Kentucky Christmas Morning
(has 8 batches)
Hardywood Park Craft Brewery in Richmond, Virginia, United States 🇺🇸
Stout - Pastry / Flavoured - Imperial Winter|
Score
7.86
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Hardywood Kentucky Christmas Morning is liquid proof that good things come to those who wait. Our original Gingerbread Stout takes an initial transformation through months of aging in Kentucky bourbon barrels, reaching new levels of maturity with layers of vanilla, coconut, and toasted oak. Before bottling, the barrel aged stout is cold filtered through heaps of freshly cracked locally roasted coffee beans from Blanchard’s Coffee Co, showcasing the nostalgic joys of Christmas Morning. Treat yourself, it’s been a long year.
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7/10
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Appearance 8
Aroma 7.5
Flavor 7.5
Texture 4
Overall 7
Canned 11/8/24, drunk 9/1/25.
Big, tan head. Dark, but garnet-hued, clear body.
Nose is really candy/adjunct-forward initially. Milky, chocolatey, sweet but not too much cinnamon, at least. Bourbon shows up. Lightly, but noticeably. No alcohol noted.
First thing I get is ginger, followed by milk chocolate and rich malts, with a soft, sweet, thin texture. Quite watery. Bourbon notes are mellow and flavorful but this body/texture is abysmal! Drinks like a 5% stout. It doesn't need to be syrupy motor oil, but at 12.2%, it damned sure needs to have a lot more malt depth/texture than this.
Big, tan head. Dark, but garnet-hued, clear body.
Nose is really candy/adjunct-forward initially. Milky, chocolatey, sweet but not too much cinnamon, at least. Bourbon shows up. Lightly, but noticeably. No alcohol noted.
First thing I get is ginger, followed by milk chocolate and rich malts, with a soft, sweet, thin texture. Quite watery. Bourbon notes are mellow and flavorful but this body/texture is abysmal! Drinks like a 5% stout. It doesn't need to be syrupy motor oil, but at 12.2%, it damned sure needs to have a lot more malt depth/texture than this.
Tried
from Can
from Tavour
on 01 Sep 2025
at 22:53
4.2/10
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Appearance 6
Aroma 4
Flavor 3
Texture 6
Overall 4
Can to glass. . . Dark and smelling of ginger..odd indeed. Finishing as Indian food essence. As it gets warmer....does not improve. Heavy spice with the promise of coffee. Disappointing 😞 Its just too much imbalance of ginger for me. May just be my taste.
Tried
from Can
on 27 Dec 2024
at 04:17
8.6/10
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Appearance 6
Aroma 9
Flavor 9
Texture 10
Overall 8.5
S: bourbon (duh!) - tobacco - burnt coffee (starbucks) A: oily dark brown body - thin tan head T: prunes - vanilla - dark chocolate P: no carbonation (lost?!?) - leather - concord grapes O: super complex - rich body (despite stillness) - great for season (of course!) 75 cL corked and caged bottle - Costco: Arlington (Pentagon City), Virginia - purchased: 13-December-2019 - 2019 Vintage (from label) - US$10,99 - sampled: Exactly, five years later on the date, after just visiting the same Costco - Merry Christmas 2024, Early!
Tried
from Bottle
on 14 Dec 2024
at 06:29
8.3/10
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Appearance 8
Aroma 8
Flavor 8
Texture 8
Overall 9
pitch black color. Amazing nose of bourbon, nutmegs, cloves. Amazing depth of bourbon, oak, chocolate vanilla, tons of spice. Alcohol well hidden. Super drinkable. Perfect Christmas time beer. Meets my expectations.
Tried
on 03 Jun 2024
at 08:34
8.5/10
—
Appearance 8
Aroma 9
Flavor 8.5
Texture 8
Overall 8.5
Pastry stout aged in Kentucky bourbon barrels – a variant of the regular Christmas Morning, the ‘gingerbread’ stout from this Virginian brewery, a multi-flavoured stout with typical American ‘Christmas spicing’ (involving, at least in this case, coffee, cocoa, cinnamon and vanilla). Comes from a stubby bottle of 355 milliliters, received as a gift from my friends Morgan and Lauren from Richmond, Virginia – thank you both so much guys! Thin but retaining yet opening, pale greyish beige, irregularly lacing, tiny-bubbled head on a black beer with thin mahogany edges. Intense and indeed ‘Christmassy’, spicy nose of coffee powder, pure black chocolate, clear bourbon but integrated well into the whole, raw cinnamon, cocoa nibs, vanilla both real and from oak wood, camphor or paraffin accent, raisin bread, ‘speculoos’, toffee, gingerbread made with a lot of ginger powder, Glühwein, Christmas cake, vague background notes of blood and shoe polish. Dense, concentrated onset, sweet but not sticky, candied dates, plum, very light porcini (umami) accent, with finely tingling effervescence (working well in a big stout) and full, thickly oily mouthfeel still maintaining a fairly high drinkability. Layers of smooth hazelnutty, thoroughly dark-chocolatey (enhanced by the cocoa) and toffeeish malt bittersweetness fill the mouth, in the end just a tad more bitter than sweet (luckily!) thanks to the coffee, the cinnamon and the bourbon, yet in spite of the added lactose, which nevertheless manages to keep things creamy. The finish is soaked in lovely vanilla-ish, spicy-warming bourbon and oak wood, along with considerable ginger- and cinnamon-like Christmas spicing (almost cardamom-like even). Quite an impressive, very rich and layered stout: you will have to be able to appreciate pronounced Christmas spicing, but then I endured many an overspiced Belgian Christmas ale in my time so this is not an issue for me – on the contrary, this one does the same desserty, decadent spicing in a big, bold U.S. style imperial stout context and does it well. The long shadow of Perennial’s barrel aged Abraxas looms in the background… A truly lovely stout, ‘baroque’ and excessive, yet at the same time managing to keep all those ingredients in the exact place where they belong, and maintaining high drinkability in spite of its heft. I was very impressed – and feel lucky to have another one left, because who knows what a few extra months of ageing could do to this beer…
Tried
on 22 Mar 2024
at 10:37
7.9/10
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Appearance 8
Aroma 7
Flavor 8
Texture 8
Overall 8.5
Bottle from Tavour. Pours dark brn/blk with a slight tan head. Aroma of cinnamon and dark malt with a touch of coconut. Full bodied. Flavor is the aroma plus ginger, bourbon/vanilla, and a touch of wood. Not at all dry. Some bitterness from spice and wood. And heat, perhaps. Quite tasty.
Tried
from Bottle
on 09 Feb 2023
at 02:09
7.8/10
—
Appearance 8
Aroma 8
Flavor 8
Texture 8
Overall 7
Hardywood Kentucky Christmas Morning BBA Christmas Coffee Imperial Stout 11.6% Inky black with a tan head. On cracking open the bottle there was a huge bourbon aroma. After a bit you get softly sweet pop astray stout with cinnamon aromas. The taste is a bit ascerbic and tart like a fruity coffee with soft spices in the finish. Good but not as stellar as the regular version. This tartness may be a result of the aging or it being a touch old, the body seems to have gotten thinner as well. Nice example of aging changes (had this since last summer). I’m gonna get the regular Christmas Morning for next year if I can, it’s a tradition I’m trying to start.
Tried
from Bottle
on 25 Dec 2022
at 12:40