Bottled at Stockholm Beer Festival 2007. A black beer with a red-brown shine under a rim of orangey head. The aroma is sweet with primary notes of over ripe fruits. The flavor is sweet malty with notes of over ripe fruit, and towards the finish a note of alcohol grows.

Cask conditioned - gravity dispense - Merchants Inn, Rugby. A black coloured beer with bits of off-white head. The aroma has mocha notes. Treacle and coffee in the taste. Some burnt toast and sweet notes. Nice but this better years ago when brewed at the hotel.

Cask, ’The Joy of Six’ Merchantfest ’08, Rugby. Blackish and headless with ruby tints. Charcoal nose. Mouth full-on high cocoa, burnt malt, dusty drinking chocolate sweetness, long lingering smoke. Thinnish but sticky with brown sugar, dark fruit, molasses. Some creeping black olive notes as it warms, and oak. Tasty, but a bit disappointing for a festival-topper.

<i>Bottle at Stockholm Beer Festival 2007</i><br />Black color; thin creamy head. Mild aroma of caramel and roasted malt. Good body strength, a lot of dark caramel flavor, but a bit metallic too; quite sweet.

<i>Sampled at SBWF, 2007.</i> Dark brown with a small, beige head. Some chocolate and a lot of coffe in the aroma. Dry cocoa-flavour with a fine bitterness.