Happy Saint Patrick's Day! Normally, I don't do up St. Paddy's too much--just add a few drops of green food coloring to a lager or two (what can I say? I'm an OU grad). This evening, though, I have something a little special.

See, I happened to run into a sixer of Warped Wing's St. Patrick's Day stout at a local bottleshop a week or so ago. It's a variant of the brewery's 10 TON Oatmeal Stout (which I briefly mentioned in this post but have never done a full writeup on). I had some of the original 10 TON within the last month and figured now would be an incredibly opportune time to crack into some 10 TON Irish Cream Stout on the blog; not only have I refreshed myself on the base beer it's, y'know, seasonally appropriate.

Warped Wing's (we'll do the usual thing here and talk about the brewery first) based in Dayton, OH. Their name comes from an invention that let the Wright Brothers perfect their flying machine. The brewery also draws inspiration from Dayton's innovative industrial history and brings innovative brewing to the beers they craft. Here's their "About Warped Wing" page if you want all the details.

10 TON Irish Cream's full description can be found on Untappd, so that's where we'll pull our information today. The 7% ABV stout builds onto 10 TON's oatmeal foundation with notes of chocolate and vanilla.

The stout's nose has a hearty backbone of everything a good oatmeal stout should showcase: coffee, chocolate, and malt. But this is all overshadowed by the whole "Irish Cream" bit of the beer. The vanilla is omnipresent in the bouquet, heavy enough so that it imparts a marshmallow aroma to the whole thing. Purrl gave my can three whiffs, indicating that it's a little too sweet for her.

That vanilla sweetness carries over to 10 TON Irish Cream's flavor. Again, those chocolate and coffee notes are here, but the vanilla overshadows them. The beer tastes nearly like a Ho Ho, all sweet cream and chocolate.

A nice creamy mouthfeel is exactly what this beer should boast and I'm happy to report that's the exactly what the mouthfeel is.

I can't think of St. Paddy's Day without remembering Green Beer Day in uptown Athens, OH. It was the night a year when I'd actually order whatever macro beer bars had on tap because, you know, the beer was dyed green. It was festive. I wish I could've found a good craft beer like this stout dyed green. Maybe next March 17th I'll head to a local brewery or two to see how they do it up.

Warped Wing always makes a good beer, and this 10 TON variant is no exception. While I think it's a little on the sweet side (I'm in agreement with Purrl on this one), I'm still giving it an 8.0/10. It's definitely a fine St. Patrick's Day brew.