New Glarus Cherry Stout

It’s good to have friends in different parts of the country to send you beer that you can’t get locally, this beer comes to me via my buddy Jason at BarleyPopMarker.  You can read his New Glarus Cherry Stout review here, which I hadn’t read prior to this review.  I’ve had a bunch of New Glarus beers of late and when I heard their latest “Unplugged” would a cherry stout, I got pretty excited.  Love Stouts, Love Cherries, and Love spontaneous fermentation.  That’s right  spontaneous fermentation.  This beer was aged in oak barrels to promote  spontaneous fermentation, which gets me wondering will this beer be sour or funky and how much.

Here is how New Glarus describes their beer:

Due to popular demand we brought back Dan’s Gold Medal winning “Unplugged Cherry Stout.” This ale is aged in Oak barrels to promote the spontaneous fermentation. Eight Wisconsin malted barleys combined with Wisconsin Montmorency Cherries make for a complex and sublime taste experience that you may never find again. Discover why Dan is repeatedly recognized as the Best Brewmaster in America.

ABV: 6.5%

Bottle: 12oz Capped & Foiled

Appearance:

Beer isn’t very dark for a stout, more the tone of a brown ale, but has this amazing red tone to it.  Held up to the light it shines a bright ruby red.   While it didn’t have a huge head, it does appear to have a slight bit of retention with a nice little clingy collar of beer.

Aroma:

Quite unique, initially it smells like Boylan’s Black Cherry soda.  After a couple more deep whiffs, the cherries are still the prominent player, but there are notes of cough syrup (cherry of course) and a bit of funk.

Taste:

As you’d expect from the aroma, this beer is big right off the bat with a giant sweet cherry right up front.  As that passes through your mouth you get a ever so mild hint of oak as the flavor changed to a tart cherry.  it finishes up with a chocolate covered cherry sweetness. Very thin mouth feel.  Lots of cherries in this beer, that’s for sure, very cherry pie like.

Glassware: Goblet or Wide Snifter

Overall Impression:

First let me say I really enjoyed this beer, reminded me a lot of their Wisconsin Belgium Red, also very much like cherry pie.  As a stout, I don’t think it fails under a stout would expect a thicker, darker beer with more roasted grain qualities.  But, I’m not a BJCP judge so I don’t have to follow their guidelines.  I think 12oz is plenty for this beer, very cherry sweet, I would be hard pressed to drink more.