This beer is an indescribable experience like no other. It's a cool summer midnight in your glass, rich and dark and alive and yet understated and refined.
It pours an oily black with a rich khaki head. Aroma is a complicated palate of yeast, chocolate, bread, raisin, and light caramel. Fruit and yeast greet your tastebuds, followed quietly by chocolate that isn't sweet, roasted coffee and malt, and a mild burst of alcohol. There's a depth of flavor here that is both mysterious and comforting, strange and yet so hauntingly familiar. It finishes bitter and a little dry and slightly sour, but refreshingly and invitingly so.
This was my first imperial, so it may be that I don't yet know what I'm talking about... but. If this beer really is an example of the imperial style, then I am, without a doubt, an Empire man.
The Bottom Line: I think I've got something in my eye... *Sniffle*
The Rating: Legendary.
