Abita Bourbon Street Imperial Stout – A First Sampling

A big thank you to everyone at Abita for sending me a sample of their new Bourbon Street Imperial Stout.

First off I think the packaging for this and their other Bourbon Street beer looks great.  This beer will be followed by their Bourbon Street Baltic Porter and it’s my understanding that Abita plans to grow their barrel aging program, so I’m hoping we’ll see even more.  This Imperial Stout is aged for several months in small-batch Bourbon barrels.

Bourbon Street Imperial Stout pours a rich and black/dark brown color with a creamy head. The color is gorgeous and the aroma is loaded with Bourbon, vanilla chocolate and even some coffee.  The taste backs up the nose nicely with lots of coffee, vanilla, Bourbon and dark chocolate flavors.  The mouthfeel is medium and the finish carries in some oak flavors and a really pleasant vanilla-toffee finish.  At 8% ABV there is a bit of a boozy feel and flavor in there, but the beer is so well balanced, that it really seems to mesh well enough with the Bourbon flavors to mask it.

Abita Bourbon Street Imperial Stout is available in 22oz bottles so be sure and try it for yourself and let me know what you think.  Cheers to Abita for creating a really interesting brew.  I also sampled their Abbey Ale (and old favorite) and you can read about it here.