Jolly Pumpkin Madrugada Obscura

Brewed by Jolly Pumpkin Artisan Ales
Style: Stout
Dexter, Michigan USA

Thin brown lasting head held up by steady rising streams of small bubbles. Black beer. Huge dusty aroma like breathing cocoa and coffee dust carried on an alcohol cloud. Expecting the biggest chocolate coffee stout ever and you are surprised by a wine-like chocolate coffee beer. 3/4 stout 1/4 wine. Chocolate and coffee seem overwhelmed by the wine. It’s a black wine! Cool and unique but I still want to try the beer my nose told me I was going to drink.

Batch #266. Pours black with huge brown head. Aromas of roasted malts, chocolate and sourness. Similar flavors with a dry finish. Medium body with lively carbonation. Decent beer.

Pours completely black with a swirly dark caramel brown head. Very beautiful. The nose has so much going on. I get roastyness, citrus acidity, sour yeast funk, wet rotten hay (or mildew), sour apples, and caramel. The flavor is crazy. All over the place but it balances into a wonderful drinkable beer. It starts out roasty then flows into a sweet fruit flavor, and then finishes with a sour citrus bitterness. The after taste is tangy and pleasant. The palate has everything: great complexity, well balanced flavor, and is very easy to drink. Phenomenal.

Bottle: I opened this one up for the first game of the World Series. Go Phillies! Anyways, this one was a great choice for the game. It started out great as Utley hit the two run homer in the first inning. This beer was just warming up itself. It poured a dark black color, with load of chocolate colored head. The aroma was roasted malts and chocolates. The flavor was chocolate, roasted nuts, coffee, and caramel. The finish was excellent, Hamels gave way to Madsen who handed off to Lidge to shut the door. Great Game! The beer finished with a dry and sour finish, Great Beer!

This was a treat. Black as night with a massive brown head. Roasted malts and chocolates intermingle with faint sourness and a wine like character. A similar set of flavors in the thick body.

Batch 265. Pours pure black with a huge, lacy, chocolate-brown head. Chocolate and roast coffee aroma with some tart notes. Flavor is roasty chocolate, quite dry, with vinous, fruity tartness in the middle and a long tart-chocolate finish. Very tasty and very drinkable, only knock is that it’s a little thin and fizzy for a stout. Otherwise great.

Bottle, batch 266.
Huge brown head, pitch black body. The lacing is just incredible. Chocolate, roasty, coffee into cherries, tart with some JP funk coming through stronger as it warms, some oak and some caramel on the nose. When cold it starts out smelling like a solid coffee/chocolately stout, but after letting it breath the tartness comes much more to the fore. Much the same in flavor, strong chocolate, coffee, tart and funky and vinous. Some grapes. Not very sweet. The wild yeasts have dried this out wonderfully. Quite tannic, with very nice carbonation. Very good funky stout.

Bottle. Batch 265. Blackish beer with a tan head. Chocolate, light roast aroma with slight tartness. Roasty, tart flavor with light chocolate, light fruitiness, and some oak. Medium-plus bodied. Tartness lingers with roast, malt, grain, and chocolate. It’s good and very drinkable, but it’s crying out for just a bit of bourbon.