. Black with a tan head. Aroma is complex with milky coffee, chocolate, caramel, and toffee. Similar flavours on the palate, with a pleasant sweetness which is more than I usually like in a beer, but is perfect in this one. A sweetish finish, with lingering coffee and toffee/caramel.

Tasted 26/10/2005. Shared 330ml bottle at Neil Miller’s October Cellar-Vate Tasting. Black, with a thin, airy, tan head. Lightly carbonated. Great fresh nose - milky coffee, hints of caramel, toasty malt. Freshness follows through in the flavour, which follows the same line of the nose. Plenty of residual sugars balnce nicely with the dryness of the dark malts. I got little, if any, hop influence. A little thin, like many antipodean stouts, but this is a very good, fresh, product from a brewery that just keeps getting better and better. Retasted 31/05/2007. A shade volatileon the nose but then hints at excellent espresso coffee with three sugars and cream. Sweet but more-ishly delicious.

Invercargill may not be the end of the world but you can certainly see it from there. Huddled on the southern toe of New Zealand’s South Island, this must be a contender for the world’s southern-most brewer. It’s a cold bastard of a place, where a decent stout would be most welcome at the end of a long day. These guys squeeze so much flavour and character into a 4.5% abv sweet stout that I’d love to see what they could do with an imperial. I reckon they could do something pretty special. This didn’t look exceptional - pitch black, of course, with a modest plug of foam - but the aroma was huge for a sweet stout. Rich fumes of roasting coffee beans, dark chocolate, with some intense phenols for the abv. The body can’t fulfill the promise of the aroma. It’s syrupy but thin. I’d love to see a heavier version of this - at least 6% plus. It’s sweet but balanced by a tarry coffee-bean bitterness with notes of lemonade, shiraz and Bourneville chocolate. This is crammed with flavour. Grand stuff indeed. (330ml bottle from Scenic Cellars, Taupo)