Birkenhead Chocolate Malt Stout

Brewed by Birkenhead Brewery
Style: Stout
Western Cape: Stanford, South Africa

Serve in English pint

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A pour of cola brown gives a diminishing tan head that can’t wait to disappear. South Africa needs to walk away from the forced carbonation process. Not that it’d make much difference to this beer, which has a coffee, chocolate nose and a matching taste. But it’s just so thin, so weak and lacking; no hops, no bitterness and certainly no complexity. Basically it’s like a non-alcoholic malt drink that just happens to have a smidgen of booze. It’s an unbalanced beer for people who don’t like beer (made by people who appear to know nothing about beer). Terrible.

Murky black with thin diminishing foam head that leaves no lacing. Aroma burnt with some chocolate. Sweet & watery with too much carbonation. This does not even resemble a stout.

Bottle. Dark brown with read hues with a tan head. Aroma of chocolate, socks and burned toast. Flavos is thin, like creamted toast dissolved in water. Body is watery thin. An astringent mess and is not recommended. try Castle Stout instead.

courtesy of Per Forsgren - dark black colour with a very little beige foam; roasted and lactic aroma of chocolate and ashes; low carbonation, very thin-bodied, sweet with a dry and totally flat finish of roasted chocolate malts - very poor stuff

on draught this was passable, even kinda nice...um, the bottled version i had to throw out half way.i mean there were circumstances surrounding the event, but the aftertaste pissed me off...like a charcoal...anyway, the draught version is quite nice..its smooth (pretty damn thin) ..but it these temps, its nice.

This one looked pretty good - jet black with a generous head that laced well as it receded. Some dry roasted malt, milky chocolate and burnt toast. A little sour on tasting (like the brewers other beers), but reasonably well balanced. Not bad.

If you’re an overseas visitor to this South African brewery looking for beer to take home, this is the one. It may not be the best of the range when fresh but it’s the only one that survived a flight to Australia without falling apart. I guess stouts are more robust - or at least, their flaws are less obvious. This chocolate malt stout isn’t a world beater but’s well made and easy drinking. Looks great: teak with a 2cm head, fair retention and great lacework. It’s quite milky in the aroma but not too sweet, mainly showing dry cocoa powder. It’s softly carbonated, perhaps a tad thin in the body. There is a bit of licorice root in there and some some nice malts but overall it’s quite restrained, like a sweet, weak milky coffee. There are no fireworks here but it’s solid - a bit like eating a soft-centred milk choc. (340ml bottle; born on 20/9/05; bottle courtesy of Bridge and Omhper)

I guess they tried to immitate Guinness, but somewhere in the process burnt something. It would have been drinkable, but the burnt taste makes this their worst beer. It looks good though: a dark bear with a cream coloured creamy head.

Draught at the brewpub. Near black with dense beige head. Fruity licorice aroma. Sweet with plenty of coffee as well as notes of plums and metal. The mouthfeel is sharp and the finish somewhat ashy. A little unbalanced.