Founders Breakfast Stout

I'll just lead off here by simply saying: Best.Stout.Evar.

Now, I'm sparse with the superlatives, and I try to be fair when evaluating beer--but this one has earned it.

Pours black, with a great dark tan head. Best head I've seen in an impy stout. Opaque, with reddish highlights around the edges.

Man, this smells great. Smells like coffee grounds. Not from a regular coffee maker, but like it was from the old percolator style coffee makers, except after the grounds have been sitting for a day. Strong, and wet. Great memories of my grandparents' kitchen. As the head fades the smell opens up more to the grain, with a sweetness from the heavy malt and oats.

The coffee disappears from the taste initially, but does come out in the aftertaste. The first hit is of sharp grain, from the huge malt. No discernible taste of oats, which are usually sweet but this beer is too big for the oats to compete against the malt and the coffee. In the aftertaste the coffee comes out much more, a good coffee, not some scorched Starbucks version. Strong, black. The alcohol is almost completely absent, not interfering in the taste of the malt or coffee one bit.

Best stout ever, I think. I could not find a single fault with it. Well, one fault--it's only a 12 oz. bottle.