“The next instalment of our favourite adjunct laden stout. this year’s rendition has been fermented cold with our house lager yeast and has been conditioned on mountains on toasted hazelnut and coconut. Dolce Noir exudes richness, it’s time to stop living down there and start living up here.”

Glassware: Snifter.

Appearance: As black as midnight with a huge three and a bit finger head. It takes an age to recede and leaves big, blotchy patches of lace on the glass.

Aroma: Unsurprisingly the coffee is pretty direct. Hints of cocoa and chocolate in support and the dates at this stage are MIA. The base Stout provides an excellent roasted malt profile which takes on a hint of ash, molasses and licorice at times. The dates start to come through as it settles and brings a hint of dark fruit with them i.e raisin, blackberry and blood plum.

Flavour: Good progression on it. It opens with dark fruits which reach well into the mid. The coffee also slots in early and adds to that impressive progression we mentioned. It hits a fairly intense roasted note midway which brings those ashy/smoky flavours before it rounds out on a roasty yet sweet and chocolatey finish. Excellent length too.

Mouthfeel: Just a tad too lean for our liking. Medium body, low-ish Co2. For a Stout weighing in at 6.7% ABV it should be thick and viscous.

Overall: Aromas and flavours were great, good depth and complexity. Just the body and general texture of it fell short in our opinion. All in all a fairly decent pastry Stout.