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Tuesday night, prior to the blizzard and no work on Wednesday, I had decided to stop by the Four Seasons Beer Store for some libation to weather through it. The last three bottles of Lagunitas Cappuccino Stout were sitting on the shelf with a big empty space next to it. I made a mental note of it as I perused the shelves and the cooler for something for the evening. My plan was to review a beer while the blizzard raged outside and schedule it for Friday night. After all, I was on 10s this week, Friday included. Doing a brew review at 1:30 in the morning was not a good idea.

As I walked the same familiar paths I spotted some of my old friends. A few of the guys from Great Lakes Brewing, a few from Bell’s, Ommegang and the big guns from Sam Adams. Screw it, I thought. Let’s have some dark creamy coffee-beer. Back to the shelf I went, scarfing the three remaining bottles. I paid the man a decent price and returned home.

I put the beer in the fridge about 3 pm and thought that they’d be cold enough by 8 or so, the time I usually start the review. But nature decided different. After a few brief power outages and reboots during the intended review, the electricity on the block went out completely. But, I’m repeating myself.

I drank the beer while my wife and I acted like a couple of teenagers in the dark, with her yelling at passing motorists, “Moron! It’s a blizzard!” and “Go home!” The beer was very good between laughs, having a great unique stout flavor but lacking in the coffee department as far as I was concerned. It was quite a drinkable beer, though. But this dissertation is not about that beer but another one… perhaps more deadly.

With work scheduled for Saturday, I sent asked one of my sons to pick up the Saturday review beer and get it cold while I was away. It was a beer that I was only somewhat familiar with. The brewery, though, was going to become one that I would respect and admire along with Bell’s, DFH and Sam among others.

The beer in question was Stone’s Double Bastard Ale. Last week, I saw nine bombers sitting on the shelf and made a mental note of it. I remember Stone’s Oaked Arrogant Bastard Ale as being a great beer adventure as well as their Sublimely Self Righteous.

But wait. I did a review on their Vertical Epic last week and it was damed good. I wondered how that would sit with the readership having two beers from the same brewer two weeks in a row. I remembered seeing 11.2% ABV on the Double Bastard label and decided, “Screw it. It’s my money and my website.” I bought two bombers of Stone Double Bastard Ale and did some research afterwards.

According to Stone, the type of hops used in this beverage are listed as CLASSIFIED. I have learned that the IBUs of this beer are also CLASSIFIED. This gave me pause for thought. The pause included that, along with a highly malted beverage (The Bastard,) we may have have a beer of extraordinary IPA characteristics. I couldn’t wrap my my mind around that. Hmm. What would a heavily malted, dark, IPA taste like? I was about to find out.

After work let out on Saturday, there was time for a hearty supper and dessert. BeerAdvocate rated this DB as “A+ World Class.” Even RateBeer rated it almost 100 across the board. I wondered what I was in store for.

When the time came, I thought about what my head would feel like for Super Bowl Sunday with a houseful of kindred and their babes. But I couldn’t pass this up. This beer was a seasonal and won’t be available down the road. For a brief moment, I wondered if I made the right choice. Then I said again, “Screw it. It’s my money and my website.” I popped open the first bomber and poured, wondering if I’m gonna get myself in trouble.

The beer poured with a beautiful light brown, amber color and the liquid remained translucent in the glass. Right away it reminded me of a nectarine-like fruit juice. The foam came up nicely to about 3/4”, nice and thick. The aroma itself had a certain sweet fruit-juicy scent to it.

The first sip was incredible! There were absolutely tons of malt body to this beverage, accompanied by a nice sweet center taste. Then came the wallop and the surprise at the end. The swallow had a bit of bitterness to it as it went down, but almost immediately that taste transitioned into the taste of citrus hops. This beer must be a super-hybrid of sorts.

Maybe it’s chameleon beer. It started out as a really robust “big beer” style ale then changed into tart stout-like drink then the change again into a super IPA. Incredible. I got notes of grape, then grapefruit and at times, some orange when going from sip to sip. If my taste buds were wired to a breaker, the first few sips would have popped it from overload. I can safely say that I’ve never had a beer that tasted this complex yet this smooth.

As the sips went on, each taste was never the same. One time it’s plum or nectarine. The next it’s Ruby Red grapefruit. Then it’s a sweet porter disguised in barbed wire. By the middle of the glass, the peg-the-needle taste sensations mellowed out and I sat back back for the next drop on this mag-lev roller coaster I was riding. The beer became smooth to drink, but still an ever-changing taste joy ride.

Each sip of this beverage plays a “Guess Who” game with the tongue. The tongue always loses, but the drinker wins. Besides being this multifaceted beer in a bottle, this drink is incredibly smooth after the tongue recovers from the initial explosion of tastes. Each sip stretches the taste buds like a glob of Silly Putty, first one way, then another, never repeating the same stretch twice.

This beer is almost comparable to the likes of Pere Jacques, Dragon’s Milk or Sam Adams Doublebock. It’s like them, but it’s not. It’s more. This beer goes to eleven. One sip had feet with the wings of Hermes. The next sip had Frankenstein boots. It’s an up-down-sideways beer that not only will shock the taste buds but also zap the memory into a long retention period. I won’t forget this beer for a long, long time.

Other than the experimental folly of tasting this beer for the first time and getting quickly hammered for the effort, this is beer for special times to say the least. I can see very special friends or loving family members getting together for toasts to each other and good times over a few pulls of this Bastard beer. (Quite an oxymoron, eh?)

But this is a manly beer. A beer to be had over a game of nine-ball and cigars in the rec room with a very close brother or Dad. All the metaphors of the above discourse apply including barbed wire, breakers popping and explosions.

This beer is way, way out there. It’s a beer that made me feel very fortunate that I was alive to taste it.

The SixPackTech ratings for Stone Double Bastard Ale are:

Taste: A+ > A time machine fruit stand in a bottle.

Smoothness: A+ > The bombs going off are making music on the tongue.

Drinkability: A+ > So incredible, so deadly, I must have another taste.

Bang for the buck: A+ > The best taste experience you could have without getting a permit.

ABV: 11.2%

Wife’s all-encompassing opinion: It’s very cloudy. Heavens. (sip) Oh. … Ogay… That’s enough for me. Oh, real dry. Real dry. Ohhhck. (Maybe the second sip will help you get some sweetness out of it.) (sip) Maybe a little sweetness but all I’m getting is dry. All the saliva in my mouth is ……. gah! (She heads off to bathroom. Hey! I have a time machine roller coaster!)

BeerAdvocate rates.

RateBeer rates.

Random Review from ItsTwelveoclockSomewhere.

Stone Brewing Tour

Note: On my list for a future review is Dogfish Head’s World Wide Stout, weighing in at 18%. I have two bottles on the floor, next to my bed. When I get two more bottles, I’ll share some with my craft beer drinking sons. Then I’ll share that experience with a new bottle or two with you readers. I wonder how it would stack up against this Double Bastard? But with WWS being a stout, I’m sure that it would be a completely different taste experience. (Thankyouverymuchhaveaniceday.)

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