Well Lord love a duck! I am so behind on my posting!  This actually happened weeks ago….

Going to Chocolate—er, Copper Canyon: A Chocolate Beerposium with Beer Todd

I like to think that I defy gender stereotypes in many ways. For example, I do not enjoy shopping, I own about five pairs of shoes, and I think I drive pretty badass. I also am not a huge fan of chocolate. I will eat it if it is around, but I don’t buy it myself and rarely find myself craving it. Boyfriend Ken, on the other hand, loves the stuff. So when I heard about a chocolate beer tasting—a Beerposium—at Copper Canyon, I knew we had to go.

The head brewer at the Canyon is my friend, Todd Parker (a.k.a. Beer Todd; I actually had to stop and think about his last name there for a second) and he puts on one helluva show. Beer Todd had 17 beers waiting for us, neatly broken up into categories of chocolate ale, chocolate & coffee beer and chocolate mole. Here are my top five picks:

Atwater’s Decadent Delight: Far and away, my favorite beer of the tasting. Boyfriend Ken frowned when he saw the name of the beer and suddenly I saw him pecking away at his Smart Phone. A moment later, he confirmed that decadent is actually a negative term, meaning “being in a state of decline or decay”. (Later, my own research proved this to be true; I am not sure how we got to the point of using the term as a positive, although I am sure someone somewhere earned a degree for writing about this topic. The same degree that I earned by slogging through 100 hours of 800 level law courses, but hey whatever, Doctor Decadent). This beer was neither in decline nor in decay and was all awesome. It literally smells like hot chocolate! Like what your mom would make you after you got home from school on a cold day hot chocolate. The taste was like being kissed by chocolate. Note that I am leaving this description vague so that you are forced to try it yourself!

Southern Tier’s Choklat:  Previously, I had only had the Crème Brulee beer that Southern Tier makes, and I was hella impressed by that. (Are the kids still saying hella? No? Oh, well.). This beer was made with Belgian chocolate, which may very well be what made this beer so delicious. It is heavy and thick, with a fairly high ABV (11%). It is sweet, with a faint alcohol finish. Kind of like drinking a chocolate bar, with a beer finish.

Arcadia’s Cocoa Loco: Arcadia made this beer with both chocolate and cocoa nibs and I credit the nibs with giving it an extra special taste. The beer has a nice molasses flavor and a sweet, chocolate taste. I could also pick up a slight lactic taste, which just added to the enjoyment of the beer.

Harpoon’s Chocolate Stout: This beer was brewed with only chocolate malt, and very little (if any) actual chocolate added to it. I therefore was skeptical as to what it would taste like. Imagine my delight when I found the beer to be delicious—nice balance of roasted malt and chocolate notes. There was also a touch of hops in the finish. The texture was a little thinner than I would like, but this did not take away from my enjoyment of the beer.

Copper Canyon’s Shillelagh Stout:  This oatmeal stout has chocolate added to it, for an extra special bonus! Beer Todd says it is a “Todd Stout”, which the internet tells me is a stout that is too strong for an oatmeal, too weak for an imperial and too sweet for a foreign export. Given this yummy beer, I vote for a new category called “Todd Stout” to be added to the BJCP guidelines, pronto.

Despite not being a huge chocolate fan, I really enjoyed the tasting. As I mentioned, Beer Todd puts on a great show and for only $20, it was more than worth it. The next Beerposium is coming up on May 5 and will feature the Beers of Summer. Something tells me that a certain Summerzest beer might be on tap for that….