Oatmeal Stout - Tasting

For this batch I was hoping for a smooth easy drinking stout without much astringency.  This recipe had a pretty complex grain bill with 5 different specialty grains as well as flaked oats.  At this point in my brewing hobby I'm not equipped to identify what impact using victory malt had on the beer vs the impact the crystal had vs the other ingredients.  Brewing this beer was good learning experience from a process perspective but I'm not sure it will teach me much regarding ingredient selection.  I'd really like to build up more of a comfort level with the contribution made by the various specialty malts so that I can start building my own recipes.

Out of the fermenter it had a nice chocolaty and slightly sweet flavor.  Now, after conditioning, every bottle I've had so far has a strong alcohol flavor that I didn't notice before.  I'm not sure what happened but it isn't a pleasant flavor on the finish.  I did pitch the yeast into 80 F wort for this batch which I am thinking may have been a contributor.  I have also been storing the bottled beer at house temperature which is in the low 80s typically - I wonder if that could be contributing as well.  Another option could be that my bottle sanitation method left some soap in the bottles.

Tasting Notes:

• Aroma:
• Chocolate and roast malt are the most prevalent smell.  A bit of fruity ester and alcohol in there as well.
• Appearance:
• Nice black color.  Completely opaque.  Thin head even after a fairly aggressive pour.  Head quickly dissipates down to a ring of foam around the edge of the glass.
• Flavor:
• A bit of chocolaty malt flavor up front followed by prickly alcohol in the middle and a somewhat harsh alcohol flavor in the finish.  I think it could be described as fusel or solvent like.
• Mouth-feel:
• A bit thin - the alcohol has a prickly burn to it that leaves an unpleasant feeling on the tongue and throat after each swallow.
• Overall:
• At bottling I though I had a winner in this one but it took a turn for the worse at some point.  The harsh alcohol flavor doesn't render it completely undrinkable but it's pretty close.  I can only hope that giving it some more age will allow it to mellow out a bit.

So, at this point I've decided to give the beer a couple months to mature.  I will give it another taste test at that point to see if the age has done it any good.  The English Mild I did previously had some bottles that seemed more harshly alcoholic than others.  Not sure how that could happen or if it's going to happen with this batch as well.  Very puzzling.  Going forward I am going to start chilling the wort down to fermentation temperature (or maybe slightly below) prior to pitching to see if that helps.