Prairie Paradise

Product description:Coconut Vanilla Stout. It’s about to get really hot outside. How about a cold glass of refreshing Imperial Stout. Yep, you heard that right. Brand new to our line up is Prairie Paradise. We took a stout, gave it a hint of vanilla and a good deal of toasted coconut and created one season defying, genre bending brew. Imperial stouts are usually thought of as a cold weather beer, but here the coconut and vanilla blend push the image of the stout into a year round, all season style. Prairie Paradise will be available exclusively on tap and in kegs.

Prairie Artisan Ales – Prairie Paradise (2017 Vintage) – 12oz. bottle poured into speciality glassware – 13% abv.

Like the Firestone Walker Bravo 2017, I decided to take a gamble on this beer and see if it’s worth the price. In this case, $12 for a 12oz bottle.

Prairie Paradise pours inky black out of the bottle generating some incredibly thick, tan foam. There’s impressive retention here. I’m a sucker for aesthetics, and this beer just looks fantastic. The nose on this is smoked meat up front, chocolate-covered bacon, and slight red apple. Not what I was expecting, but this should be an interesting experience. The flavor is likewise more savory and smoky than I would have imagined with an excellent body like melted, buttery dark chocolate. As it warms, thick Mounds bar comes through in the nose and the flavor moves to dark rum. The palate is outrageously silky but never sticky or sweet. It has great balance and finishes fairly dry.

The overall beer is assertive and decadent while the coconut and vanilla additions I can barely pick out, which is fine because this beer doesn’t seem to need any more of them. What’s here seems to be mild and well-integrated. Slight red apple character in the aroma distracts, but that seems to be a common issue I find with imperial stouts recently.

I would be the first to tell you to stay away from these adjunct flavored stouts. But this one is perfectly executed.