Huge thanks to CCB for letting us lush our way through multiple glasses of this wonderful brew. It pours deep dark chocolate with dark brown edges and wispy mocha head. Looks impressive and hinting at the yummy goodness to come. The aroma isn’t pungent but more moderate in strength conveying adequate notes of rich roasty malts mixing with an inviting level of rich smelling dark chocolate and a mild background of toastiness. The taste starts with a rich creamy full mouth feel ushering in velvety dark chocolate, some roasted malts to burnt malts and yummy sweet, and yes creamy, caramel candy. I love that ribbon of caramel that persists throughout the flavor experience. Wow, awesome flavor. But wait, there’s more. As the finish approaches a very complimentary toasted multi grain bread stirs up and blends into a mild roasted cedar wood confluence of notes. This is just a fabulous brew and tells me a dark chocolate, caramel candy and roasted wood mix of notes can come together in near perfect flavor harmony. The only tiny knock I can give this brew would be that it could use a slightly fuller aroma. But that is getting picky.

The commercial batch lacks the added caramel candy goodness from the pilot batch. For me this takes away from the experience and it is no longer a 4.7 score but rather a tasty 4.2.

750mL poured deep dark void with dark mocha head, a bit of legginess and sparse spotty lacing. The aroma has lots of roasty malts moving toward full hearty thick earthiness and then into milk chocolate and spicy hops. As it warms the notes shift all over the place from lots of chocolate to mostly earthy then to highly roasted. The taste begins smooth and creamy as a wide load of roasted to highly roasted malts rumble through the flavor. The roast squashes out moments of dark chocolate, earthiness and spicy hops as those notes struggle to be heard. Into the finish it gets more roasty and toward burnt like with brief wafer thin pulses of caramel showing up as the taste murmurs away into the long lasting after taste.

Pours deep dark chocolate brown with tan head. The aroma is big and sweet with lots tangelo citrus sweetness from a load of late addition hopping followed close behind by muted malt notes in the background made up of chocolate, roasty malts and almost detectable rye. I get a myriad of other hoppy notes under the heavy handed citrus tangelo and orange like some floral, spice, a bit of pine and subtle grassiness. The taste is thick and near chewy with tangelo hop flavor sweetness rushing in first followed by a growing varied mix of hop bitterness starting mostly with thick citrus hops, some floral and spice. The bitterness seems to peak as the finish approaches and carries deep into the after taste. For the malt side of this there are notes of various roasted base malts, a solid rye twang that seems to bridge the gap between bitter hops and meatier malts. The overall taste experience seems a little disjointed with a load of hops and a bold mix of complex malts polarizing the experience somewhat. It seems to lack a little harmony. That’s just the sense I get. Those comments are getting a little too picky. It is a real tasty brew.

Big thanks to CCB crew for bringing this to the OTH 09/06/08. It pours very very dark with thin mocha head. The first initial draw brings up a fruity ester note mixing with solid fresh oakiness. Then behind those festering notes are chocolate, malt roastiness, mild smoke and a touch of earthiness. The smoke rises up and lingers for a while. There is a lot going on here. The taste is a rash of numerous bursting notes like rich dark chocolate, oak, smokiness, roasted malts and then some dryness. It seems to be a little tannin like and has a red wine fruity note too. It ends dry with tons of flavor spilling over into the after taste. This is the sort of brew I want to dig into and extract the full experience with a protracted encounter. Awesome stuff.

Courtesy of CCB. Pours hazy brownish copper with tan head. The aroma is big with grapefruit, orange juice, orange peel, some grassiness, pine and a bit of cherry hard candy sweetness. The taste starts with a pulse of malt sweetness and a hint of fruity esters. Quickly the hops over-run the malts with grapefruit and pine hop bitterness flowing into orange juice late addition hop sweetness, some tangelo and a moderate level of grassiness. It ends with lingering pine to grapefruit hops and a hint of maltiness. If I was to split hairs I’d say for a straight up IPA the appearance is too hazy and dark. But I’ve seen some IIPA that look just like this one. Very solid IPA. 3.9 The last improvement on this beer has really helped. It has a very assertive west coast feel hop bitterness and hop flavor that I just love. 4.1

Bottle 4/29 courtesy of CCB, thanks a ton for this damn good beer. Pours dark dark brown with wafer thin tan head. The aroma is big bold smoky rauch-ness with a smokiness getting close to but not reaching Schlenkerla levels of bacon-y camp fire char. I get caramel, molasses, a hint of earthiness and some chocolate all hanging out behind the veil of smoke. The taste is the same with a solid smokiness up front moving into sweet slick sweetness coming from caramel, molasses and faint malts. Nearing midway chocolate notes sore to the front and lead into burnt malts and scorched molasses just as the smokiness re-doubles its influence. Into the finish I get brunt notes and solid lingering smokiness hanging around for a while as I come to grips with the full body, full flavor, full velvety creaminess of the experience. I think what this beer needs is a bit more balance in the nose and taste with either, dare I say, bolder notes around the smoke or a little less smoke. To me that would take it from stellar to frikin’ amazing (4.3 to at least 4.6).