Japanese breweries tend to produce sweeter beers around Valentine’s Day in the hope of enticing new customers to share the love; this Sweet Vanilla Stout by Sankt Gallen, while brewed all year round, is no exception. Made with fresh vanilla, it is technically a happoshu (like the Coedo Beniaka reviewed here); however, it still contains the essential ingredient: alcohol. Wait – I mean hops, malts, and all that.
With added fresh vanilla.
Sankt Gallen Sweet Vanilla Stout Aroma and Taste
Pouring like a typical a stout, you will get a black body perhaps slightly dark brown if the light is shining on it at an angle and the merest of creamy white heads. Aroma wise, it has good lacing of vanilla, which isn’t a surprise, followed up with coffee and chocolate notes as well. Sankt Gallen Sweet Vanilla Stout smells like a beverage you would get at Starbucks (in this case, a good thing).
When you sip on the Sankt Gallen weet Vanilla Stout (and it is a sipping beer), it’s heavy and warming. The taste is almost the same as the aroma, however the roasted malt is far more pronounced; there’s also a sweetness to it from the sugar and a mild bitterness in there as well. Strength wise, at 6.5%, it does not overpower you with the alcohol content.
Sankt Gallen Sweet Vanilla Stout One-line Review
A good sweet stout that would be welcome as a dessert but not something you would want as a regular beer.
