Funky Fluid Breakfast Stout Rwanda Minazi Coffee

Brewery: Funky Fluid
Country: Poland
ABV: 7%
Style: Milk / Sweet Stout
Other Notes: Hops – HBC 472

Brewer Description: (from can) Full-bodied and smooth milk stout with Rwanda Minazi coffee selected by Sławek Szostek & Kuba Poręcki and roasted by Czarna Fala in Warsaw. Perfect match!

My rating: 4
My beeradvocate.com rating: 4.13
My ratebeer.com rating: 4

Intro: A 500ml can, with a best before date of 17th December 2021. Poured into a snifter glass.
Appearance: Dark brown in colour with a half finger tanned head that dissipated fairly quickly but left some nice lacing.
Aroma: Roasty, coffee, with milky/creamy notes.
Taste: Mildly sweet, milk coffee, roasty, coffee beans, espresso, light bitter finish.
Mouthfeel: Creamy, velvet silky, smooth, full bodied with soft carbonation.
Overall: Very coffee forward, but that’s great if you enjoy coffee. Creamy and silky smooth just made it so easy to drink.

Advertisement

Funky Fluid Gelato Pastry Sour – PB&J

Brewery: Funky Fluid
Country: Poland
ABV: 5.8%
Style: Sour Ale – Smoothie / Soda / Pastry
Other Notes: Hops – Amarillo

Brewer Description: (from can) Sweet & sour beer. Inspired by Italian ice creams and famous Peanut Butter & Jelly sandwich. Packed up to the ceiling with raspberry & black currant purée.

My rating: 4
My beeradvocate.com rating: 4.17
My ratebeer.com rating: 3.9

Intro: A 500ml can, with a best before date of 1st July 2021. Poured into a Alvinne teku glass.
Appearance: A cloudy artificial purple pink colour, with a one finger pink head that disappeared almost immediately, while leaving no lacing.
Aroma: Sweet, dessert, jammy, mixed berries, wafer, nutty, with notes of peanut butter.
Taste: Sour, tart, jammy, mixed berries, sweetness, wafer, nutty.
Mouthfeel: Medium bodied with moderate carbonation.
Overall: Easy drinking dessert like beer. Although the nuttiness was more like wafer/peanuts than peanut butter, it still tasted nice with the jammy mixed berry flavours.

Alvinne Cuvée Sofie Alvino

Brewery: Brouwerij Alvinne
Country: Belgium
ABV: 8%
Style: American Wild Ale
Other Notes: 2016 vintage. Alvinne limited edition, single cask, 700 bottles. 2012 French Oak from Burgundy. Grape variety – Boskoop

Brewer Description: (from bottle in Dutch) Alvino is een exclusief project omdat we enkel druiven van eigen kweek gebruiken. De oogst van 2016 was uitzonderlijk goed, voldoende om aan twee vaten cuvee sofie 20kg per vat toete voegen.

(translated to English) Alvino is an exclusive project because we only use grapes from our own cultivation. The 2016 harvest was exceptionally good, enough to add 20kg per barrel to two barrels of cuvee sofie.

My rating: 4
My beeradvocate.com rating: 4.15
My ratebeer.com rating: 3.9

Intro: A 500ml bottle, 2016 vintage, with a best before date of December 2021. Poured into an Alvinne teku glass.
Appearance: A lightly hazy copper amber colour with a one finger off white head that dissipated fairly quickly to a ring around the glass, while leaving some nice lacing.
Aroma: Sweet malt, grape, grape juice, oak, lightly vinous and light funk.
Taste: Lightly sour, grape, lightly vinous, oak, a splash of sweetness, apple, tart, funky.
Mouthfeel: Medium bodied with moderate carbonation.
Overall: Not as vinous as expected from the barrel, but it was still enjoyable and easy drinking.

De Struise Black Damnation IV – Coffee Club

Brewery: De Struise Brouwers
Country: Belgium
ABV: 13%
Style: American Imperial Stout
Other Notes: 72 IBUs

Brewer Description: (from bottle) A Belgian Royal Stout from Flanders aged for 2yrs in Caribbean rum barrels.

My rating: 4
My beeradvocate.com rating: 4.4
My ratebeer.com rating: 4.3

Intro: A 330ml bottle, Vintage 2018, bottled on 26th November 2020, with a best before date of bottled date +5 years. Poured into a De Struise Black Damnation tasting glass.
Appearance: Black in colour with a half finger beige head that dissipated fairly quickly to a ring around the glass, while leaving some lacing.
Aroma: Roasty, coffee, neapolitan ice cream blend, chocolate, rum, brown sugar.
Taste: Moderately sweet, lightly boozy, rum, roasty, coffee, chocolate, oak, molasses, brown sugar, with vanilla notes.
Mouthfeel: Medium to full bodied with soft carbonation.
Overall: Not a fan of rum, but this worked well with enjoyable aromas and flavours.

Trillium Wild Sinister Kid – Double Blackberry & Cabernet Grapes

Brewery: Trillium Brewing Company
Country: USA
ABV: 10%
Style: American Wild Ale
Other Notes: American Wild Ale aged in red wine and bourbon barrels. Hops – US Goldings. Malts – Pilsner, Abbey, Special B and Carafa III. Adjuncts – Blackberry, Cabernet Grapes, Belgian Candi Syrup and Turbinado Sugar

Brewer Description: (from website) Sinister Kid is named after the unofficial mascot of our Congress Street brewery: a long-forgotten, dismembered doll unearthed in construction rubble. We dusted off Sinister Kid and breathed new life into her, installing a new pipe leg and a wire arm. We quickly found a new use for her evil appearance: keeping an ever-present, protective watch over the first floor of our Fort Point restaurant and brewery.

This year, we’ve crafted what we consider to be our most complex variations of Sinister Kid to date. We took the base Belgian Strong Ale recipe, fermented it with our native New England yeast culture for two years in both bourbon and wine barrels, then transferred the beer to our oak foeders to condition on a variety of fruit. The six resulting blends are intricate expressions of wild yeast, time, and fruit all coming together harmoniously in the bottle.

Three of the 2019 Wild Sinister Kid blends were conditioned upon twice the amount of fruit as their counterparts to achieve a truly elegant and fruit-forward final blend. Consisting of 50% bourbon barrel-aged beer and 50% wine barrel-aged beer, Wild Sinister Kid: Double Blackberry Cabernet presents a deep plum color in the glass. Intense blackberry aromas wash over the palate immediately followed by notes of fig, raisin, and cherry. Mildly warming, with a touch of sweetness and rounded acidity, this beer is elegantly balanced and refined.

My rating: 4
My beeradvocate.com rating: 4.22
My ratebeer.com rating: 4

Intro: A 330ml bottle, bottled on 19th September 2019. Poured into a Lindemans stemmed lambic teku/tulip glass.
Appearance: A cloudy dark reddish purple colour with a one finger brownish purple head that dissipated fairly quickly while leaving only sparse lacing.
Aroma: Lightly tart, blackberry, nail polish, oak.
Taste: Tart, sour, blackberry, mixed berries, grapes, grape skin, lightly vinous, oak.
Mouthfeel: Medium bodied with moderate to soft carbonation.
Overall: Aroma and flavours were enjoyable, and the 10% ABV was well hidden.