7.4

Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7.5 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7.5

Apparently Rock City in Amersfoort kept Buried Treasure, originally a superstrong flavoured stout brewed in collaboration with the great Dutch craft pioneer De Molen, in its standard range, albeit in less strong and less 'ornate' form, calling it a 'double' stout on the cans but still referring to it as an 'imperial' stout on their website. Can from the Jumbo supermarket in Ghent. Thinnish, initially moussey but quickly opening, regular, greyish-beige head on a black beer with thin nut brown edges. Aroma of charred toast, black coffee, bonfire ashes or charcoal even, burnt raisins, porcini, dried pine needles, black pepper, gin, tar, reduced Asian plum sauce, molasses, shoe polish. Dense, sweetish onset but not nowhere as sweet as most other contemporary imperial stouts, just hints of prunes from a can, old raisins and some dark berry-based venison sauce - balanced by a light umami touch (porcini) and softly carbonated with very thick, somewhat syrupy mouthfeel. Thick layers of black chocolate-, mocha- and toast-like malts unfold in the mouth, unctuous yet more bitter than sweet, in fact the sweetness seemingly comes from the malts only and not from something 'added' - indeed a no-nonsense approach in this highly profiled style... Minerally aspects run underneath, almost unnoticed, while fortified wine and cooked dark fruit elements fleetingly pass by - overshadowed by huge dark clouds of roasted, coffee-like bitterness and dry, unsugared black chocolate. A solventy aspect, with a sweet side to it, does linger retronasally - a minor flaw for me personally, but the finish remains firm and focused, with bayleaf- and salmiak-like aspects, leafy hops and warming, rum-like alcohol, the latter perhaps just a tad too outspoken (but I admit that I am very sensitive to booziness in strong beers). Rock City's great strength lies in IPAs and this strong stout is no match for those even in its own respective style (for me at least), but this 'double' version of Buried Treasure sure remains a powerful, polished and boldly roasty example. Too bad I did not know about the original version with De Molen, I certainly would have tried to get my hands on a sample if I had known of its existence.