Sin Tax

To close out a heavy evening, I selected a 1pt 6oz bottle from Vista, CA's Mother Earth Brew Co. and an Arturo Fuente mini-corona. The beer was called Sin Tax, an 8.1% imperial stout. It poured midnight black, with a creamy head. In the cold light of day, the Mother Earth website told me this was actually an Imperial peanut butter stout.

To my admittedly compromised nose, there were rich chocolate and coffee aromas--very sweet and sultry. The taste was chalk full of cocoa notes, as well as a hint of tobacco (and that wasn't just the cigar). Mellow and smooth to the mouth, with a fairly sizably bitter finish, though this played second fiddle to roasted malts and chocolate notes.

Sin Tax was a wise beer to finish a sudsy evening. It was strong and sweet, with a hearty flavour. Typically too sweet for me and with less bitterness than I prefer, the beer managed to really hit the spot. The subtle tobacco flavour played nicely with the peppery cigar to create a nice combo. My stout was bigger than the tulip glass I was given, so the helpful staff at Cuban Cigar Factory provided me with a glass full of ice to chill the remainder--a really nice touch that kept my strong stout cool, but not too cold.

Rating: 8.0 out of 10.