Holtermann’s Chocolate Crumb Cake Stout
The Flagship Brewing Company

 

It's always a good time for desert. A pint can poured into a clear Imperial pint glass starts the process. We find a very dark brown liquid with a light brown head atop, with no glass lacing. Less than robust is an aroma of malt, vanilla and maybe some chocolate. The taste is only mildy sweet and brings more chocolate than the nose foretold it would. Not that this is a sugary mess. It does run toward the sweet side of stouts and there's no hop nor heavily roasted malt presence in the taste. This is a very pleasant tasting, mildly flavored stout that drinks as smoothly as many with half the ABV. A great desert, before or after you eat, or by itself. It may fall a little short in the look/smell tests, but its taste and mouthfeel are good.