Garrison Brewing Company Wintervention Imperial Stout at 10.5% ABV | 60 IBU (C$7.71 at NLC Stavanger, 650 ml, no bottle date or best before, acquired 3-Feb-2017, reviewed 8-Feb-2017)
Appearance: near opaque black with brown highlights at the margins, medium dense light beige head diminishing gradually to a thin cap, moderate lacing. (4/5) Aroma: chocolate nibs, coffee, dark roasty malt, light nutty, hint of wet dog. (6/10) Taste: moderate sweet, moderate-high bitter. (7/10) Palate: medium slightly slick body dropping off to watery, moderate carbonation, off-dry moderate bitter and mildly warming finish. (3/5)
“It’s 20º below, dark at 4 o’clock & the holidays are over… Time for a Wintervention!” Indeed. I honestly don’t know how many more Canadian winters I can stand, but double digit ABVs might hold the key to increasing that number. Marginally. Except, funny thing, even though the ABV for this is well integrated and manifests only as a mild warming, the body is surprisingly thin. Given the somewhat enthusiastic flavours and alcohol load on this one, I’d expect (and prefer) a thicker body, but this almost feels like a (fairly anemic) porter. Warming doesn’t really improve this, either – as I noted above, there’s actually a hint of wet dog that actually starts to come to the fore, once you let this sit for a bit, so I find myself in the fairly unique position of recommending you don’t drink this Imperial Stout too warm. I’m actually surprised this isn’t better than their Martello Stout, but given this is nearly double the price per millilitre, I’d say drink two Martellos instead. On the up side, it’s not too sweet, so there’s that. (13/20)
6.5/10 #ryansbooze ryansbooze.com
