“Descent 22, our birthday beer, has descended. This Imperial Stout is aged in foeder barrels for 6 months, allowing the immersion of the vanilla, oak and wild yeast characters that combine with the roasty, bitter black malt leather-like esthers to complete this winter warmer.”

Glassware: Snifter.

Appearance: Pitch black with a sturdy two finger brown head which hangs on for the ride. Nice lace decoration as we imbibe.

Aroma: Picking up somewhat dark and tart fruits/berries, blood plum and marzipan. We can certainly pick up the woody oak as well. Wafts of carob and or raw cacao, fennel, an obscure molasses-like note and that off-putting ink quality that was detectable in D20. We’re either crazy or not understanding the infected side of this. It is clearly tart (almost sour) and we’re again not only confused but not really digging it.

Flavour: So it’s only now that we’re certain the slight funky-ness is intentional. In the weird, edgy, craft beer-loving side of us we like it but we can’t help but feel that there should be more of a reference to the intentional infection in the description. Anywho… its funky, tart, fruity and oaky accents make way for delicate roasted notes, licorice and milk chocolate which sign off on a soft roasty and funky finish. Good length on it as well.

Mouthfeel: Good density and plenty of grip on the way down. Co2 is spot on and the 10% ABV is well disguised.

Overall: We skipped D21 coz D20 was pretty disappointing. We decided to revisit to see if anything has changed and unfortunately it hasn’t. The only difference is they’ve decided to drop the “Russian” side of the Imperial Stout. It was never a R.I.S anyway so we can agree with them on that.