Sierra Nevada Narwhal Imperial Stout

Brewed By: Sierra Nevada Brewing Company in Chico, California 
Purchased: Single 12oz bottle from a 4-pack, bought at Friar Tucks in Urbana, IL; 2012
Style/ABV: Russian Imperial Stout, 10.2%

Reported IBUs: 60

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Sierra Nevada hasn't been messing around this year, dropping some really nice beer with their Ruthless Rye and 2012 Bigfoot. Today's beer is another down to business beer; a big ol' 10.2% Imperial Stout. In case you aren't familiar with the social news website Reddit, you should check it out. They have pictures of cats and boobs and other cool shit. Reddit is broken down into "subreddits." A subreddit is basically a forum with a specific theme. Reddit has a picture subreddit, a gaming subreddit, and a beer subreddit. You can find the beer subreddit at Reddit.com/r/beer. Why is any of this relevant?

Because the folks at /r/beer were jizzing their pants over the release of the Narwhal Stout. The Narwhal is a famous Reddit avatar, logo, and character. "The Reddit Narwhal." So -- of course -- the denizens of /r/beer had to try tonight's beer. I happen to be one of those denizens of Reddit and /r/beer, but I didn't have any particular plans to buy this beer.

I stumbled upon this beer on accident. I was looking for some beer to drink while playing poker at the girlfriend's house. I went to the liquor store, saw this beer, and said, "why the fuck not?" And so it came to be. As you may recall, I really enjoyed the Narwhal Stout. I enjoyed it so much, I drank 3 bottles in about 90 minutes, along with a bunch of other beer. And I had a badddd hangover. I guess the moral of this story is...Reddit likes Narwhals, Narwhals give me hangovers, and I should spend less time on Reddit. About Sierra Nevada:

Sierra Nevada are one of the big players in craft brewing, and one of the first craft breweries to arrive on the craft beer scene. If you check out their history page, you will see that founder Ken Grossman began his quest to build a brewery in 1976. In 1980, Ken Grossman and co-founder Paul Camusi brewed their first batch of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. According to Wikipedia, Sierra Nevada's Pale Ale is the second best selling craft beer behind Boston Lager. Sierra Nevada is the sixth largest brewing company in the United States as well, cranking out over 750,000 barrels in 2010.

The Narwhal Stout is part of the brewery's "high altitude" beers. If you roll over to the Narwhal page, you can get info on it. The beer is described as having notes of espresso, baker's cocoa, roasted grain, and smoke. The beer is brewed with Magnum and Challenger hops, and features Two-row Pale, Caramel, Chocolate, Honey, Carafa, and Roasted Barley malts. Clocking in at 10.2% ABV and packing 60 IBUs, this is a massive Imperial Stout, even by extreme craft beer standards. Let's get this into a glass, and see what's up.

Sierra Nevada Narwhal Imperial Stout

This pours ink black, with a thick viscous body. The head begrudgingly and slowly forms, cascading into a finger's worth of dark, coffee-brown foam. The head is thick and creamy, and clings with good lacing. At 10.2%, you get alcohol legs on this. In bright light, this beer is still impressively dark, and the head is still coffee-brown. The head is sustaining nicely, which leads me to believe this has good carbonation.

The aroma is a really smooth blast of strong roast, chocolate, and hints of meaty smoke. I'm pulling out hints of complex alcohol and booze, boozy dark fruits, raisins, chocolate and cocoa, and some hints of bright hops. (some people are saying they smell licorice; I'm getting raisins and hops). I also get some coffee, and just really nice roast. You get a hint of campfire, but not much.

This is a boozy and hoppy Imperial Stout. This has a ton of boozy complexity, with hints of licorice, bourbon, and even some spice. I'm tasting a lot of roast, grain, and even some tar. This is also quite bitter, with piney and bitter hops driving the back half of this beer. The hops build as you drink this as well. The hops in tandem with the dark roasted malts almost give this beer a Black IPA kind of vibe. There are moments where I'm getting that roast-hop-anise thing you often find in Cascadian/Black IPAs. The giant alcohol presence only reinforces this fact. In fact...the more I drink this, the more I feel like this blurs the line between Stout and Black IPA. I am getting some really solid coffee notes and espresso in this beer, and this drinks really damn smooth for 10.2%.

Yup...smooth, creamy, supported by light carbonation, and pretty damn bitter...this is easy-drinking at 10.2%. I should know, I put down three of these in less than 90 minutes. It may have even been less than an hour. The mouthfeel on this is full, with moderate palate depth for the style, and big complexity. The complexity in this comes from the big hops and the booze. Up front is roast, coffee, espresso, and bitter chocolate; this rolls into intense bitterness, fading roast, burgeoning hops and pine; big anise; the finish is lingering anise/licorice, coffee, hop bitterness. Big dry finish.

Rating: Above-Average

I'm feeling a Decent Above-Average on this. This is a fantastic beer, especially from the Sierra Nevada wheelhouse. Maybe unsurprisingly, this beer favors big hops. The boozy complexity (and 10.2% ABV) is a bit of a shock, and to that I say: "Bravo!" I'm serious! This beer has big complexity thanks to the huge hop and alcohol presence. This should be fun to age, and you certainly would do right by picking up two 4-packs; one to drink fresh, and one to drink down the road. Being so bitter, I would pair this with sweet chocolate cake, a burger, ribs (as per SN's website), or a pork sandwich. I think a 4-pack of this was around 9-12 bucks. Not bad.

Random Thought: This one is really pushing the line between Stout and Black IPA. Ultimately, the Narwhal Stout still seems to tip towards roast, but this also has a huge hop thing going on. Thankfully, beer style guidelines are like Manti Te'o's girlfriend. They don't real.