25 Beers of Christmas '08, Day 17: Rabid Duck Imperial Stout

Brewery: Duck Rabbit Brewery
Style: Imperial Stout
ABV: 10.0%
Date Poured: December 2008

Duck Rabbit is a small craft brewery located in Farmville, North Carolina. Rabid Duck is their winter seasonal and they only recently began to distribute in Atlanta.

Pours dark as night with a thin brown head. Rich malty and creamy in the nose with significant alcohol and dark fruit notes.

Wow. Malty and rich in the mouth. Oaky with a light roastiness. Very, very sweet dark malt. Bitter chocoalte and creamy mocha. Very bold and intense. Enormous body in the mouth, full and sticky. A roasty finish and aftertaste.

A little brewery that is doing big things. Go get some.



Duck Rabbit Brewery

Tasting Notes: Alvinne Podge Belgian Imperial Stout

Brewery: Picobrouwerij Alvinne

Style: Belgian Imperial Stout (?)

ABV: 10.5%

Date Poured: October 2008

Alvinne is a brewery located in West Flanders and has been brewing in earnest since 2004. In addition to more traditional imperial stout ingredients, it is supposed to be brewed with candy sugar and a strain of Irish ale yeast.

Pours a murky dark brown with a thin brown head. Smells fruity. Like ripe dark fruit. Smells quite boozy with some vanilla and sweet dark malt too. Also lightly spicy.

Lots of dark fruit again, overpowering, with some dark chocolate and sweet roasty malt. This one is much more sweet than roasty. Some alcohol warming as it goes down. Sweet finish. Medium to full bodied. A sipper for sure.

Quite unusual but it's not half bad. Certainly different from your average imperial stout.


Picobrouwerij Alvinne

BA Imperial Stout Meet-Up

This past Saturday, several Atlanta area BA's (Beer Advocates) met up in Decatur for an Imperial Stout tasting. Tim works at The 5th Earl Market so he provided the venue and organized the event.

The full list of beers (as far as I can remember) is as follows:

Great Divide Oak Aged Yeti
Southern Tier Oat
Southern Tier Jahva
Peche Mortel
Mikkeller Black
O'Dell's Imperial Stout
Brewdog Paradox (not sure which release...)
Eel River Raven's Eye
Lagunitas Imperial Stout
Great Lakes Blackout Stout
Weyerbacher Old Heathen
Weyerbacher XIII
Weyerbacher Heresey
Bell's Expedition
Samuel Smith's Imperial stout
Smuttynose Imperial Stout
Nøgne Ø Imperial Stout
Duck Rabbit Rabid Duck
Left Hand Imperial stout
Fish Tale Poseidon's Imperial Stout

Personal highlights included the Smuttynose Imperial Stout, Weyerbacher Heresey, Southern Tier Jahva and Nøgne Ø Imperial Stout. Samuel Smith's was quite a surprise as it held its own against this crew of American heavyweights. Mikkeller Black was the most unique tasting (this Danish stout clocks in at 17.5%) but probably need a couple years aging (at least) to reach its potential.

As far as food, one of group ordered the Newcastle Mussels which smelled amazing (I did not have any). Others were kind enough to share some blue cheese and crackers with the group and I discovered that drizzling a little honey on the blue chees is a fantastic combination.

A good time to be sure. Met some new people and reconnected with some old acquaintances. Drank some great beer.

(On a side note, I arrived early and had one of the bar's draft offerings, Allagash Hugh Malone. Very good stuff.)

Thanks to Tim and The 5th Earl Market for hosting the event. A few snapshots are below.





BA Imperial Stout Gathering

Tasting Notes: Opening Day Edition - Clipper City Peg Leg Imperial Stout

Brewery: Clipper City Brewing
Style: Imperial Stout
ABV: 8.0%

(The Orioles continue their improbable run to open the season, now at 6-1 and still leading the AL East. Here's the third installment of this series from Baltimore's own Clipper City brewing.)

It pours deep black but you can pick up a hint of mahogany highlight every so often. In the nose, bitter hops, almost smell like noble hops...(Fuggles and Goldings actually, British style...) Some roasty aromas from the malt

First impressions are that it seems bit overcarbonated in the mouth. Very creamy and sweetish, almost like an imperial milk stout! Tasting lots of that herbal hop character in the flavor. Quite hoppy for an Imperial Stout. But it's yummy.

It's bottle conditioned so the last two bottles go into my cellar. Maybe I'll break one out when the O's reach the World Series in October. Nah, who am I kidding...

Clipper City Brewing

25 Beers of Christmas, Day 14: Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout 04-05

I am woefully behind in my 25 Beers posts. Let's try to catch up...

Another old winter favorite takes the stage next. Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout is an annual ritual and one of the better aging beers I've experimented with. Upon release it needs a good year in the cellar before it really shines. At 10%, it's sometimes a little hot right away. This bottle is three years old, the 04-05 version.

Pours like motor oil with a quickly dissipating light brown head. Smells chocolatey with hints of alcohol esters. There are aromas of dark fruit from oxidation and a hint of vanilla.


The taste is sweet and chocoaltey with almost no hint of alcohol. Lightly bitter with smooth mocha flavors. A big sweet sticky mouth. There's some light oaky and black currant flavors from oxidation. Sticky finish with some estery alcohol in the finish.

It's a good one. Throw a couple in the basement.

Brooklyn Brewing