It's no secret that the team at Newtown's Young Henrys love to collaborate. Roast coffee? Come and make beer with us! Got vanilla? Come make beer with us! In a rockin' band? Come and make beer with us! Run a radio station... Well, you get the message. It's not that often, however, that they make beer with other brewers but, following a few real ales shared at this year's Good Beer Week Cask Off, owner Richard Adamson got chatting to Holgate Brewhouse founder Paul Holgate and a plan was hatched. Young Henrys head brewer Sam rates Holgate's Temptress as one of the best chocolate beers in the land so the plan turned into a chocolate stout but, being Young Henrys, that wasn't enough so they called in supplies from the Truffle and Wine Co in Manjimup and chucked a kilo of fresh perigord black truffles in too. With a new brewery only recently installed, there were issues along the way: failing pumps and long hours, but the end result, so we're told, "has depth and creamy smoothness with cocoa and truffle complementing roast and earthy tobacco notes - a triumph over adversity!"
As for the name, aside from the obvious chocolate pun, it harks back to 1930's obscure rhyming slang for 'I should think so", which is used sarcastically in retort to a whacky idea. Example: 'Hey Paul, do you want to come up to Sydney to share your secrets and make a beer on our new brewery (which we haven't worked out how to use yet and will probably break) and throw a kilo of one of the world's most expensive ingredients into the mix?"
"I should coco!"
Published August 6, 2014 2014-08-06 00:00:00
