Left Hand Milk Stout review

Today is a two brew review day as I had a nice big 12-pack sampler of beers from Left Hand Brewing Company from Longmont, Colorado staring me in the face and I just have to have one more beer today. Left Hand Brewing offers up a 12-bottle Mountain Mixer and provides four different beers to sample and enjoy. Seeing how I am a fan of the dark side of brewing, I first chose to taste their Left Hand Milk Stout. I've tried a few dark stouts in my day including Guinness but had never had a milk stout. But what in the world is a milk stout you say? Does it include actual milk? No. Not a drop of cow juice was mixed into this dark beer, but rather the brew was primed with a milk sugar which helps balance the roastiness of this stout beer.

This beer poured almost black. While it isn't thick by any means, this beer is as dark as they come. As pictured above, this beer pours with a rich thick head that actually went slightly over the top of my glass when poured. The foam lingered on the side of the glass as it settled and left just a small tiny bead. Immediately you could smell a rich roasty, coffee and chocolate like aroma with a slightly different hop smell. This Left Hand brew uses Magnum and US Goldings hops, a much different smell than your typical Cascade that was in my last beer. Here, the malts are definitely the main feature here. This stout comes in at an ABV of 5.2% with an IBU of only 22. Left Hand uses a variety of malts including: Premium Pale 2-row, Munich, Crystal, Roast Barley, Flaked Oats, Flaked Barley and Chocolate malts. Wow - now that's a line up of malt!

This beer had a very rich malty taste with a true roastiness to it. After a few seconds I noticed just an ever so slight roasted aftertaste that stayed on the middle of my tongue. Nice, and not chalky but borderline so. If you love coffee, you'll love this beer. Even I enjoyed this beer while not being a coffee drinker. I love the smell of good coffee but prefer not to drink that bean. But this beer is very smooth. This being my second beer of the afternoon, I can definitely feel a buzz from the previous beer and this one. Much more so than the 22 oz imperial porter I sampled earlier this week.

This is the first beer from Left Hand Brewing Company that I've had the opportunity to sample. So far so good. I have a Brown, and Pilsner and their flagship Ale to sample next and am looking forward to it. I'll give this milk stout a decent 3.5 out of 5 rating. Definitely worth a try.

Related articles:
- Left Hand Snowbound Winter Ale review.
- Left Hand Deep Cover Brown Ale review.
- Left Hand Sawtooth Ale review.

This article came from FermentedlyChallenged.com
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