Background

I like stouts, and I’ve liked most everything from Avery, so I thought I would give Mephistopheles Stout a try.   The name gives everything away for this stout.  This is a devil of a beer.

Mephistopheles is such a mouthful

Avery’s Mephistopheles Looks

Mephistopheles has a dark tan head and a thick head.  Everything about this beer screams DARK!

The dark brown head stood for quite a while, lasting a few minutes.  The head is really thick and foamy.  The head on this stout could hold a dime, and is one of the better beer heads I’ve seen in a while.

This stout is a very dark beer.  (Did I say that already?)  A quote from the label states “he who does not love light”.  The quote is no exaggeration; this beer abhors light.  I held the glass up to the light and I could see no light through the glass.  I can’t get coffee to do that!  The glass was held a few inches from the light bulb.  I am officially impressed at how dark this beer is.  The color was dark like black coffee, but no light could pass through.  Mephistopheles is like a beer black hole.

Aroma

This beer makes a very impressive entrance, and when the bottle cap is popped off everyone around knows it.  Mephistopheles Stout has a very strong smell of spices and nutty coffee.  I could actually smell the beer from several feet away.  The aroma could almost be described as toffee.  There are also hints of caramel.  I could smell a bit of the hops, but I would not say it was pronounced.  The beer has just a hint of hops.

Taste

The stout has a good creamy mouthfeel, with an alcohol bite which creeps up on you.  Mephistopheles is a very strong beer.  The alcohol content is 16% ABV, much stronger than most imperial stouts.  The mouthfeel may be from the lower carbonation levels which give the beer a smooth seductive feel.  The mouthfeel does seduce you a bit, but the bitterness and alcohol quickly overrun any flavor you might enjoy.  There are strong notes of whiskey.  The roasted malt flavor seems like “burnt coffee”.  The beer has some maltiness, but not sweet.  I’d even call it a whiskey coffee or whiskey double expresso.

The beer claims 107 IBUs, although I thought I had read 100 IBUs were the effective limit for any beer.  Needless to say the beer is a bit very bitter.  I think you need to add a ton of hops just to balance the amount of malt needed to reach 16% ABV.  The label states they also added turbinado sugar (brown sugar), most likely to get the alcohol content high.  The grain bill for this beer must be impressive, second only to the hops needed to reach 107 IBUs.

It takes a while to drink this beer.  It took me a very long time.  If you enjoy very strong stouts, this is a good sipping beer on cold winter nights.

Results

Mephistopheles is much stronger than I’d like it.  Imperial Stouts are usually around 9% ABV to 10% ABV.  I think 16% ABV is too much, and it really overpowers this beer.  The bitterness is very powerful, and the roasted malt tastes too burnt.  I’ll give this stout 7 dark princes out of 10.

Brewery: Avery
Country of Origin: Colorado, USA
Style: Imperial Stout
ABV: 16% ABV

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3. Scary Brews!

Oak aged beers are starting to be popular.  Several brewpubs are starting to offer this specialty.  We saw that Avery (the makers of The Beast) offered one, so we had to try it.  The beer features the fallen angel, Samael, on the label.  Samael is known as the accuser, seducer, and destroyer.  In some lore, he is the true Satan.  This is one devilish beer.

Avery's Samael is quite the seducer

Samael is not a small beer.  This beer comes in at 14.9% ABV, which is much higher than most oaked ales – much higher than most beers in fact.  We were expecting alcoholic jet fuel.

Samael has a very malty smell.  There are some hop aromas, but you really have to sniff for it.  If you homebrew or have ever been to a brewery when they were making beer, you know what this beer smells like.  It has that wonderful aroma of malt boiling in the kettle.

The color is a very pretty amber.  When you look closely at the beer, it looks like a snow globe.  There are light flakes floating down to the bottom, while carbonation bubbles float up.  It is very hypnotic to watch.

Samael is quite the yummy dessert!

Our first taste took us by surprise.  The beer is very thick and smooth.  Joan described it as “a yummy dessert where you can’t get to the next bite quick enough”.  We could taste the oak, but just a little.  This beer has very strong caramel flavors, almost like a caramel turtle dessert.  The beer is very well balanced.  The malt flavor is strong, however, it is perfectly countered by the light hops, alcohol, and oak.  Even the aftertaste is tasty.  This will be a very popular beer over the winter holidays at fermentarium.

We give the beer 10 fallen angels out of 10!

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We went looking for some scary brews for Halloween.  Our selection was based purely on if the beer looked somewhat festive for Halloween.  Here’s our scary lineup!

Scary brews for Halloween

Dead Guy Ale

Our first scary 12 ounce brew comes from Portland, Oregon.  It was originally created in the 1990s for a restaurant called Casa U Betcha (surprising that it is in Oregon and not Minnesota with a name like that).  The restaurant served it to celebrate the Mayan Day of the Dead holiday.  The label and beer have no relation to the Grateful Dead, but the label looks close enough to Grateful Dead iconography to give one deadly pause.

Dead Guy Ale

This ghostly pale ale is 6.6% ABV.  The color is actually a strong yellow with a slight haze.  This beer was created as a Maibock using more hops and pacman yeast, but it tastes more like a slightly hoppy pale ale.  The hops tend to sneak up on you in this beer.  There isn’t much hops in the nose or taste, but the aftertaste bitterness lingers.

This beer isn’t a Maibock, there’s too much hoppiness.  It is a pale ale using German grains.  However it is a light and somewhat refreshing beer.  This is a good beer, and might be a great selection for your Halloween, but it won’t “wow” you.

Dead Guy Ale gets 7 bones out of 10.

Hobgoblin Ale

The next witch brew comes from Wychwood Brewery in Oxforshire, England.  We tried the 500ml Hobgoblin Ale in a green bottle.  From what we read, the darker bottle is a new item for the beer.  This beer was first produced in 1996.  The strength is 5.2% ABV.

Hobgoblin Ale

This beer has a heavy malt scent, even a bit chocolatey.  This beer had a much more complex profile than what we were expecting.  We could taste a fruitiness in the beer; some berry that we could not place.  There were also flavors of coffee and nuts.  The aftertaste seemed almost like a stout, but the beer was malty and sweet  The aftertaste also had a strong chocolate flavor.

This beer had a very low hop flavor, and was not bitter at all.  It reminded us of several local nut brown ales.  This is a good English ale.

Hobgoblin Ale gets 8 witch brooms out of 10.

Lakefront Pumpkin Lager

We really didn’t think we could get away with a Halloween review without reviewing a Pumpkin beer.  We really didn’t know what to expect.  Pumpkin isn’t our favorite flavor, and it seems like a weird choice of fruit for a beer.

Lakefront Pumpkin Lager

At first we could not taste the pumpkin in the beer.  It seemed like a sweet light lager.  There was no scent to the beer that we could tell.  There were other flavors, like a hint of cinnamon.  Then the pumpkin flavor creeps up on you.

It really tastes more like a pumpkin pie after about half of the bottle.  It just leaps out at you about half way through the glass.  There is very little hop flavor in the beer to counter the sweetness.  That is by design, because, these fruit beers really should taste like a dessert.  The cinnamon was also stronger with each sip.

The beer really was nice as one, but it was too sweet to drink more.  It was a good beer to try, but if you get a six pack make sure you have 5 friends with you to share.

The Lakefront Pumpkin Lager gets 7 pumpkins out of 10.

Avery’s The Beast

Our last beer was selected a bit blind, even though the Avery Brewery is very near our place.  The label looks scary and we thought that was cool.  We did not realize the horror that lies within the bottle until later.  Most beers range in alcohol between 4 and 7% ABV.  Wines are usually 10-15%.  Once you cross the 16% ABV barrier in the USA, alcohol is taxed at a much higher rate – very few fermented beverages that are not fortified or distilled go beyond 15% ABV.

The Beast is 16.42% ABV.

It scared us.  For a 12 ounce brew, 16% ABV is quite a bit.  A timid sniff of the glass had grassy scents, definite hops, and a strong caramel smell.  There were also hints of honey, and some berries.  With a great aroma like that, how could we be afraid of this beast?

Avery's The Beast

The taste of the beer is BIG.  Scary big.  The mouthfeel is very thick, almost like a syrup.  The beer was much smoother than we were expecting.  At 16.42% ABV, we were expecting jet fuel.  There is a slight burn as it goes down, but not a fire.  There are strong caramel and vanilla flavors.  The hops balance the maltiness quite well.

It would be nice if Avery included the optimal serving temperature and glass.  We noticed that the beer was more flavorful as it warmed up a bit.  We tested the beer in a goblet.

This is a great beer, but imbibe carefully.  If you try to tame too many Beasts, the Beast will tame you.  This is definitely a sipping beer on a cold night.  It might also make a good beer to cellar for a few years.

The Beast gets 10 sharp teeth out of 10!

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