Echigo Stout - Uehara Shuzou Co. Ltd. / Echigo Beer Pub

smakawhat

Maryland

3.15/5  rDev -15.8%
look: 4 | smell: 3 | taste: 3 | feel: 3 | overall: 3.5

Dark brown stout borderline black, gives off a nice chocolate brown hue, with tan bubbles.

The bouquet is kind of weak, with faint malt, and a light mixed nuts quality. Taste improves with a slight chewy light smoke and tobacco, but also of store bought pre ground coffee. There is strangely next to no finish on this beer.

A strange mouthfeel with a small abv content that seems wet but masked easily. Wet but strangely drinkable and easy.

Serving type: bottle

12-11-2010 04:28:20 | More by smakawhat

lacqueredmouse

Australia

3.1/5  rDev -17.1%
look: 4 | smell: 2 | taste: 3 | feel: 4.5 | overall: 3.5

Can brought back from Hong Kong by @LaitueGonflable.

Pours a pleasantly dark, but relatively translucent red-black colour, with a nice fine head of mocha brown. Some lacing sits clearly around the edges of the glass. Body is quite liquid, surprisingly, keeping it fluid and dynamic. Not bad.

Nose is dim and slightly roasted, with a twinge of sweetness, and a rattling dark grain character, like the last coffee bean stuck in the grinder. There's also a hint of unpleasantness to it, something a little like rubbish heaped in a back alley, or leftover rice meal. It rather puts me off the taste.

Taste is thick with molasses and burnt coffee, giving a sweet, husky, crispened flavour, which works nicely against the smooth, slightly creamy and foamy mouthfeel. Very little sweetness, but the feel somewhat makes up for that. Finish is actually quite long, again helped by the feel, leaving some bitter grounds flavours on the back. The feel is really quite exceptionally good. While the flavours aren't as complete and full as they could be, there's very little to fault in how it feels in the mouth.

Looks good, smells quite unpleasant, tastes fine (well, OK at least) and feels sublime. A beer of contrasts. Thankyou.

Serving type: can

03-17-2012 01:33:23 | More by lacqueredmouse

froghop

Washington

3.03/5  rDev -19%
look: 2.5 | smell: 3.5 | taste: 3 | feel: 2.5 | overall: 3

pours a clear black with a red tint when held to the light, a very thin beige head, and some lacing.

smell is of malt, some cocoa, weak coffee, a touch of nuts, and a little vanilla.

taste is thin, cocoa, sour malt, a touch metallic, and a little coffee, ends a little dry.

Serving type: bottle

09-09-2009 01:24:54 | More by froghop

htomsirveaux

Texas

3/5  rDev -19.8%
look: 3 | smell: 3 | taste: 3 | feel: 3 | overall: 3

330 mL bottle tried 24 Nov 2011. Served in the 0.4 L Ulmer Munster snifter.

Very small tan head. Medium carbonation. Very dark brown in color with ruby highlights. Light aroma of molasses and ethanol. Starts with burnt dark malts. Some molasses. Bold but not particularly strong flavors. Medium body, warming ethanol. Molasses and burnt sugar dominate. Slightly acrid aftertaste.

Fairly average, on the lighter side for an imperial stout.

Serving type: bottle

03-19-2012 16:40:18 | More by htomsirveaux

JDV

Texas

2.95/5  rDev -21.1%
look: 3 | smell: 3 | taste: 3 | feel: 2.5 | overall: 3

Bottle in trade with miketd. Thanks!
Pours a dark brown black color with a light tan head. Smell is lightly roasty, and very mild, and thin. Taste is lightly roasty with a slight char, but watery. Very easy drinking and mild, but not particularly great. Just too thin for a stout.

Serving type: bottle

11-16-2008 20:22:03 | More by JDV

laituegonflable

Australia

2.85/5  rDev -23.8%
look: 3.5 | smell: 3 | taste: 2.5 | feel: 3.5 | overall: 3

Purchased at some wholefoods-type store in central Hong Kong, muled back to Australia for sharing.

Pours a deep, dark reddish-brown colour. Head is beige, nice and frothy when poured, sinks to a thinnish film but leaves a decent sheet of lacing behind. Fairly decent, could be darker.

Smells a little bit roasty, quite sweet but largely dry, with hints of espresso, molasses and licorice. Slight grainy, almost adjuncty sweetness floats over the top, which is unfortunate; the roasty notes that are there should be more prominent.

Taste is unfortunately sweet, and a bit segmented and detached. Lots of flavours coming through individually without a good coherence. Sweet grain, carob, espresso and char, with some vanilla notes and aniseed and black pepper. Put in a logical order, these flavours may have played out to great effect, but it's confused, and finishes very astringently while the predominant flavour is that carob.

Not a lot of body to it; goes down with a smoothness but I really want more substance.

From the brewery that brought me Echigo Pilsener and rice lager, this is an improvement, but for a 6+% stout it's disappointing.

Serving type: can

04-07-2013 12:02:28 | More by laituegonflable

popery

California

2.7/5  rDev -27.8%
look: 3.5 | smell: 2.5 | taste: 2.5 | feel: 3 | overall: 3

Decent stout but not really anything special. This is a strong-ish stout that is relatively light on roasted malt flavor. There's a lot more caramel character than I'd like, but it's still an enjoyable beer. The body is a dark, transparent ruby, below a creamy off-white head. The aroma is dominated by caramel and butterscotch with hints of fruit and roast. At 7% abv, I expect more roast than this beer brings. The flavor doesn't really help. It's fairly sweet and roast only really shows up in the aftertaste. There's some coffee and chocolate in the finish, as well. Mouthfeel is a bit too thin and a tad cloying but not bad. At this strength, this beer is kinda in between a normal stout and an imperial. Unfortunately, it doesn't manage to pull off the high points of either. However, Echigo Stout also doesn't commit any grievous sins. It's just a ho-hum strong-ish stout dominated by caramel malt. My review scores wouldn't be so harsh if this beer had been placed in the the standard American Stout category, rather than with the big boys.

Serving type: bottle

07-28-2010 04:57:40 | More by popery

July2Nov

Hawaii

2.23/5  rDev -40.4%
look: 2.5 | smell: 3 | taste: 2 | feel: 2 | overall: 2

A: Nice deep cola color. Head could have been
a bit larger, and
and foamier. As it was, the head was too carbonated
and the 1/2 inch of foam quickly dissipated to
minimal lace.

S: A bit sweet (hints of caramel and toffee).
Deep-roasted nutty smell. slight syrupy hint at the
end. Overall, very nice.

T&M: Smooth and very light tasting for a stout.
Way mild for a 7% abv. Pretty much non-descript as
far as taste goes. Chalk taste throughout with a
carbonated nutty feel at the end. Not impressed as
much as i thought i would have, by the smell of it.

D: Had high hopes for this one, but alas, it certainly
didn't live up to my expectations. Well, you live and
learn. if your in a desperate pinch to drink, then
try it out for yourself and see if it's right for
you. as for this reviewer, i'd rather drink some sake
to get a taste for Japan.

Serving type: bottle

01-17-2010 03:38:56 | More by July2Nov