Pumkin Honey Coco Stout

Pumkin Honey Coco Stout was made with a pinch of soured stout from last year (maybe 2%), and a pinch of that coco powder I bought from Peru via Amazon.  And it's ended up mildly hoppy, creamy, with more chocolate notes than I expected given the tiny pinch I placed in bottle-- very tasty all in all, and maybe even, as the kids, chefs and bartenders can't seem to ever stop saying: both  "delicious" and maybe even completely "amazing".  

"Delicious, amazing, delicious, amazing, delicious, amazing".  Is anyone else hearing the buzz of these words around their heads these days?  You know what happens when everything becomes "amazing"?   In the 80's, I recall everyone was saying everything was "wonderful".   It was like everyone was quoting Willie Wonka. I was glad to see "wonderful" go, but the "amazing" might be worse.  Okay, okay, sidetracked much? 

Anyway, I know what you're thinking-- Pumpkin with Chocolate!?  Come-on.  Really?  Syria?  WTF?   Sounds Benghazi, right?  Yes, but the Pumpkin flavor here was not overwhelming or pronounced enough to really piss in the punch bowl.  It was more in the spirit of drizzling chocolate on the whipped cream atop a slice of pumpkin pie, or coco, flavored with ginger, nutmeg and cinnamon.  After all, pumpkin beer is more often than not the pumpkin pie spices one uses in the beer.   And the adjuncts were balanced well with the coco here.

I've made Pumpkin wine and hard cider with roasted fresh and canned pumpkin to see what kind of flavor I could pull out of this popular, glamorous gourd, only to find that when the sugars are fermented out, pumpkin imparts very little flavor of its own, without the Pumpkin Pie spices, as many experienced homies  have testified on the home brew message boards.  However, what it does impart is tannic mouth feel, like wine, which put it on part with a nice, light White table wine.  It makes pumpkin well worth a plus one to many fermentation party you're having.