Bottled@HBF2016. Black colour, small off-white head. Aroma is liquorice, fruits, vanilla and some alcohol. Flavour is fruity, liquorice, some coffee, roasted malts and some vanilla.

Bottle 330ml. [ As Guineu / La Quince Vanilla Black Velvet 2015 ].Clear dark black brown color with a small to average, frothy - fizzy, fair lacing, mostly diminishing, off-white head. Aroma is moderate to heavy malty, roasted, chocolate, spiced, vanilla. Flavor is moderate to heavy sweet and bitter with a long duration, roasted, dark chocolate, vanilla, chocolate. Body is medium, texture is oily to watery, carbonation is soft, finish feel is light alcoholic. [20150926]

HBF 2016. Brown color, thin white head. Strong vanilla flavor, sweetness. Flavor has vanilla, coffee, chocolate and salt. Sweet as well.

Sample at HBF 2016, Helsinki. Colour is almost black with small brownish white head. Aromas and flavors: Chocolate, vanilla and roasted malts. Quite good. Nice soft chocolate in flavour.

Draught @ HBF 2016. Pours pitch black with a smooth head. Aroma of roasty malts, loads of vanilla, coffee, cocoa, milkshake and candy. Taste is smooth, sweetish and slightly roasty with massive amounts of vanilla, some coffee and cocoa. Finish is smooth, sweet and slightly roasty with loads of vanilla and hints of cocoa. Quite a vanilla overdose.

On tap @Luppolo Station (Rome). Pours deep brown/black with a cappuccino head. Aroma of roasted malts, coffee, licorice, a lot of vanilla, alcohol. Flavour is medium sweet with a medium to light bitter end, coffee and licorice in the aftertaste, some astringency, alcohol. Full body, medium carbonation. So rough and messy.

On tap at Luppolo Station, Rome-Italy. Pours black with a brownish head. Nose: whiskey vanilla root, macchiato. Mouth: medium carbo, chocolate/coffee, bitter finish. Not so balanced but quite complex with a bitter end. ---Rated via Beer Buddy for iPhone

In a country experiencing a craft beer revolution to the extent Spain has been experiencing it since a few years, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that some of them join forces to create collaboration brews and this apparently is one. The label gives ample detail about the ingredients which include, among others, wheat malt, oats, Chinook hops and actual vanilla beans from Madagascar - sounds promising. Thinnish, milky, pale yellowish beige, moussy head with decent retention, lying quietly over a blackish beer with translucent, deep yellowish mahogany brown edges. Rich and dense bouquet of black chocolate bars, mocha ice cream, a lot of wet leather (in the non-Brett way), more subtle hints of gin, teriyaki, vanilla not very outspoken but still there, quite strong iron, cocoa nibs, toffee, cured meat, roasted peanuts, cigar ashes, pine wood, rainwater, salmiak, dried fig, charcoal, porcini and dried field mushroom, cold black coffee, shoe polish, faint hints of damp forest floor and dried Mediterranean herbs. Restrained dried fruit sweetness in onset (fig, raisin), quite strong umami flavours (cured meat and dried mushrooms) and underneath a basic, soft, dull sourishness for balance; carbo remains soft but effective, mouthfeel is smooth, slick (oats!) and oily but perhaps a bit less ’thick’ and viscous than I expected seen the style and ABV. Rich multi-layered maltiness ensues, very briefly caramel sweetish, then very nutty and toasted, but turning to bitter chocolate and coffee grounds ’roastedness’ quickly, with a faint hint of ’natural’ feeling iron somewhere; this roasted bitter effect, becoming even a bit ashy at some point, lasts till deep into the finish, where it is further embellished with a (dried) spicy, earthy hop bitterness subtly yielding dried grapefruit-peel like echoes retronasally (but maybe that’s just my imagination after reading the word Chinook on the label) - as well as a firm but still relatively mild dosis of warm, long-stretching, gin-like alcohol. Vanilla does show up very far away in the background, but only as a brief and subtle hint, not providing the aromatic sweetness I was hoping for; the initial dried mushroom-like umami flavour remains after swallowing, along with the alcohol and the bitter chocolate malt flavour. It is only after these begin to fade a bit, in the very end, that a vanilla flavour reappears more distinctively, but obviously it shows up much too late - and still too weak. Rich and interesting sipper for sure, but lacking a bit of body, which probably also explains why the alcohol is so noticeable in the end - though it manages not to become too obnoxious. Could do with a tad more sweetness I think, and when I buy a big stout which announces ’vanilla’ in its name and label, I expect the vanilla aroma - which in my opinion is one of the most beguiling aromas in the plant world - to be more prominent. I don’t see the point of the wheat either. A bit more sweetness, more body and more vanilla could possibly make this a world class masterpiece, now it ’merely’ remains one of so many memorable craft beers in the new Spanish context. Update: tasted this from tap at Hedonis Ambachtsfest in September 2017, one and a half year after this rating, and this draught version delivered a lot more vanilla aroma, more sweet chocolatey flavours and a more velvety mouthfeel - in all, a more satisfying version, so this rating is to be taken as an average of both.