I post my tasting notes of good (and bad) beer that I find in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond. I don't write snooty or nuanced reviews, nor do I only drink one style of beer.

I'll generally rate beers on this purposefully crude scale, with a few accompanying tasting notes:

0 = offensively bad
1 = bad
2 = meh (mediocre)
3 = good
4 = exceptional

Follow me for an eclectic mix of beers and info about where to find them. I am Stephen Goggin. When I'm not writing about good beer and drinking it, I'm a PhD candidate at UC Berkeley.

 

Mikkeller’s Black Buffalo Bourbon Barrel Stout. A 3 of 4. Thanks Ruth & Greg for the bottle! The nose is basically all bourbon, with some chocolatey notes as well. Sips very well with tons of complexity and a nice balance between the chocolate and roastiness you’d expect from a stout, with the vanilla and oak notes of bourbon, with a nice thick, sticky body. Quite good, but the bourbon seems a bit overpowering at times.

Mikkeller’s Black Buffalo Bourbon Barrel Stout. A 3 of 4. Thanks Ruth & Greg for the bottle! The nose is basically all bourbon, with some chocolatey notes as well. Sips very well with tons of complexity and a nice balance between the chocolate and roastiness you’d expect from a stout, with the vanilla and oak notes of bourbon, with a nice thick, sticky body. Quite good, but the bourbon seems a bit overpowering at times.

9 months ago