Herevana – McLeods – Smugglers Bay Bourbon Barrel-aged Milk Stout 2020
Smugglers Bay Bourbon Barrel-aged Milk Stout 2020 , the only words missing are “Limited Edition” I await the day when we get “restricted Release” a contender for longest beer name of the year.
I had to sit in the corner. the label clearly says “limited edition” and it’s bottle 865. that I’ve having, which also “Can be” cellared for 5-10 years. I don’t have a cellar, my fridge keeping turned out to be less than ideal with the Epic beers recently, and I don’t have 5-10 years of patience left in me. So here we are.
McLeod’s Brewery Make the McLeod’s Milk Stout (Bourbon Barrel beer in 🇳🇿 Waipu, New Zealand, it’s a Stout – Flavored / Pastry beer with a modest (it’s relative) 6.9% ABV and this would be 2.7 standard drink units in NZ
It is with great regret that I’ve not been to Waipu, perhaps next year, a significant birthday, I’ll get there. It’s been an odd year, but there’s no immediate rush. Like a cellared beer I should improve with age. /smirk I’d hope that Jason would at least give me a nod of familiarity. if not friendship.
Anticipated & delicious, we took 2019 seasonal Billycan Milk Stout & matured it in bourbon casks for six months. Like its predecessor, the beer is moreish & luxurious. Soft bourbon with vanilla & cocoa on the nose, its equally-captivating palate is smooth, full-bodied & silky leading to a very satisfying finish.
A milk stout aroma, which is on point 🙂 when I opened this.
The pour is more dark brown that coal black, but in the glass you get obsidian darkness and a head that is cloud fully and coffee coloured .
Aroma is smokey which then leads to a taste that is quite sweet and fruity and light and travels all the way along a nice journey finishing with a no hurry to be just quite nice and calm and lovely.
That ‘fruitiness’ the brightness in a Stout isn’t something that I’ve read about, I might be making up my own descriptions for a beer that is jut really nice, it’s not bitter in a way that makes you thing “oh that’s bitter” or difficult in a way that makes you go “that’s weird” in the mouth, there’s not dryness, no smokiness, nothing is not where it shouldn’t be, there’s just this really nice pleasing sweetness in this that sites there being it’s thing, and it’s ok.
There was only one way to go with Music after Amy Whitehouse, of course it was Elbow. Live at The Ritz – An Acoustic Performance by Elbow A Christmas Vinyl present , you should enjoy it on Spotify.
The Pdubyah-o-meter rates this as 9 on the arbitrary number scale, This is the beer you buy people who like Stouts, the beer that you give to people who want to try a stout, the beer that you buy yourself because you deserve it. It’s that beer.
Herevana beers are those I drink at home, I’m not at some beer festival, like, for instance, Beervana, but am just in my kitchen, usually, dining room table, sometimes, or outside, occasionally, where I can take an average picture and write in real time about the beer that I’ve invested in, both in a monetary and emotional way.
Philip himself.
A life just as ordinary 