“Tiramisu is a rich, creamy oatmeal stout infused with the indulgent charms of Mojo Coffee La Jacoba beans, Wellington Chocolate Factory Dominican Republic cacao nibs and HeilalaBourbon vanilla. Heading into winter and replacing our Black stout series of recent years, Tiramisu Oatmeal Stout is designed around its Italian dessert namesake. A ‘pick me up’ to get us through the winter months. For lovers of this venerable style, Tiramisu is bold, rich, warming and moreish – velvet on the palate! For those keen to dip their toes into the craft beer ocean, Tiramisu is a beer to warm the soul with rich coffee, chocolate and vanilla flavours.”
Served from Tuatara’s trademark scaley bottle in to a snifter glass. The black complexion is covered by a two and a bit finger head that slowly reduces to a fine film that’s leaving some patchy lace clinging to the glass. We’re fans of tiramisu (how could you not be?!) The ingredients that mainly make up the deliciousness of tiramisu can be broken down to coffee, cookies, cocoa, cream and marsala. The aroma definitely packs a good hit of coffee with cocoa and subtle vanilla notes in support. The use of oats in this brew cleverly provides the cookie-like scent and the additions of licorice, chocolate and roasted malts fill it out. The one thing missing is the marsala which, to be fair, would be a difficult ingredient to integrate. So all up they’ve done a solid job of showcasing tiramisu on the nose. In the mouth it’s finely carbonated with a slightly higher IBU of 50. The body is nice and full with a creamy texture going on. The onset is slightly artificial, but very close to, flavours of tiramisu – coffee, chocolate and roasted malts. An assertive bitterness develops in the middle with a slight roasted edge that’s helped along by grainy oat accents. Bitter chocolate and coffee return before it’s punctuated by a dry toasty finish with reasonable length. To be honest we think they have featured the tiramisu quite well. Although the coffee, cocoa, vanilla and oats were all displayed well we feel they didn’t really gel as fluently as they could have in flavour. Take nothing away from it though it’s a damn tasty stout, it just didn’t hit its mark as well as it could have for us. Not bad.