Monk's Mistress (Bourbon)
Midnight Sun Brewing Company in Anchorage, Alaska, United States 🇺🇸
Belgian Style - Strong Ale Regular|
Score
7.51
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Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 9
Bottle from the AK hook up himself. Pours a murky brown color with a medium off-white head. A big bourbon nose. Rich layers of vanilla sweet bourbon, leather, toffee, berries. Damn good. Huge improvement in the barrel.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 9 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 9
22oz bomber courtesy of SHIG, thanks Shawn. It pours with a deep mahogany body that supports a thin tan head. The aroma offers up caramel, spicy winter holiday cookies, spicy Belgian yeast, marshmallow and then a nectar like sort of molasses sweet richness in the background. The taste delivers rich smooth notes that are balanced. Yum. I get molasses, caramel, rich prune candy, brown sugar, sweet cherry reduction and a marshmallow note where subtle smooth candy like bourbon is well off in the background. Wow! This all goes together seamlessly. Rich lovely. Wow!
Appearance - 10 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 8
Bottle: #235 Alaskan brewed beer rating, finally after 16 month I’ve finally tied for third. Pours a thick chocolate brown with a whispery head that disappears. Strong bourbon nose that lingers. Lots of dark fruit with wood and bourbon hints. Finish is malty and strong alcohol warming.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 9 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 8
Bottle from bu11zeye. 2006 Bottle. Pours with a thick off-white head and a hazy deep brown body. Aroma of maple, oak, nuts, dark fruits and vanilla. Taste is dark fruits, brandy, barrel, raisins and bourbon. Syrupy mouthfeel with light bubbles.
Appearance - 10 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7
Bomber drunk on 6/28/07
Very nice to see that this one (unlike the monks mistress cabernet) actually produces a large, resilient head (dark beige in color) that is very slow to recede and laces lightly. The mahogany brown liquid has slight auburn hints and shows a medium-high clarity and plentiful carbonation.
Hmmm, that’s definitely bourbon in the nose. Spicy and well attached to the dark malts, which give it a sort of vanilla-cola sort of feel. Sharp wood notes and some alcohol heat round out the picture, with a light fruitiness playing about in the background. Not quite as lively as the base beer, with the wood and bourbon morphing the more lighthearted esters in to a sort of black cherry-meets-black pepper note that is decidedly less suited to a Belgian beer (IMHO). Still, I’ll certainly agree that this isnt as egregiously over-barreled as the cabernet version, which practically beat you to death with the wine character. Strong, lasting aroma, and quite thick to-boot, the strength of the bourbon and the underlying maltiness seeing to that, no doubt.
Heavily carbonated texture (though moderately tight) leads to a very, very creamy and full-bodied beer, with streaks of dry chocolate running from start to finish and interacting with oily wood tannins, clove, cinnamon and vanilla bourbon notes to produce a very well-homogenized flavor that still preserves the dry, wondrously fruity character of the base beer, to some extent. Light hints of chewy caramel stick to the palate and the alcohol warmth and bourbon character slowly gain steam, eventually overwhelming my palate (with help from the acidity present in the beer). Dates and raisins, with more oiliness emerge with warmth, and the malt sweetness grows in girth (this beer is very sweet when young and though it’s been aged, it still seems to be a sweeter batch, perhaps purposefully). While the bourbon isnt nearly as overpowering here, I still think it’s slightly overdone and seems to insert itself in to all aspects of the beer. Perhaps another 6 months and some of the sweetness will subside, though I wonder where that will leave the bourbon flavor (perhaps even more in control).