Name: Great Lakes: Blackout Stout
Brewed In/Type: Cleveland, OH / Russian Imperial Stout
Bought at/Price: Woodman's / $8.99 4pack
Dennis: They say some good can come from everything bad. This beer is based off the 2003 power outage that affected a lot of the northeastern US. Smelling of roasty malts the beer tastes like what you would expect from an imperial stout, strong dark chocolate tastes combined with burnt toast hints. I"m sure there are some hop somewhere but I can't pick them out from the rich taste. Certainly no the richest/thickest Imperial stout I've had, but at 9% it certianly will keep you warm at night. But as the label shows, any friend who shows up with $53 bucks of beer in a black out is always welcome.
Jen: As a general rule of thumb, Great Lakes makes some outstanding beers. This one seems to fall short by just a hair. It starts with a nice scent of roasted malts. The taste follows up nicely with a dry espresso taste and dark chocolate (not creamy like milk chocolate, more like a Hersheys Special Dark mini bar). There is a definite dryness to this that leaves your mouth with a taste that lingers only for a short while. On the exhale, I get a twinge of the 9% alcohol. The body of this beer is just too thin for me, and that is where this brew falls up a hair short. I feel a Russian Imperial Stout should coat your mouth and hang around for a while after swallowing. I would, however, never turn this down, as I am a stout lover and this is a very good one to have!
Rating: 4 out of 5