From old tasting notes. Translucent brown, black color topped by a huge creamy tan head. Rich chocolatey roasted malt aroma. Bitter roasted malt flavor is creamy and finishes dry.

Roasted malt, cardboard, charred wood, vanilla, and sawdust with walnut accents, quite woody. Clear mahogany, thin tan head. Tart heavily roasted malt, ash, and vanilla. Bitingly bitter char and grapenut finish. Vanilla is pleasantly ever-present. On the other hand, there is too much char and it’s too tart. Odd, but ok.

12 ounce bottle. Pours a clear very dark brown color with a medium sized tan head. Decent head retention. Aroma of roasted malts, coffee, nuts, chocolate and vanilla. The taste is roasted malts, vanilla and a bitter hop finish. Medium bodied. Decent.

Ya know, just when you think you’ve tasted every saranac, you didn’t. The first real craft brews I had in a mixed six, back in 1980, no lie. Fromabottle it looks pretty dark but not coal black fer sure. Nice head. First taste is enoyable stout. Roasty, perhps some tartness, very good beer that seems to be less than 4% but its not. Good beer bite but never goesw over the top. One of the better stouts. After a while during the session some sharp bitternesss builds up to a medium sharp thing, unexpected with most stouts. Fun, interesting. Very nice brew, would buy a case of this stuff. Good craft beer for a lager lover.

Pour is black as you’d expect. Small head. Nose is chocolate malts and coffee. Taste is coffee grounds and chocolate malts. Rated 12/20/2000

I am not much of a basic stout drinker and have often found Saranac products to be rather uninspired so it happened that this brew threatened to take up permanent residence in my fridge as it was constantly bypassed in favor of other brews. Eventually after a few months of this I decided to have at it and try the bottle.+++ Sampled from the typical 12 oz brown bottle this beer poured a dark black color with a medium sized foamy tan head that lingered and left good lacing. The aroma was definite roasted malt with moderate notes of caramel and vanilla and a bitter floral hop presence. The flavor was roasty - a nice mix of sweet and dry - and also had a noticeable floral hop presence with undertones of vanilla and caramel. There was a long finish. A bit thin in body. I was prepared to not be impressed by this one, but for a basic stout I found it remarkably drinkable.

Very deep garnet, nearly opaque. Large beige rocky and bubbly head. Light aroma with caramel and chocolate primarily, with a touch of roast. Interesting flavor, rounded and sweet up front with more caramel and chocolate. Drying finish, with sufficient roasted flavors and an emergence of hops at the very end. Nutty character emerges as it warms. Nicely complex malt profile, well balanced and integrated. Nicely done.

Opaquely black in colour with the smell of raisins! Very malty and strong, but not too bad for a Saranac beer--usually they are pretty bad! Long bittered finish, and somewhat offensive.