Double Cake
BrewDog

12 oz can from Ohio.
This ale is an excellent outcome for a brew inspired by chocolate cake. It has a rich, chocolaty flavor with a solid, dark malt base. Sweet but not cloying.

 

Ebony with a 1" tan head, which slowly fades. Moderate lacing.

Aroma of vanilla, chocolate.

Taste is vanilla cake frosting, corn syrup, cocoa.

Medium body, light carbonation. Sweet finish.

Kind of like a chocolate cake with vanilla frosting. A bit on the sweet side.

 

Excellent stout. Not quite black look. Definitely has a little marshmallow taste but is not overly sweet. Maybe the chocolate is like real chocolate, a little bitter, and that mellows out the mallow. The 7% abv is lower than many stouts I drink but this still feels like a higher abv drink. Definitely worth seeking out.

This is a weird one it kind of taste sweet and really wants to be a good Imperial Milk stout but their is something off and Artificial about this especially the body that makes it weird. It might be a weird toasty aspect like burnt marshmallow or something but I am just not loving it as much as say Left Hand Milk Stout. Not even really a pastry or cake beer to be honest...

 

BORN: 11/03/21

Looks pretty decent with lightly creamed coffee head and lacing. Smells decent too with vanilla and milk chocolate and mild roast. Roasted malts take over on the front of the palette before the sweetness takes over and while it's pleasant enough I can't help but question why they named this "Double Cake". There's nothing cake-like about it; it's just a standard stout with some sweet "add junks". Whatever; probably just trying to jump on the pastry stout fad. I understand and can overlook that. Its biggest sin, though, is far too thin a mouthfeel at 7% ABV. How did they even manage to give something of this octane almost zero body? You can really taste the alcohol, too, as it warms. Not my favorite beer.

Pours a dark brown color with a minimal head that lasts quite a while. Aroma is sweet chocolate and caramel and roasted malts. Tastes of black coffee and dark chocolate. Taste is not sweet. Has a rather bitter finish.

 

Picked up a six pack at my favorite distributor for $11. 7%, sweet stout, decent packaging; the label reads, “UNITED WE STAND FOR BETTER BEER FIERCELY DEFIANT AND INDEPENDENT.”
Looks good and brown dark opaque. Smells are definitely chocolatey vanilla roasted malt and adjuncts. I contacted the brewery to make sure that no actual marshmallow (thus, as a result, animal hooves) was used. Pretty standard fare really. Taste follows the nose. Vanilla pastry thing going with the adjunct chocolate and roasted malt flavor. A bit crisp, which, for a milk stout of this type, is one of the few notable things. Otherwise a textbook sweet stout. I wish I could give it like a 3.3 overall. 3.5 is too much.
TLDR: I would take this opportunity to remind everyone what can be done with malted grain, hops and yeast. Truly the possibilities have not been exhausted and the rush to an adjunct is frankly lazy.
That said, all types of natural ingredients added to the brewing process are fine with me, so long as they are noted and the origins of same explained. But we’re at a place where, in pursuit of the most unique craft beer, and given the absence of labeling requirements, unscrupulous brewers are happy to throw pickle juice and cat shit in beer if it sells. Mostly this affects IPAs, of course, because a certain lack of discrimination is a prerequisite to enjoying that “style,” but adjuncts are almost ubiquitous in American craft beer and brewers are under no obligation to disclose what exactly you are drinking. I think we have come to a point where we must demand labeling of the contents of our beer. Just imagine what a boon such a requirement would be to ethical brewers!
The “libertarian” (and I use that term in the American sense as distinct from what everyone else on the planet understands a libertarian to be) argument is always that the State distorts markets (absolutely correct) but there’s little to nothing to say about who, then, holds the capitalist to account. As such, and given the sad fact that we already live under a monstrous and omnipresent State, I think it’s appropriate to demand labeling of beer adjuncts.
Anyway this stuff is okay. Probably wouldn’t buy it again. Would drink it for free.

I got a can of this beer from a mixed Christmas 2021 holiday 24pck that my wife got me. It poured an opaque dark with ecru ring head that is leaving some lace. The scent had rich chocolate notes. The taste was nicely balanced and easy to drink with chocolate and subtle presence of vanilla extract. The mouthfeel was medium in body and had good carbonation. Overall it is a great beer.

Black in color with minimal light penetration. There's a fingernail of brown over four-fifths of the top. The aroma is of decadent dark chocolate and lactose. I'm tasting milk chocolate and lactose. The mouth is velvety smooth.

 

APPEARANCE: Black with ruby hi lights. Big head of khaki suds and no lace.

NOSE: Dark chocolate, almost fruity, too, and not getting much marshmallow.

TASTE: Big cake-like chocolate with frosting (getting the marshmallow here). A wee bitter, coating the tongue in a weird and confusing melange. Wanted to like this one more, but nah.

1/1/22 On tap at Industry Public House

Definite sweet and cocoa aromas flood the nose on this, but also a slight medicinal scent that detracts. The flavor, however, does not disappoint. Sweet chocolate cake, just the right amount of baking chocolate mellows out the sweetness. Smooth mouthfeel gives the sense of moist cake.

Just when you thought that you'd never get to have your cake and eat it too, BrewDog comes to the rescue with a pastry stout that's moderate enough in strength to make you want seconds.

Double Cake leaps out with a very dark brown, just a shade off of black. As its creamy light tan head builds upon the rim, the stout starts to swirl with chocolate, vanilla, caramel and cream. With a suggestion of coffee, the scent soon turns over to a sweeter, milkier stout with the bold influence of cake batter, brownie and fudge, equipped with the beater.

With its sweetness held firmly in check, the middle palate is just as sweet as the early flavors suggest. Laced with chocolate and marshmallow fluff, the creaminess of the beer seems nougat-like. With a simmering hint of cappuccino lying as its foundation for taste, the beer's late palate shows a somber bitterness that provides a welcomed woodsy offset for the sweetness.

Double Stout is a tasty not-so-little beer that has all the flavors of more famous or notorious pastry stouts, just in a smaller package. Though the palate often wants a bolder, heftier session, there's something friendly about this beer as a single 12oz can is the proper serving size. Finishing full, rounded and off-cloying, an extension of bittersweet chocolate follows in a long and malty aftertaste.

 

On tap

A- pours black with a one finger creamy khaki head that has great retention

S- chocolate, light toast, vanilla, marshmallows, cocoa nibs

T- chocolaty malt with notes of cocoa nibs, followed by a creamy marshmallow vanilla note. The finish gives more chocolate with a creamy lactose finish

M- medium body with moderate carbonation leads to a creamy mouthfeel that continues into the finish

O- not a sweet and more approachable than a typical pastry stout