Mikkeller 黑 / Black

12.7oz. bottle, with thanks to TheEpeeist from a trade back in January 2009. Pours dark black with a thin head of larger and loose bubbles. Aroma is ripe dark fruits, chocolate, and some more alcohol port/cordial aromas as well. Flavor starts with dark candied fruit sweetness and some chocolate, then transitions fairly quickly into more burnt roast malts on the finish. The sweet, then burnt thing with a more alcoholic finish is weird. This one just didn’t work too well for me, but thanks again Chris!

12.7 oz cork and caged green bottle from Canal’s Hainesport. Poured a perfect looking pitch black body with a deep beige head that is so thick, full and creamy it looks like chocolate mousse. Aroma was lots of dark rum soaked cake, dark fruits, tobacco, soy sauce and alcohol. The body has some serious alcohol heat on the back of my throat that makes this seem more like a cordial or perhaps a Weyerbacher brew. The body itself is velvety smooth wth light carbonation. The flavor is dominated by alcohol and burnt malts. The alcohol flavor is so strong it’s difficult to pick up on the subtle flavors that were present in the aroma but still this is exactlly the strong sipper I was hopingit would be......good stuff but very very STRONG!!!

Pours a dark chocolate brown with close to no head just a little tan head. Aroma is again largly alcohol. Flavor is very choolatey with quite a bit of alcohol. body is creamy with light carbonation.

Bottle with 2017 expiry. Not my favourite Mikkeller, but tasty, more like a port than beer though. Pours black (big suprise) and zero head. Nose is roasty, port notes, with lots of alcohol coming through. Body is thick and syrupy, almost no carbonation. Roasty malt, dark chocolate, sweet with big bitter character coming through. I found this beer benefited from some aging.

Picked up somewhere...can’t really say actually because it would violate the law. Poured a very viscous black; a very nice and thick pour. Head was a dark brown color and looked nice but faded away QUICKLY. Sweet malt alcohol and champagne yeast aroma. You can really smell that champagne yeast. I don’t think the aroma is very impressive. A roast aroma does come through. Again, just not my favorite aroma. Nice thick flavor. Wow the flavor is so much better than the aroma. Nice deep roast flavor, and honestly the alcohol isn’t that bad. THe beer starts off as a sweet malt flavor and then that deep alcohol and roast just smack your tastebuds. It is a very nice developed roast flavor. Some great bitter flavors going on. Just a nice complex taste. The alcohol doesn’t kill the flavor at all. Not carbonated and very smooth. Pretty good, thought from the aroma it was going to be worse.

chocolate, coffee, roasty, citrus, alcohol, raisin, black, cloudy, brown foam, heavy cloying sweetness, very bitter, full body, oily feel, flat, long finish, bitter alcohol,

[Bottle from beermerchants] Pours so black that no light gets through even when held up to a lamp. Very dense, thick head of a dark brown colour; very pretty. Big, powerful aroma of dark chocolate, roast, prune, port and a lot of alcohol. Extremely full bodied (as you’d expect) with a lot of sweetness upfront. Lots of dark chocolate and roasted malt on the palate, muscavado sugar, prunes. Leads to a very bitter, alcoholic finish (though perhaps not quite so alcoholic as one would expect).

Bottle... Poured a thick, syrupy black with little to no head. Super balance and drinkable for 17.5%. WOW! This was really awesome. Not as cloying and thick as others in this range. Chocolate tones and a little soy sauce tone. Dark fruits and and a creamy, sugary malt complexity with dark, roasted coffee beans. Had a sherry booze-like finish.