We have all heard about two great tastes in one candy
bar from the 1970’s TV commercial for Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. Two dorky
looking kids walking down the street (one of which went on to become Ralph
Malph of Happy Days TV fame) collide with one another with the end result being
the unwanted mixing of the eatables they have in their possession. “You got
your chocolate in my peanut butter!” the one kids yells, to which the other guy
replies, “You got your peanut butter in my chocolate!” But the two taste the
newly formed concoction only to discover it’s pretty darn good! The same can
be said for the marriage of chocolate with of all things, beer! And leave it
to our friends from the Young’s Brewery across the pond at Wadsworth, London, England
to come up with such a marriage that is both unique and delicious.
Young’s is a brewery that offers a wide variety of
unorthodox, but most notable traditional English ales. They make an oatmeal
stout, which strangely enough you can’t get in England, as it is brewed for
export to the United States only. A barley wine called Old Nick’s is another of
their creations. It is very strong and has a caricature of Lucifer himself on
the label. Ram Rod, is Young’s signature English bitter, and they make an ale
(are you ready for this?) called Dirty Dick’s. We won’t go any further with
that one.
But Young’s creation of a stout with chocolate as one
of the main ingredients truly sets the precedence for this brewing style. As a
matter of fact, the world’s best known authority on beer, Michael Jackson says
in one of his many beer books that the unusual usage of chocolate as a brewing
ingredient makes perfect sense because malts with chocolate like flavors are
used in brewing stouts all of the time. If you have had a Guinness or two, I
am sure you would notice this and agree. It seems though that Young’s Brewery
took the bull (or in this case, the goat) by the horns and moved forward with
the action of throwing dark chocolate bars and chocolate essence into the brew
kettle.
I first tried Young’s Double Chocolate Stout at the
Piper’s Pub on the South Side of Pittsburgh, PA. In case you haven’t noticed,
I spend a lot of time there when the budget allows it, and when I get the urge
to imbibe some traditional English and European brews. Anyway, my first
experience with this lovely beverage involved it coming out of a 14 to 16 ounce
nitrogenated can. And naturally that typical widget thingy that you will find
in these pseudo-draught ales was present within the stout’s metal confines. I
am not sure if that was a good thing, but the Piper’s Pub did not have it on
tap or in a bottle, so we had to make do with what we had. It didn’t matter to
me, though, because I was trying something new and was really happy that I did.
Double Chocolate was first introduced to the world in
1997. It pours from the can or 500 milliliter bottle into the pint glass with
a thick dark ruby to black hue and leaves a thin milk shake like head that is
not long lasting, but is still very inviting. It has aromas of fudge (go
figure!) and, yes, a German chocolate cake. It may be an insult to our English
friends to say that, but no harm is intended here! Trust me. The mouth feel
is very creamy, velvety and silky-smooth with a live complexity. The melted
dark chocolate bars and chocolate essence that are added after the filtration
process are heavily present on the tongue. The tastes of pale and crystal
malts, along with the Fuggles and Golding hops used in this recipe are not so
much present as the chocolate dominates. And the aftertaste is slightly
bitter, but not objectionable.
To sum all of this up, Young’s Double Chocolate is
definitely a world-class trend-setting winner of a stout. At only 5% ABV, it
makes for a wonderful session beer, and I highly recommend it as a solid after
dinner brew or desert beer. It is clean, fresh, syrupy, chewy and very
satisfying. Some might scoff at this brewing style and call it liquid candy.
I prefer to call Young’s Double Chocolate Stout Guinness with a confectionary
bang! On a final note, the head brewer at Young’s states on the company web
site that the combination of chocolate and beer is “surprisingly easy to
drink.” He is correct in his assessment. Cheers!
