Founders has become pretty well known for it’s stouts, especially the breakfast stouts. The Kentucky breakfast stout and Canadian breakfast stout are some of the most well reviewed stouts out there, usually referred to by their initials KBS and CBS. They’re highly sought after and frequently traded. Luckily, when they are available you can usually get some here in the Greater Cincinnati area. Also the Moerlein Lager house will have KBS on tap September 10th!!! Anyway, I’m wasn’t lucky enough to score the Kentucky or Canadian varieties but here comes the review for the plain old Breakfast Stout.
Brewery: Founders
Beer: Breakfast Stout
Style: Imperial Stout
Alcohol by Volume: 8.3%
IBUs: 60
Not as heady as I expected it to be, really just a thin layer of brown head that goes no where fast. If you’ve ever been deep in a cave at night and turned off all the lights you can come close to picturing how freaking black this thing is.
Incredible malt aroma of chocolate and roasted coffee beans. Behind all this action is the slightest hint of the alcohol. I don’t drink Starbucks (or coffee) but if they served alcohol I imagine it would smell like this.
Tastes makes a similar combination hitting a bit stronger on the chocolate notes. After the initial pass over the tongue it lingers longer on the coffee flavors. You really pick up lots of the roasted malt flavor here. If you’ve been following along for a while now you know I’m relatively new to the stout scene so it’s kinda weird for me to have a beer that has almost NO hop flavor and only slight bitterness. Hold pls, letting it warm up a bit. OK we’re back. Woah coffee kicked it up a notch! Chocolate has become much more of a background flavor here, still hanging in there but over powered by coffee. Actually the coffee flavor has become a bit overpowering for my tastes.
I’ll be honest, I’ve never had a full bodied beer… at least not that I’m aware of. That said I’m pretty sure that this IS very full bodied. It’s thick and chewy though smooth and creamy. Does that makes sense? I’m not sure… but it’s true.
This is a pretty damn fine beer. Is it 100 level quality like Rate Beer & Beer Advocate give it? I think not, though I wouldn’t consider myself a well rounded judge in this area as this is like my third stout. But I enjoyed it, which is what really matters. Am I gonna drink it all the time, doubtfully. Do I want to drink the KBS and CBS? Certainly. Bottom line, would I suggest this to others? Of course!
BrewMinds 
I continue to hope and pray to get my hands on a bottle of KBS or CBS. Only a dozen of each were delivered to my local store and raffled off last year. Regular-old breakfast stout does OK to hold me over until then. Definitely one of my favorites of this style.
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CBS and KBS are great, but it’s really, really nice to be able to run to the store and pick up a four-pack of the normal Breakfast Stout without the hassle associated with the other two.
I got two bottles of CBS when it was released and, though it was amazing, I don’t think it would have been worth it if I had to run the gamut like most people did to get bottles.
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Where did you find FBS? haven’t seen it in stores for month.
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It had been in the fridge for a few months so I don’t recall how I came about it. Either Jungle Jims or a trade most likely.
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Hey Earl,
This year’s bottles should be seen on the shelves around here very soon. I remember seeing a picture of them coming off the labeling line just a few weeks ago.
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just an FYI, I saw a post from Founders that FBS’ release date is 9/21.
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That’s the draft release day, they just posted on FB that bottles are now available.
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