Närke Kaggen Stormaktsporter

Brewed by Närke Kulturbryggeri
Style: Imperial Stout
Örebro, Sweden

Bottle... This beer rocks!... Pitch black ale with a mid-sized, creamy, brown head. The nose is of rich milk chocolate and coconut with a small dose of acetaldehyde. I’m supersensitive to the stuff, so most wouldn’t even detect it. Despite the ethanal, the aroma is wonderful. The flavor offers terrific balance between sweet chocolate malt, woodsy sourmash and moderate scorched bitterness. Full-bodied with a mouthfeel of heavy cream and almost lively carbonation. Burnt, bitter, not-too-boozy, chocolate finish. World class effort!

2005 vintage generously shared by cquiroga on 2/8/07: Pours an oily viscous opaque with mahogany edges and a thin ring of light brown head that almost turns the glass brown. Has an amazing, big, complex dark fruity plum and raisin nose with lots of floral dark honey, some tobacco, and sweet caramel malt with good oaky vanilla bourbon notes throughout. Body starts with a healthy dose of sweet dark caramel malt softly melding into bourbon toffee sprinkled with tobacco and dark chocolate with some bitter roasty notes toward the finish. Has nice brown sugar and raisin flavors as well. Nicely-balanced throughout and very drinkable, especially given the intense complexity. Slightly sweeter and more viscous than the 2004 vintage regular version. A great beer, very deserving of its ratings. Thanks again to cquiroga for sharing!

courtesy of Per Samuelsson - dark black coloured with a little brown foam formed of big bubbles; robust and highly complex aroma: wood and licorice, roasted coffee, chestnuts, prune and a touch of alcohol; thick and slightly oily palate; full-bodied and with a strong but not overwhelming bitterness; very long bitter and salty coffeish aftertaste where more woody, cookie notes can be met along a warming alcohol touch - what a fantastic beer ! complex, powerful but never exuberant

Bottle. Menacingly black appearance, looks good, but what stout/porter doesn’t? Aroma is fantastic. Vinous, oaky, heavily roasted, licorice, chocolate, dark fruit, rum, vanilla. Palate is once again fantastic. Rich, vinous, yet the oak isn’t really too overdone in my opinion. Nice rum n’ raisin character in the flavour, with lots of roasty malt, mocha, chocolate and licorice flavours. The flavour really seems to go on forever. I tried my be as harsh as i could ith my rating, but i kept just loving it more with every sip, and in my opinion it was simply fantastic. Best beer ever (in the words of my good friend magic_dave).

2006 vintage Huge, dense, very dark-greige head over jet-black beer. Some shards of lace despite all alcohol. Superb winey, vinous nose, with nuts, cocos, moccha, cacao, whisky, rum, dark fruit, fuselalcohols, fresh vanilla and new oak barrels. Impressive. Chocolate flavourS - mix of milkchocolate and full black; rum, but a better kind than I’ve ever tasted; surprisingly sweet, with a vanilla icecream touch, plus a good dot of moccha icecream. Dark rock candi sugar, very little wood, but lots of ethanol & higher alcohols. Liquid black chocolate on rumliqueur. WITH raisins drenched in honey. Utterly viscous, slick as none, soothing best bar none.
Comparing this to Westvleteren is utter nonsense. I never believed in the idea "dessert beer" - until now. Westvleteren is (superb) beer, full stop. Thomas D, eternal gratitude!

Rating # 4000. Huge thankx to Bierkönig and Keller for sharing this one. The beer has a pitch black colour with a small dense brown head. Quite fruity and light roastede malty aroma with vinous notes and a hint of wood. Roasted malty, liqourice spicy flavor with vinous notes and a light alcohol sweet finish with wood notes. This is, I’m sure, what they drink in heaven....

Bottle (RBESG 08): Pitch black with a small beige head; turpentine, vanilla, toasted malt and wood in the nose; very full bitter-sweet flavour, full bodied, creamy MF; long, long, long finish: chocolate, cacao and so on. Great, great stuff...............

My Bottom Line:
This coating Imperial Stout’s complex and portly malt profile spreads its heavy wings from vanilla realms to dark chocolate abodes, as a witty barrel apport and alcohol warming nearly balance out the wealthy grain bill.

Further Personal Perceptions:
-A ring of foam surrounds the pitch black with thin brown sleeves.
-Some cherry fruitiness is found within the sweet malt dominance.
-The roasted cereals are quite well developed and lend a cushiony mouthfeel.
-The bubbling is prickly yet soft, which helps drinkability.
-The malty and honeyed sweetness also emulates anisey licorice, and perhaps black beans (although subtly).
-The body on this one was thicker than Nogne O’s Dark Horizon, which sits at 16% abv.
-This is a fantastic example of the style, but I am not sure it has enough distinguishing features for me to choose it amongst my favorites of this tenebrous empire.

Bottles; thx David and François!