Brewery: Outstanding Beers
Location: Bury, England
ABV: 5.5%
Version: Bottled and Draught
Source: The Met, Bury / The Trackside, Bury

I've had the very great pleasure of encountering Outstanding Stout on two separate occasions in the last few weeks. The first was at Bury Met (the occasion being a rather bloody marvellous Spiers and Boden gig) where they have a range of bottled ales from local brewery Outstanding Beers behind the bar. At £3.75 a bottle and only plastic glasses to drink from, it's not an ideal session experience, but the beer itself more than made up for it: Outstanding Stout is delicious stuff. Absolutely delicious.

Pitch black with a creamy-tan head, Outstanding Stout's aroma is an enticing blend of liquorice and coffee and both characteristics carry through to the flavour, along with an added smokiness and a rich, chocolatey bitter-sweetness. Mouth-feel is excellent as well: silky-smooth and creamy as you could hope for, just like a good stout damn well should be. I was extremely pleased to have discovered this one and will be back for more next time we're up at The Met (Chris Wood, May 15th).

Then, last Friday, Jo and I and our good mate Andy nipped out to enjoy a session down at The Trackside, the pub on the platform at the Bury end of the East Lancs Railway. And they had Outstanding Stout on draught.

Oh... my... word.

I thought the bottled stuff was good, but fresh out of the keg? All those flavours, but twice as intense, twice as rich. A huge hit of coffee and chocolate this time around; the liquorice was less prevalent but there was a spicy hint of something extra as well, maybe nutmeg or cinnamon. I said a while back that I was on the look out for my perfect stout and I thought I'd found it with a couple of BrewDog's Paradox variants (two of which I haven't written up quite yet). But you know what? This is very, very good stout indeed. And at 5.5% it's more of a session strength beer, whereas Paradox's connoisseur-grade 10% is a definite sip-and-savour special.

Although, a word to the wise: Outstanding Stout is a very easy-drinking beer and very tasty indeed, but I'm not so sure it plays well with others. At least, not in my experience. Perhaps (just perhaps) if I'd downed a few pints and then stopped when the keg ran out, rather than going on to sample a couple of different bitters afterwards, I might have enjoyed a more pleasant (more human, says my missus) Saturday as a result. Just a thought...

Related posts:

1. Tasting Notes: Outstanding OSB
2. Tasting Notes: Sierra Nevada Stout
3. Tasting Notes: Wychwood Black Wych
4. Tasting Notes: Hambleton Ales Nightmare Stout
5. Tasting Notes: Ossett Brewery Treacle Stout