“Marge, there’s an empty spot I’ve always had inside me. I tried to fill it with family, religion, community service, but those were dead ends! I think this chair is the answer.” — Homer Simpson
OK, I won’t go quite that far, but we were fortunate enough to score a half-growler of Founder’s Canadian Breakfast Stout (see this).
It is, in a word, remarkable.
It pours an opaque black with dense ring of light chocolate-colored head. There is a distinct aroma of maple, though it’s not as pronounced in the tasting. I’d say the consistency is a bit less syrupy than that of, say, Goose Islands Bourbon Barrel Stout, but that’s from memory. When swirled, it’s just a tad slower around the glass than you’d think beer might be. It feels slick and full and rich on the tongue.
When I drink the Founder’s Kentucky Breakfast Stout (not to mention pretty much any of the other 6.8 billion bourbon-barrel-aged stouts/porters/ales that are out there), there’s usually a pleasant, but distinct, tingling or warmth in the upper back of my palate, not unlike the sensation one gets when drinking actual bourbon. Go figure. And that’s in no way a criticism of those beers. In the Canadian Breakfast Stout, the maple syrup (and time) seems to have mellowed that characteristic. Your first taste tells you that this is indeed a bourbon-barrel-aged stout, but it’s on the back end that the sweetness of the maple makes it’s mark. While, as I said earlier, there is a note of maple in the aroma, the maple and the vanilla flavors combine to the point where I, at least, couldn’t really say (or care, frankly) which was which.
One mystery: in the write-up we posted earlier, the description of the process was that used bourbon barrels were then used by an artisan maple syrup operation, and those, in turn, were used by Founder’s to make the Canadian Breakfast Stout. While chatting with Michael Bell from Founder’s this evening, I understood him to say that the barrels were sourced from a distillery, then used for aging Kentucky Breakfast Stout, then shipped to the maple syrup folks, who then returned the barrels to Founder’s to make the CBS. I might have misunderstood him. I’m not sure what the story is, but it doesn’t really matter. The stuff is incredible.
And, I’m sorry to say, you probably can’t get any. It was apparently on tap at the brewery pub, but what we got was from what was reportedly only one of forty 1/6th barrels outside Grand Rapids. And it was gone in 20-minutes.
Can we work the Space Shuttle into the next batch guys? You need to do something, I dunno, complicated
Comments 1
Sounds like an incredible beer. Sad that it doesn’t have wider availability. But I’m impressed that it sold out so quickly.
Posted 18 May 2009 at 11:52 pm ¶