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Beer Reviews

Captain Swain’s Extra Stout

Cisco Brewers
Nantucket Island, MA
USA
http://www.ciscobrewers.com/

Style: Dry Stout
ABV: 8.0%

Rings’s Rating:
   (Outstanding within its style.)


Comments:
Now that we’re back to American craft beers, for the most part, I’ll “importing” another brew from Nantucket. I mentioned briefly a bit of Cisco Brewers tale in my review of Grey Lady Ale a few months ago. I’d been saving their Captain Swain’s Extra Stout as a winter warmer, so today seemed like the day.

Named after a whaling captain ancestor of one of the proprietors, this dry Irish stout contains a blend of thirteen different malts in the grist bill. It pours dark, thick and black, with low carbonation and rather like used motor oil. There’s a lovely milk chocolate head that unfortunately lingers for only a few moments before settling into a thin circle around the edge of the glass. It has a lovely roasted, woody aroma and the initial body is a full toasty, roasty malty assault that jumps quickly to a firm, dry bite and lingering hoppy finish. A beer like this is actually a good reason for my pessimism at Guinness Foreign Extra reviewed in February, because this is what that could have been: firm, full and nuanced.

This is an above average effort.

Reviewed by Rings on May 2, 2011.

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