330ml bottle. Thick black with a thin tan head. Sweet, chocolatey malt aroma, flavour is similar with some spice, a little dried fruit and a sweet smoky finish.

Handpump at Bishop's Arms, Malmö, Norra Vallgatan; Jan 2014
Black color with brownish head. Very nice aroma of roasted malt and fresh coffee, the quality is way above the average Stout (8.5). Lowly carbonated, not cold; good flavor of roasted malt, coffee, chocolate; it's rather dry, yet with a background sweet feeling; correct bitterness; drier in the final, with some paper; it had a very light fruity impression overall.
Very well made.

Fluffy & frothy beige head stayed well on a very dark oak coloured still body. Big aroma of oak, wood, malt & quite dry. Medium to thin body & nice carbonation. Taste is much as aroma with smoky, oak, wood, malt, dark berry & grape.

F: medium, tanned, quick gone. C: dark, opaque. A: dark malts, chocolate, dried dark fruits, bit cocoa, dark caramel, bit tobacco. T: dark malts, chocolate, bit smoky, coffee, dark fruits, caramel, bit umami, bit nutty, hint of iron but not disturbing, full body, low carbonation, light oily mouthfeel, very good, fully enjoyed, 33cl bottle from Malt Attacks in Brussels.

330 ml bottle. Pours black with moderate tan head. Aromas of dry dark coffee and oily roasted malts. Flavors follow same with emphasis on fresh ground coffee, but without the earthiness of a lot of coffee stouts.

Cask at PoW, Farnborough. Bunged up nose, not gettng much aroma. Some coffee. Dark and velvety. Half moon of a bubbly beige head. Sweet tinged bitterness with some berry sourness. Coffee. Chocolate. Cream. Medium bodied. Slick, with sticky residue. Soft carbonation. Relatively abrupt finish. Easy drinking. Relaxed. 'Slick' sums it up.

Bottle from Gedeelde Vreugde, a Siren classic that apparently had escaped my attention so far: a "breakfast stout" (I guess I'll never see the point in this American idea) flavoured with coffee and with added lactose. Bit irregular, thickly 'membranous' lacing, moussy, warm beige coloured head, completely closed for a long time, over a jet black beer with burgundy-bronze hue, which is only visible at the edges and under bright light. Aroma of a lot of coffee (grounds) indeed, coffee cream and quite a lot of it, strong beef stock cube presence, lightly toasted brown bread, liquorice, molten 'fondant' chocolate, toffee, granola, hints of pipe tobacco, old tea bags, dried elderberries, tiramisu. bayleaf, muesli bars, haemoglobin-like iron, wet cloth. Restrainedly (dried) fruity onset, some low sweetishness but actually less so than expected, underlying sourishness, quite strong umami (beef stock cube - already very present in the nose so this comes as no surprise) but altogether juicy and pleasant enough, softly carbonated with the creamy, slick, velvety mouthfeel as is to be expected from a stout brewed with oats and lactose, but not as thick as I was hoping for. Some natural iron-like notes accompany a still mouthfilling, nutty, toffeeish maltiness, subduedly sweet, adding pleasant, soft toasty bitterness in the end, aided by a dash of herbal, almost tea-ish, gently but explicitly bittering hops. Ends creamy, bittersweet and with very noticeable wet coffee powder flavours left behind on the tongue and in the throat after the beer itself has passed by; a notable liquorice-like flavour appears as well. Less deep and complex than advertized on the label but still interesting and multi-layered, though it could have done better with less of that beef stock-like umami for me (which goes for most other Siren stouts as well, now that I come to think of it). A stout with its own personality, though, glad I tasted it. You'll have to like coffee in order to appreciate it, but its effects are elegant and not needlessly over the top as is sometimes the case in coffee stouts of lesser calibre.

Cask at Ealing Park Tavern pours a nearly opaque black with some swirling khaki head. Nose has roasted grains, burnt toast, molasses, some smoke. Flavor has more of the sweet notes and less balance, molasses, caramel, licorice, cakey, brown sugar. Seems like the sweetness overwhelms the coffee notes. Finishes with a roasty character that probably saved some cloying texture.