Blue Mountain Barrel House Dark Hollow Chocolate & Coffee Aged

With my February Rare Beer of the Month Club, I received a bottle of Blue Mountain Barrel House Dark Hollow Chocolate & Coffee Aged. The beer pours a black color with a bubbly tan colored head. The aroma is bold with toasted malts, dark Belgian chocolate, coffee, espresso, vanilla, cherry, and caramel. The taste is rich with dark chocolate, sweet with vanilla and coffee, and has a solid toasted malt base. A dry oakiness arrives with a twist of cherry. The alcohol content is 10.0% ABV. What a wonderful beer this was! It was full of a variety of flavors and the cherry accents from the bourbon really made it, and I would highly recommend this beer.

Ballast Point Victory at Sea Coffee Vanilla Imperial Porter

I picked up a bottle of Ballast Point Victory at Sea Coffee Vanilla Imperial Porter from Al’s of Hampden. The beer pours a black color with a frothy tan head that leaves plenty of lacing on the glass. The aroma consists of coffee, espresso, caramel, vanilla, dark chocolate, and toasted malts. The taste is full of dark and bitter chocolate with lots of toasted malts. Once the bold chocolate flavor subsides a bit, coffee takes over the mouth with a touch of vanilla sweetness. The finish is dry and roasted that lingers for a while with a bitterness and a bit of carbonation bite on the back of the throat. The alcohol content is 10.0% ABV. The dark chocolate bitterness and the coffee bitterness really played nicely together, bound by the vanilla sweetness. It definitely ranks up there with the better coffee infused beers.