Top 5 Dark Beers

[Nolerama]

1. Delirium Nocturnum- Rich, tasty, and has a high alcohol content that gives a nice kick. In STL, it's about $8 a pint. But it's worth it (at times)

2. Guinness- It's my staple dark beer as of late. It can be interchanged with

3. Fat Tire- Goes great with a good burger and plate of fries.

4. Schlafly's Chocolate Stout- One of STL's local breweries puts out this thick, but delicious beverage. I prefer this one w/o any food. It's better enjoyed without crutches.

5. Anything classed as "Barley Wine". It's last because this tends to be a seasonal brew. So I don't get to drink it as often. When it's available, I'm all about it.

 

[Steve]

Bert Grant's Perfect Porter... I was so sad to see it go. It had a smooth, nutty taste that was... well... perfect.

Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout: These tend to be less thick, a little sweeter and higher in alcohol content (~9% by volume) than an Irish Stout. Very good beer.

 

[Kreth]

2. Guinness- It's my staple dark beer as of late. It can be interchanged with

The dark beer.

3. Fat Tire- Goes great with a good burger and plate of fries.

Great beer, been way too long since I had one of these.

Here's a good one from up by me.
This is a good seasonal from them as well.

 

[crushing]

I guess I need to know how "Dark" is defined. I wouldn't necessarily put an amber ale like Fat Tire into the dark category. If you consider IPAs as dark, then Short's Humalupalicious and Bell's Two Hearted would top my dark list!

They are numbered, but I wouldn't put much in to their order.

1. Founder's Kentucky Bourbon Stout

2. Bell's Expedition Stout

3. Rogue Mocha Porter

4. Flying Dog, Gonzo Imperial Porter

5. Delirium Noël

For a 'barley wine' check out Flying Dog's Horn Dog Barley Wine Style Ale. Flying Dog is selling a Canis Major 4-pack with four different beers. I picked one up for my own Christmas present. If it wasn't for the 4-pack, I wouldn't have had a barley win style ale. I wish more stores allowed mix-n-match six packs, but I can understand how that can mess up shelf space and be difficult to maintain.

 

[Tez3]

If you like Guinness you'll love Murphys, just that bit smoother. Beautiful!

 

[crushing]

Bert Grant's Perfect Porter... I was so sad to see it go. It had a smooth, nutty taste that was... well... perfect.

Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout: These tend to be less thick, a little sweeter and higher in alcohol content (~9% by volume) than an Irish Stout. Very good beer.

Nice links to beer advocate! I recently subscribed to their magazine and went to one of their parties last year at the Grand Rapids Hop Cat.

 

[Kreth]

For anyone in the Philly area, there's a "deli" called Michael's (IIRC) in Valley Forge with a pretty good selection of micro-brews and international beers, and they let you mix and match.
I used to make a point to stop there every time I was working in the area.

 

[Xue Sheng]

1) Guinness extra stout - warm
2) Krombacher Dark - warm
3) Mackeson Stout - warm
4) Any "Barley Wine"
5) Newcastle Brown Ale - Not exactly a dark but I do like it

 

[Steve]

If you like Guinness you'll love Murphys, just that bit smoother. Beautiful!

I've never had Murphy's on tap. Don't have many beers on tap anymore, as they tend to frown on babies in the bar.

In my area, Guinness and Murphy's are both available in a can with a nitrogen charge. Pretty good alternative. It's been a while since I had Murphy's out of the can, but it had a funny aftertaste that sent me back to Guiness.

 

[Tez3]

I've never had Murphy's on tap. Don't have many beers on tap anymore, as they tend to frown on babies in the bar.

In my area, Guinness and Murphy's are both available in a can with a nitrogen charge. Pretty good alternative. It's been a while since I had Murphy's out of the can, but it had a funny aftertaste that sent me back to Guiness.

Could be the can. Both should be on draught and take ages to pour.
Newcastle Brown Ale in America, wow! I think it's ghastly lol!

 

[exile]

My favorite 'dark' beers (in no particular order):

(i) Otter Head Bitter

(ii) Meantime Porter

(iii) Adnams Broadside

(iv) Guinness

(v) Murphy's

Otter Head and Adnam's are, officially. bitter ales, but quite a bit darker and maltier than the usual south-to-midlands UK bitter. Meantime, which makes a superb IPA, makes an equally terrific porter, and is a true bottled real ale, whose final fermentation is in bottle. Guinness and Murphy's are both Irish stouts and, as Tez says, Murphy's has a more approachable, lower-impact overall flavoer—Guinness is distinctly bitter for a stout (and therefore high on my 'good' list of darks, which for my taste tend to underdo the hops).

 

[Steve]

Could be the can. Both should be on draught and take ages to pour.
Newcastle Brown Ale in America, wow! I think it's ghastly lol!

I agree, but don't fear the can. I have had a lot of Guinness on tap and also out of the can. It's pretty good. The nitrogen is in a little widget that simulates pretty well the nitrogen tap necessary for a good pint.

 

[Sukerkin]

Some good opinions coming up here, ladies and gents.

Only last year, thanks to the knowledge of Exile, I was brought to the realisation that my opinions of American beer were based upon data that was, well, out of date .

He reckons that, these days, you chaps on the other side of the Atlantic now understand that beer should be brewed for it's flavour and served at (cellar) room temperature rather than near frozen.

My time in Canada showed me too that altho' it is nice to try and get a 'taste of home' in beer, it is often much better to drink what is brewed locally as many beverages do not travel at all well.

For example, I had an atrocious pint of Nookie Brown in the so called English Pub in Calgary. It was so dire that it is the only beer I've ever taken back to the bar as being "undrinkably bad" . Kudos to the pub tho'; they took one listen to my accent as I explained what was up and offered up bottled Nookie Brown instead (no charge) for the rest of the night :tup:.

 

[Xue Sheng]

Some good opinions coming up here, ladies and gents.

Only last year, thanks to the knowledge of Exile, I was brought to the realisation that my opinions of American beer were based upon data that was, well, out of date .

He reckons that, these days, you chaps on the other side of the Atlantic now understand that beer should be brewed for it's flavour and served at (cellar) room temperature rather than near frozen.

My time in Canada showed me too that altho' it is nice to try and get a 'taste of home' in beer, it is often much better to drink what is brewed locally as many beverages do not travel at all well.

For example, I had an atrocious pint of Nookie Brown in the so called English Pub in Calgary. It was so dire that it is the only beer I've ever taken back to the bar as being "undrinkably bad" . Kudos to the pub tho'; they took one listen to my accent as I explained what was up and offered up bottled Nookie Brown instead (no charge) for the rest of the night :tup:.

I went to a Christmas party last month at a rather nice establishment and I ordered a Guinness and the bartender sat it on the bar.... Now I only get to drink a beer these days about once or twice a year so I was pretty happy they had a dark beer, since a year before they had none. But back to this last time…. I took a sip and it was COLD:cuss: I called him back and asked him why on earth he would take a perfectly good beer and ruin it by refrigerating it. He looked at me like I was crazy and walked away. Luckily we had a bit of a wait so it had time to warm up before I drank it. You will still find an awful lot of people in the US drinking their beer cold. But then I don't even drink cold water anymore so maybe it's me.

 

[exile]

My time in Canada showed me too that altho' it is nice to try and get a 'taste of home' in beer, it is often much better to drink what is brewed locally as many beverages do not travel at all well.

This is definitely the case with a number of excellent UK brews, S. For example, Coniston Bluebird Bitter regularly wins prizes in local CAMRA beer festivals and has won the Grand Championship at the All-Britain 'main event' CAMRA competition a couple of times; yet, in spite of the fact that it's bottle-conditioned—one of the very few of an increasing number of bottled real ales from the UK to be imported here and reasonably available—it usually tastes watery and almost characterless. Since I've had Bluebird in a number of pubs in England itself, I know that that's not the case with Coniston on its home ground—but clearly, it hates travel with a vengeance. Something similar has happened to the Wychwood beers on occasion, and as for Sam Smith's Old Brewery Pale Ale... better pass over that one in silence. :waah: I remember how striking and complex it was when I first stumbled across it in the 1970s (in Santa Barbara, weirdly enough); now, it has almost as little character as a typical American piss-and-wind product like Coors Lite. Part of the problem may be quality decline at the source, but again, I've had it out of UK handpumps and there wasn't anything wrong with it there. So again, I think that a lot of British ales suffer in transit, and it wouldn't surprise me for some of ours to undergo a similar fate going the other way.

What I would expect, though, is that a lot of the Stone beers, or e.g. Bell's Two-Hearted Ale and the like, the very best of our 'San-Diego' double IPA style, would do quite well over on your side of the pond—because the massive alcohol content would tend to keep them in condition (7.2%), just as Meantime IPA, or Hoppy Otter at 6.9%, does very well over here for the same reasons. I'm not a big fan of hugely potent beers—I much prefer session ales, where you don't guarantee yourself a headache if you decide to have a second one before another 12 hours have elapsed—but I'm pretty sure they do keep better. Those beers are also aggressively hopped, which is why I like them so much. What I don't understand, or like very much, is the fact that increasingly I'm seeing intensely hopped beers also being the high alcohol ones. Why can't we get a beer with the savage bitterness of Stone Ruination Ale, say, but at a reasonably sane 4.8–5.0%? I can't figure out why you need extra alcohol when you make an extra-bitter beer...

 

[Makalakumu]

We have terrible beer in Hawaii. Poor choices overall, but there are some local brews that are diamonds in the ruff.

Maui Brewing Company over in Lahaina is a great place to tip back a few. Especially on the dining area on the roof while the sun is setting. The big swell IPA is great!

 

[crushing]

He reckons that, these days, you chaps on the other side of the Atlantic now understand that beer should be brewed for it's flavour and served at (cellar) room temperature rather than near frozen.

The not so good beers are better served ice cold as it helps with their 'drinkability', if you know what I mean. I belong to a veteran's organization that has a canteen that serves beer. The most 'exotic' beers we have are Anheuser Busch's Michelob Amber Bock and Labbatt Blue. When I have a drink at the canteen with my comrades, I appreciate that the beer is cold.

On the other hand, when I go to a restaurant or pub that has some decent brews, I hate it when they serve it so cold and sometimes even in a frozen mug!

 

[Xue Sheng]

We have terrible beer in Hawaii. Poor choices overall, but there are some local brews that are diamonds in the ruff.

Maui Brewing Company over in Lahaina is a great place to tip back a few. Especially on the dining area on the roof while the sun is setting. The big swell IPA is great!

It's certainly not dark beer but Tsingtao is pretty good, as is Sapporo. Do they sell those in Hawaii?

 

[Sukerkin]

The not so good beers are better served ice cold as it helps with their 'drinkability', if you know what I mean.

Quite so :tup:

On the other hand, when I go to a restaurant or pub that has some decent brews, I hate it when they serve it so cold and sometimes even in a frozen mug!

Luckily I've not encountered that over here but I did in Calgary - as we were drinking Budd maybe that was just as well :lol:.

 

[exile]

...as we were drinking Budd maybe that was just as well :lol:.

Rest assured, Mark, you wouldn't have missed much even if had been served to you frozen solid!