Seahorse
The Ale Apothecary

 

 

a truly bizarre beverage, done with a ton of chocolate, nibs and actually bottled with melted chocolate apparently, pretty awesome. its also got sea salt in it, and has been aged in a combination of red wine and maple syrup barrels, obviously a little kitchen sinky, when you add their wild funky culture to the mix, but its also oddly cohesive, and definitely stands as one of their weirdest beers i drank in 2019 so far. its dark brown to black thick and slick looking, viscous as heck, hardly any head at all, and a downright ton of sediment towards the bottom of the bottle. it tastes like rich dark chocolate, sort of raw and earthy, deep and organic to me, very little sweetness, but nice with some darker grain character in here too, this has a bready baked vibe, some obvious dark fruits from the red wine, and the natural maple as well. the first sip is shockingly sour, which was never evident in the aroma at all, so it really catches me off guard, its past vinegar to straight acetic, so intense here, almost hurts my teeth and scorches my taste buds, but my palate slowly gets used to it, and i can taste the beer finally. lots of chocolate here, again dark and earthy like the nose, with some raisin and fig sweetness and the maple coming in beautifully. light vanilla, blackberry, and sour cherry in the red wine profile that runs though it, and a neat almost spicy malt base, complex beer for sure. the salt is subtle, adding more of a mineral thing than any real appreciable saltiness as such. the maple comes out more as it warms but remains just one of many flavors in here. way more sour than i want it to be, very little of the usual wild funk that i love in the beer these guys make, its all acid. unique though, strong as can be too, and fun to drink in small doses. worthy of much contemplation. i liked this, but i wanted to love it. the over the top acidity and lack of carbonation hurt it, but its outrageously different and clever just the same. a very cool expression of chocolate in beer that i have never experienced before...

 

2019-09-28
Tried it at E9 on Zwanze day. I think it was a bottle pour.

Chocolate, roastiness, sour -- don't seem like they go together particularly well, in my opinion. Dark in color, but still translucent around the edges. No head.

This was my least favorite beer of the day -- not that it was poorly made or anything like that, but I didn't think it went together very well.