Cocoa Loco
Granville Island Brewery

 

 

Yum. Beers like this are my Kryptonite. It pours beautifully - black, with a substantial dark tan foam cap that leaves some serious lacing. It smells like a Camino dark hot chocolate mix, with a hint of Maxwell House. The flavour has a few levels - dark chocolate, toffee, coffee from a Bunn-o-Matic with a trace of vanilla. There is a substantial alcohol kick towards the end of the bottom half of the bomber, in the best possible way. There is a lot to like about this beer, including the label with the messed up Yeti. Another successful "Black Notebook" series brew from GIB.

 

 

 

Granville Is. 'Cocoa Loco' Chocolate Imperial Stout @ 8.7% , served from a 650 ml bottle purchased for $6.45
A-pour is a chocolate brown from the bottle to a near black in the glass with a big frothey beige/tan head leaving a spotty lace along the pint
S-sweet chocolate milk
T-chocolate & coffee , weak tasting Imperial stout ,
MF-ok/good carbonation , big full bodied
Ov-ok beer , weak replacement to the GIB Roger's Chocolate Imp Stout
prost LampertLand

 

650ml bottle, 8.7% ABV - seems that there was another GIB choco-stout a little while back, but oh well, ho ho ho.

This beer pours a very dark, near black, with prominent basal red cola highlights, and three fingers of puffy, weakly foamy, and bubbly beige head, which leaves some decent archipelago lace around the glass as it slowly ebbs away.

It smells of sugary sweet milk chocolate, caramel/toffee malt, faint black licorice, vanilla, and a slight generic roast. The taste is gritty, grainy medium-dark chocolate, roasted caramel malt, toffee biscuits, Nordic licorice "candies", understated earthy, weedy hops, and a tame bristling alcohol measure.

The bubbles are adequate in their supportive duties, and little more, the body a decent medium weight, and more or less smooth, that cocoa overdose going a long way here. It finishes not as sweet as one might have imagined, a certain chalky and hoppy and boozy harshness sidling its way in.

Not a bad chocolate stout, in that the guest ingredient doesn't run away with the sweetness. Kind of plain, though, any potential robustness apparently cut off at the knees by the corporate head office - not fair, I know, but give me a better bloody reason.