Destihl Dosvidanya Rye 2017

Brewed By: Destihl Restaurant and Brew Works in Normal/Bloomington, Illinois 
Purchased: 500ml (1 pint, .09oz bottle) bought at Destsihl in Bloomington, IL; 2017 (batch date: 2017)

Style/ABV: American Barrel-Aged Russian Imperial Stout, 12.5%
Reported IBUs: 84

Tonight's beer is part of the increasingly interesting Midwest portfolio of stellar BA stouts. I've been sleeping on this one for a few years, but the word really needs to get out. About Destihl: 

Destihl is a brewery (Bloomington) and brewpub (Normal, IL & Champaign, IL) based out of the Midwest. Specifically, the middle of Illinois in the middle of the United States. Daaaa midwest. The brewery was founded by CEO & Brewmaster, Matt Potts, in 2007. Like many brewery founders, Potts started out as a homebrewer, and would eventually trade his law school education and law practice for those sweet barley suds. Destihl currently brews a myriad of regular and barrel-aged beers, including an increasing portfolio of tasty sour brews. For more info, check out their website. 

So Dosvidanya is Distihl's big barrel-aged Russian Imperial Stout. It is clearly inspired by beers like Bourbon County Brand Stout, but has its own unique flavor profile. The Dosvidanya Rye is another wrinkle to the Dosvidanya lineup, featuring 2-row malt, chocolate malt, roasted barley, wheat, black malt, caramel malt 120, munich malt, victory malt, extra special malt, rice hulls, and of course rye whiskey barrels.

Destihl Dosvidanya Rye 2017

The appearance of this beer is dark, and it manages to produce Stormy Daniels amount of head. There's a fair amount of lacing, and I'm not just talking about her outfit. The legs are abundant, but what really works here is the beer's gentle demeanor. From the onset the bottle art conveys a sweet gentle tone, but lurking beneath is a brutalist concrete interior, hardened mentality, and cutthroat soldier. You have to be tough as nails to handle all four and a half eight inches of el presidente. Or whatever. 

I would say this is one of the more aromatically interesting stouts I've had in a while. The nose conveys rye, dark cherry notes, fudge, oak, chocolate, nice layers of wood, and some hints of coffee. Missing from the nose is overt raisin and whiskey tones, which you often find in these stouts. It's a welcomed change of pace.

The taste is a complex fusion of rye whiskey barrel, cherry-fudge, chocolate dipped cherries, layers of wood, almost-cherry-skin without any hint of sour, chocolate-forward coffee without any artificial or adjunct chocolate notes, gentle alcohol kisses, and a lot of complex caramel notes. It's a very constrained and mature interpretation of the style.

My untappy notes say: "Next best deviant after the og. Tons of chocolate, rye, coffee, licorice, vanilla, macaroon, wood, spice. 3d and complex like anal." I of course penned that slightly tipsy at Dosvidanya day. But to give credit to myself, I think that is mostly fair. I'm not getting quite as much vanilla or macaroon at the moment, but the licorice is a natural comp to the big cherry notes in this beer. This is full-bodied, complex stuff. It has good depth, complexity, and structure. The way this lingers on your palate reminds me of Deschutes' The Abyss. It kind of has a bitter, cherry-forward, caramel-driven finish with hints of rye. It doesn't finish overly sweet, and it leans away from the barrel/spirit sweetness and instead favors complexity and flavor. Again, this is a very mature stout. I'd say up front I'm getting chocolate, black cherries, chocolate-cherry-coffee; the mids drop rye and licorice and the viscosity picks up; the back end starts with aggressive layers of wood and barrel, and fade into lingering rye and cherries and caramel and dryness. 

Look...before I drop the score...this is riding the line between a strong above-average and light divine brew for me. I think there are a lot of amazing barrel-aged stouts presently available, and I would not hesitate to recommend this beer. BUT BUT BUT what makes this beer ESPECIALLY INTERESTING is the presence of the almost-jammy-but-not-at-all-sour fruity cherry notes. It's just a super unique, uncommon flavor not present in 99% of barrel-aged stouts. And that not only counts for something, but it makes this variant especially unique and interesting. I've emphasized on this blog before how I think review scores are basically bullshit and that people need to move in the direction of nuance with beer. There is nothing I've tasted quite like the Dosvidanya Rye 2017. It's almost flirting with something like Goose Island's Backyard Rye, only way more complex. And I really dig that. I'm curious to see how this ages, but as it stands on this present date: 

Rating: LIGHT LIGHT Divine Brew (4.5/5.0 Untappd) 

Random Thought: Destihl has figured out the stout game, but they are really lagging behind with cool glassware. As I am aware, there is no Dosvidanya glassware. And that is ridiculous considering they have made 'Dosvidanya Day' an event. ISO: kick ass Dosvidanya glassware.