“Each year under the night sky, we honour the ancient technique of our brewing ancestors with the ritual of adding wood fired stones to our kettle to caramelise the brew. Brewed for when the days are short and the nights are cold, our 2018 Stone Beer is a wood-fired porter. With aromas and flavours of roast barley, hints of coffee and dark chocolate, this winter release finishes with a firm bitterness. Stone Beer 2018 will be pouring through taps and available on shelves in venues across Australia from today onwards – Check ahead with your local watering hole to see if stock is available.”
Glassware: English pint.
Appearance: Very dark brown with faint cherry red edges. It only manages a finger of tan foam which settles to a filmy overlay. We see healthy lace work as it ebbs.
Aroma: Lovely traditional porter notes with a distinct cherry fruit sweetness fused through. Earthy malts, dark jammy fruits (fig, raisin, prunes etc), cocoa, almond and super subtle smoky/peaty notes buried deep. We wouldn’t go as far as saying it’s subdued but it takes a vigorous swirl to get a good nose-full.
Flavour: Showing a lot more vitality with dark chocolate, earthy malts, subtle smoke and mild espresso bitterness developing early in the mid. There’s this delicious underlying cherry sweetness that carries through in to the dry and toasty finish which offers additional notes of dark fruit, mild coffee and charred malts on the back end.
Mouthfeel: Slick and effortless. It holds a good weight which helps carry the 7.5% ABV. Moderate co2.
Overall: We see they’ve decided to drop from the stubby 500ml bottles to 330ml this year for some reason. That side of it is a bit disappointing but the beer itself is pretty damn good. Unfortunately we missed the 2017 release so we can’t compare it and although this is a fine offering for us nothing can top the 2016.