Name: Storm King Stout

Brewer: Victory Brewing

Style: Russian Imperial Stout

Vintage: 2007

Cellared On: August 30th, 2007

Original Tasting: September 26th, 2007

Every Victory beer I’ve tried in the past has been fantastic, so I’ve been really looking forward to trying their Storm King Imperial Stout.

Let me tell you, this is one dark beer, even for a stout. No hints of light at all were coming through it, even when I put the glass up to a strong lamp. After I finished pouring it, it had a nice cocoa-colored bubbly head. Wisps of lace remained almost until my last few sips.

Storm King is a very subtle beer aroma-wise. Not many smells at all. I got a few whiffs of roasted malt, but not much else.

I really like the flavors of this beer. It starts off with some big roasted malt flavors kind of reminiscent of coffee/espresso. I also get a little bit of bitterness at the start, but I can’t tell if it’s a hoppy bitterness or more of a coffee/cocoa bitter. There’s some nice contrast with a little bit of a sweet caramel taste. This beer is much less astringent then other Russian Imperial Stouts I’ve tried, and is pretty damn easy to drink. The hops start to come on strong as the beer goes down, and this brew finishes with a true hop wallop. I was tasting this beer for an hour afterwards, if finished so powerfully. I could barely even detect any of the 9.1% ABV.

I found more carbonation here then in your usual stout. Some creaminess in the mouthfeel, but not too much.

Overall this was a great beer to drink, but the powerful hoppy finish would make it hard for me to drink more then one.

Six Month Tasting: March 26th, 2008

This was hard to drink before? Not anymore!

There’s still an assertive hop presence here, but it is not quite as intense as before. The beer is the better for it in my opinion. There’s a great tug going on between the bitter hops and the astrigent coffee/espresso malt flavors. It’s hard to figure out where one starts and the other starts. I’m also getting a bit more of a chocolate flavor then I was before, and it works well with the espresso notes. I think the powerful hop flavors were hiding those cocoa notes six months ago.

Storm King is clearly a winner in the cellar.

Cellar Outlook: The bottle is stamped saying “Drink before 2/12″, so I think it’ll be fine in the cellar. It should be even better in a few years. I expect it to develop some coffee/toffee flavors while subsiding some in the bitterness department. I might have to pick up some more of this brew, I have a feeling it’s going to be really good….

Six Month Cellar Outlook: Storm King is doing great right now, but the fading hops worry me a bit. There’s a great balance in the beer (I sound like Obi-Wan writing that), and I’m afraid more aging is going to upset that.

Next Tasting: September 2008