“Rare and often rumored about in the darkest corners of the beer community, World Wide Stout is dark, rich, roasty and complex, and lingers somewhere beyond the limits of the average beer. Brewed with a ridiculous amount of barley, we’ve now taken this Dogfish Head classic and aged it on oak with real vanilla beans! With a little tender love and care we foster this beer from smooth, sweet wort into the big, bad blackend stout it always longed to be. Its bold, port-like complexity goes great with (or as) dessert. With its high ABV, this is an excellent candidtate for cellaring, so grab a few bottles to enjoy now and lay the others down for a few years.”
Glassware: Snifter.
Appearance: Pitch black with a finger of brown foam which rapidly reduced to a collar. We’re seeing a wet lace drag as we imbibe.
Aroma: Pungent! The two feature flavours both dominate the nose…with the vanilla slightly outweighing the oak. Unfortunately it appears to be a bit of a one (or in this case two) trick pony with only very gentle glimpses of molasses, subtle peaty notes and licorice backing it up. The upside is the extremely high ABV (16%) is nicely disguised.
Flavour: So much more complex than the aroma. Some vanilla and oak but there’s a wealth of other flavours like earthy tobacco, burnt wood, toasty malt, cherry fruit sweetness, prunes, licorice and dark chocolate. There’s an insane amount of booze carrying through to the finish with a stack of roasted and burnt notes going the distance.
Mouthfeel: Oily and astringent. Surprisingly well carbonated with medium body.
Overall: It’s a memorable beer but it’s just so damn extreme. It’s just like the 120 minute IIPA in terms of it could be an all time beer but the slight overreach actually detracts from it. Great drop but rather tough to finish.