Demoersleutel Beer Engineers: Intergalactic Bounty Hunter (Netherlands: Imperial Stout: 12% ABV)
Visual: Black. Still. Thin brown dust of a head.
Nose: Milky coffee. Coconut dust.
Body: Creamy texture, slightly oily. Nut oils. Nougat touch. Coconut. Lots of creamy coffee. Quite thick. Bitter cocoa. Toffee.
Finish: Creamy coffee. Chocolate ice cream. Coconut. Cream. Nougat. Bitter cocoa.
Conclusion: Oh, this is very nicely balanced. Also there is a good chunk of coconut. However we all know about my love of coconut in stouts, so lets concentrate on that balance first.
This is creamy of body and fairly thick, it doesn’t show the full 12% abv in weight but it definitely uses the malt to give that thick, rewarding mouthfeel very well. Despite that thickness and the creamy notes the (and heeeereee we go!) coconut notes actually makes the whole thing come across a tad drier than you would expect. It means that, while there is significant weight to this, it is far from sickly sweet and a while it has a light shimmer of an alcohol tell over whole whole thing it doesn’t feel “boozy”
There is a nice oiliness to it that comes along with a savoury nuttiness that, again, keeps this from getting sickly. The bitter cocoa dusts adds lovely bitter character while still keeping with the bounty chocolate bar theme which I am 90% sure the name calls to. They do have Bounty chocolate bars pretty much everywhere right? I’m not going to find out it is just a UK thing, right? The sweeter notes edge in with toffee hints at the edges, but in general this feel that it completely wants to be the beer take on a bounty chocolate bar, without descending into a boozy, sickly sweet mess as a lot of dessert themed stouts do.
And it manages it. Darn impressive.
It is sweet enough, just enough sweetness put out then everything else is used to bring this high alcohol beer down to being a restrained beast. So much going on here that I’ve not even touched on the mild coffee that bleeds out over the edges, the nougat thickness, or the lashings and lashings of coconut.
Oh yes this has coconut.
This is a very well made beer.
Background: This caught my eye at Independent Spirit as it is made with coconut. I love Imperial Stouts made with coconut when they are well done. Adore them. It is also made with coffee, but I’m here for the coconut. The can lists it as 12% abv, but a lot of people online list it as 10%. I wonder if that is something to do with the fact I’ve heard this a bigger brewed version of a beer they did previously? Maybe that was 10%? Not sure, not managed to find confirmation. As you can see this is one of the rare beer’s where I have done multiple shots of the can so you can see more of the art as it is very cool. Not tried anything from Demoersleutel Beer Engineers before, but I do like the name, so much more evocative than De moersleutel Brewers. Went back to David Bowie’s Blackstar as music for this – something lovely and haunting to back a big beer. Still so emotional an album even years on.
