CBS
The details: Founders Brewing CBS, 11.7% ABV, 45 IBU, 37 SRM, in a 750ml bottle poured into a pint glass
I wore a jacket to work today. I also rode with a jacket on yesterday and to be perfectly honest, I needed it more yesterday. Today it was raining, but yesterday it was autumn.
I have had mixed feelings about fall over the years. Some years I have been sad that nice, warm weather and biking are coming to an end. Other years I've been looking forward to crisper temperatures, the usage of blankets and jackets, and occasionally a fireplace or fire pit. Since I've moved to New York I'm on the fence about the change to colder seasons; people bundled up for the cold aren't in a grumpy, sweaty mood, but they also aren't as excited to be out in sloppy, sloshy, cold weather. It seems you just can't win with these people.
There is something you can always count on when the temperature starts to dip: dark beers. Those wonderful, malty delicious stouts and porters that are perfect on a cold night/day/morning/anytime. Sometimes thought of as 'heavy' and other times adjuncted with more flavors than is worth counting, these beers are my personal highlight of the fall and winter.
To drive the point home even more, eight of the fourteen beers that I have given a 5.0 rating on Untapp'd have been either porters or stouts:
Sixpoint 3 Beans (2013)
Fuller's London Porter
Hardywood Park Brewery Gingerbread Stout (2016)
Hardywood Park Brewery Gingerbread Stout (2014)
Sixpoint Xporter
Hardywood Park Brewery Gingerbread Stout (2015)
Goose Island Rare Bourbon County Brand Stout (2015)
Hardywood Park Brewery Rum Barrel Gingerbread Stout (2016)
This doesn't even begin to count the number of pints of Guinness I've had while watching football (it's hundreds at least), or the other random stouts and porters I've tried to taste whatever adjunct or barrel aging is used. So imagine when I saw a bottle of CBS (short for Canadian Breakfast Stout) in my local grocer - I had to have it.
Founders first made CBS back in 2011 to much acclaim. So much so, it seems, that they didn't make it again until 2017 (for the record, I'm drinking a bottle of the 2017 release). It's coming back for 2018 in the same formula: it's an imperial stout brewed with chocolate and coffee, then aged in maple syrup and bourbon barrels. In a few words, it's everything you know you really want for breakfast.
Even though this beer has been in my fridge for months it is, simply put, amazing. It's super smooth and creamy, and for being almost 12% does not taste boozy at all. The most dominant flavors are chocolate and maple, which if you stopped there would make a damn good beer. The coffee is reserved and is an afterthought; there is a bitterness that lingers that is reminiscent of drinking coffee that's cooled off a bit. I smell bourbon more than I taste it, but I'm wondering if some of the typical bourbon sweetness is getting run over by the chocolate. Either way, once you let this beer warm up to about 50ºF it's one of the most delicious things I've had in quite a while, and it makes me really excited for the 2018 release. I'm so excited, in fact, that I think that list above just gained a new member.
The verdict: 5.0 out of 5 (on Untapp'd - follow me @slownumbers to see what I'm drinking!)