Bluegrass Jeffersons Reserve Bourbon Barrel Stout
Aged for two to three months in McLain & Kyne Jefferson’s Reserve bourbon barrels, this stout is a richly flavored sipping beer, with a smooth chocolate taste and a hint of bourbon.
3.5
454 reviews
Louisville, United States
Community reviews
Great beer. Black pour with mocha head. Aroma of chocolate, bourbon and alittle vanilla. Taste is the same, but smoked a little. Great for winter.
Aroma: smells heavily of vanilla and caramel, cocoa, coffee. Appearance: jet black. Taste: oak, vanilla, caramel, slight purple grape, smoke. Palate: creamy and big, with notable sensation of alcohol on the tongue, lingering smokey woody grape flavors.
Bottle. Pours almost black with a small tan head. Aroma of roasted malts, chocolate, bourbon, oak and light smoke. Flavor of roasted malts, coffee, chocolate, bourbon, light oak and a hint of smoke. A little thin for the style, but smooth and the alcohol is well hidden. Great beer. Tasty and easy drinking for the ABV.
Draft. Pours a nearly black with just a slight head. Aroma is a deep chocolate roast with some toffe. Taste is more of the same. Coffee, dark roast malt and slight bourbon coming through. A nice, but not great barrell stout.
Draft to taster. Looks good; an opaque cola black with beige lacing. Smells and tastes solid; malt and bourbon. Average on the palate. Not bad beer, but not a standout for being bourbon barreled.
Tap at Trion. Chocolate, subtle bourbon, vanilla, and fruity aroma. Black brown with a small tan head. Sweet chocolate, bourbon, vanilla, and earthy smoky flavor. Medium body
Label notches indicates that its been bottled on April 2006
A - Pitch black body with a two finger light tan head. Settles down to a thin cap. Decent amount of lacing and retention.
S - Burnt malts, milk chocolate, cheap bourbon. A touch of vanilla sweetness, but the char is rather dominating. No hints of oxidation.
T - Incredibly tame and mellow. The little flavor it does have is somewhat pleasant though. Roasted malts, coffee beans, milk chocolate, vanilla, and oak. Almost no bourbon presence. Mouth feel is thin to medium with ample carbonation.
O - This beer is an exercise in the fact that not every beer should be aged. Very little flavor, the aroma is a bit offensive, and theirs a high level of carbonation for the thin mouth feel. I’m not sure how this one was fresh, but I bet it was a hell of a lot better. Luckily it isn’t oxidized at its current age.
On draft at Rustico in Alexandria, VA.
Served in a snifter. The beer is nearly black with a thin, beige head that leaves ample lacing on the glass. The aroma is of licorice, roast, alcohol. The flavor is quite sweet, a bit overly so in my opinion, with bourbon and oak notes coming through clearly. The body is too thin for the style, and can’t support the myriad of flavors that a bourbon barrel imperial stout offers. Overall, a middle of the road representation of the style.
Serving type: on-tap
Reviewed on: 04-01-2011
For a bourbon stout this one does NOT disappoint! Poured on draught at Twenty Tap Broad Ripple. The bourbon tones really smack you in the face at first sip. Mild smoke that is just right. This bourbon is the whole package. Slick master out.
From the tap came a very dark brew with a very dark head. Wonderful aromas of roasty malts, and chocolate. Flavors of roasty malt, chocolate, and coconut.
12 oz bottle pour black with a tan head. Aroma is of coffe and whisky with a hint of cocoa. The taste has the classic stout coffee and chocolate with an added hint of bourbon
bottle with MrsSwoop, darker black pour, chocolaty aroma, light bourbon, tobacco cigarette thing going on, Immediate spritzy mouthfeel chocolate, cigarette, medium bourbon notes than increase as beer warms. Higher carbonation seems off. Decent aroma & flavor, mouthfeel & carbonation seems off
bottle, chocolate brown, dark, frothy foamy big head. chocolatety aroma, bourbon is light, Flavor is like a chocolate cigarette, feels too much like smoking a cigarette. spritzy mouthfeel. Not my thing
(bottle 8/19/10). Black color. Medium tan head. Moderat bourbon/alcohol aroma, with light sweetness. Flavor of the same. Avg duration. Light dry finish. Slick texture. Soft to moderate carbonation. Spare lacing.
Tap. Smells like roasted coffee beans and bourbon. Dark. Smoked, boozy, decent hop finish. Maybe a little cocoa.
Tasted on 7/23/11 from a 12oz bottle sent to me as an extra in a trade. Pours an opaque, nearly black, brown with a massive (I mean stupid big) light brown head that really doesn’t recede at all. As a matter of fact, after waiting ten minutes, I decided to scoop out a bunch of the head with a spoon just so I could finally drink it. The nose is dominated by tons of coffee, dark and milk chocolate, molasses, burnt toast, and the underlying vanilla and coconut oak aromas. The flavor is very roasted with some coffee, toast, and vanilla, along with a hot alcohol burn. The body is impossible to detect, due to the ridiculously high amount of carbonation, along with a long toasted and vanilla finish.
An excellent stout. Perfectly balanced the best stout on draft that I have tasted. Try it if you can.
Stygian darkness fills the glass and is covered with a coffee-chocolate cream layer. This brew does not smack you in the face with bourbon, it is quite nuanced and interwoven with the roast and quite subdued in the aroma. The bourbon is decidedly more detectable in the flavor and melds well with the coffee roast flavor. Dy coffee bean burnt finish. More sophisticated that the typical bourbon-aged brew.
Draft. Got completely hammered on this and had to sleep in the back of my truck. That said, I will revisit the brew again.
Presumably on tap at Fireflies Del Ray in Alexandria, VA. It poured a clear, deep cola red with a scant, tan, creamy head that left swathy lace by the grace of God. I’m rating this under the Jeffersons Reserve entry since I read that somewhere on the menu even though there is a normal BBC Bourbon Barrel Stout entry. Aroma here is pretty null- I would not be able to pick out any specific character from this beer partly because of the shitty pour handed to me and partly because the bourbon has probably not added anything to this beer, which is obviously very thin bodied given the SRM and high abv. Taste is watery, roasty, thin, cola, bitter. No bourbon. No body. Feels like 5% abv. I just cannot imagine how this could possibly be 8.5% without any significant hoppiness or sugary body to balance. Should taste like straight vodka if that was the true abv. Maybe bourbon barrel age a true 8.5% imperial stout and put it in the barrels for more than two months. You will get about zero character from only two months in the barrel. Some breweries will barrel age imperial stouts for a year or more. Light cardboard.
poured from a 12 oz bottle Thanks to Sefus12
Appearance:
pours jet black with a 1 finger head. tan in color. doesn’t sit long and left very little lacing. i don’t think this is going to be very thick or leave stickiness on my lips.
Smell:
Hints of bourbon swirl through some roasted coffee, oakiness, and touches of powdered chocolate.
Taste:
Lots of roasted coffee, little bits of malt punched with oak. I thought i would get more bourbon tastes but there is just a little. I think the flavors balanced, but really i could have used more of all of them.
Mouthfeel:
Dry on the end, a touch of light creaminess in the front, but thin and light in the middle. not what i expect from an Imperial stout, reminded me more of a porter.
Drinkability:
Easy to drink for an Imperial because its thin. The alcohol is well masked, i wouldn’t think this had 8.5% in it. but really for a Imperial stout it should be thick and creamy.
I think I would drink this with a steak/steak sandwich, beef roast, or meatloaf. I don’t think it would stand up to anything too heavy like prime rib or heavy smoky grilled/BBQ items. maybe a Jack Daniels glazed steak if you head that direction.
nice bourbon nose, poured a black color with lasting beige head. flavr is vanilla and bourbon with nice malts. little light on the mouthfeel but really nicely balanced bourbon stout.
2006 bottle, nose was very bourbony and vanilla, jsut have been a frist fill completely, the bourbon overtakes the nose completely. The stout however isn’t as overbearing, roasted, medium bodied stout, drinkable
On tap at Rustico. Seems to be on nearly year round there. Reviewed from notes.
Pours deep brown with a nice off white-tan head and bits of lacing here and there. Nose brings a pretty good amount of bourbon along with some oak, vanilla, dark roasted malt, and some mild sweetness. Taste brings a moderate amount of bourbon and oak along with some sweet, roasted malt in the background. Medium body with light carbonation and not too much booze; a nice mix. Drinks fairly well, but isn’t as smooth as I would like.
Serving type: on-tap
Reviewed on: 10-16-2010
12oz bottled Dec ’10 (now Feb ’11). This pours with a frothy, white, vanishing-foamy head that leaves just a lacing-thick layer over an opaque beer and gives a genie-is-out-of-the-bottle special effect. The beer has a roasty, woody, high-quality, bourbon-pipe-tobacco-smoke aroma. Also, sweet chocolate, coffee, and nuts, Beautiful aroma!
The taste is not so special. Kind of every taste that is no taste.
The carbonation is quite lively; the finish, astringent (something a tiny bit soapy about my beer); texture is kind of thin and a little oily and slightly sticky. It kind of slides down leaving one wanting. These are too easy to drink.
This Kentuckyan impresses out of the gate but doesn’t quite finish in the money; but I keep it in my box if it’s a weak field.
Review from notes, sampled 2/8/2008
12 oz bottle received in trade, but I don’t know who from. I’ve been trading too much and I forgot who sent this. But thank you for the opportunity!
Pours a dark brown/black. Lets a little light through when held up to it. Meager tan head that disappears quickly. Aroma is some chocolate, some bourbon, some oak, and I pick up a bit of vanilla, faint but its there. Taste is roasty, oakey, sweet and chocolaty. Mouthfeel is thinner than I would expect for a stout. Tasty mix of flavors, but should be a bit thicker. Drinking this feels more like drinking a porter or even a strong brown ale. Tasty, but labeled incorrectly.
Poured into a snifter.
3.5 A: Pitch black color. One and a half fingers of creamy head that doesn’t retain too well and doesn’t leave much lacing either.
4.0 S: Pleasant fruitiness with black currants. Next, is oak and vanilla. Bourbon is more subdued than I’d like, but still adds to the depth. Hints of roastiness as well.
2.0 T: Comes through a lot drier than I had hoped. Way too dry. There’s a touch of bourbon, but not much. Not much malt character except for hints of roasted barley.
1.5 M: Light body, super light for the ABV and style. A bit undercarbonated, but pretty smooth.
1.5 D: Not impressed with this one.
Serving type: bottle
Reviewed on: 12-30-2009 03:14:17
12oz bottle than has been in my fridge for months. Pours dark brown with tan head. Aromas of bourbon, vanilla, little roast, and some chocolate. Flavor of bourbon, sweet vanilla, chocolate, and some roasted malts. Mouthfeel was a little thin. Nice bourbon flavor. Better than I was expecting.
Pours like a dark maple syrup with a small tan head. Sweet aroma of burnt molasses, bourbon, and a slight nuttiness. Hint of roasted malts and wood, some sweetness, and alcohol. Light carbonation, thin body, and a slightly sour aftertaste. Nice aroma, but the taste and palate are less than inspiring.
Poured dark with small head slightly flat because came from growler tasted great like bouurbon good berr