28/10/2020. Sample courtesy of danlo, cheers Ed! Pours dark brown with a short lasting fizzed off-white head. Aroma of roasted malt, vanilla, chocolate, blackcurrant, blackberry, touch of liquorice. Medium sweetness and moderate roasted bitterness with a touch of tart. Medium body, slight oily texture, fizzy carbonation.

440ml can from Rehills, Jesmond. Black brown colour, biege foam head leaving lacing and aroma of roasty malt, meaty, dark chocolate, coffee. Taste is sweetish, dark malty, roasty, dried fruits, powdered chocolate, coffee, pastry, vanilla, soya sauce hints, some earthy nutty bitterness. Medium bodied, soft carbonation, roasty bitter finish. Nicely drinkable.

Can from Gedeelde Vreugde. Pours hazy black with a thin, foamy, beige head. Aroma of wet earth, chicory, 'raw' vanilla, chocolate powder, cream, peanut, walnut, dried fig, toast. Taste has sweetish chocolate, dark toffee, walnuts, dried dark fruits & the faintest touch of cream; quickly becoming bitter earthy, toasty, coffee- & even chicory-like with an edge of leathery umami even, resulting in a malty, (dark) chocolatey finish with subtle earthy hops and slightly stronger earthy coffee, and a touch of whisky alcohol. Medium to full body, thin creamy texture, fizzy carbonation. All in all this beer does not live up to its description; I don't mind the lack of apparent lactose & vanilla if other aspects make up for that but the shallow body for a 10.5% beer is just disappointing!

Strong milk stout (so with the obligatory lactose) further flavoured with vanilla, coffee and cocoa nibs, from this craft brewery in the English Tyne & Wear area. Can from Gedeelde Vreugde. Mousy, regular, greyish beige, small-bubbled, slowly opening head on a pitch black beer, showing some greyish dead yeast 'sediment' at the bottom of the glass - not usually a good sign in this type of beers. Aroma strongly beef stock cube-like, burnt toast, cold espresso, reduced game stock, damp earth, wet black chocolate bars, leather, coffee grounds, old 'jenever', dried porcini, charred walnuts, salmiak, wood ashes, charcoal, forest floor, dead tree leaves, black tea, hard caramel, stewed beef - but very little of the promised vanilla, if any at all. Sweetish onset with light fruity notes of prunes and figs as well as a sourish blackberry-like undertone, quickly surrounded by very heavy beef stock- and porcini-like umami, with even a slightly 'dirty' effect at the edges, hinting at mild and onsetting infection - as does a suspiciously spritzy carbonation effect. Full walnutty and 'unsweet' caramelly body, bitter chocolate too, toasty but holding back its bitterness a bit, leaving that to the coffee addition, which adds a spicy, aromatic bitterness working well with a spicy hop note and lingering at the back long after swallowing, yet without becoming overly dominant; light liquorice accent as well as that 'dead tree leaf' earthiness, salmiak, but the vanilla sadly remains as good as absent. Warming, 'jenever'-ish alcohol glow amidst the lingering coffee, bitter chocolate and toasted bread aspects. I have a suspicion that a mild infection is creeping in here, with a slight dirtiness and strong earthy effects, as well as additional carbonation which breaks the normal creaminess of the lactose. That said, the lactose dosage probably was not very strong here to begin with, as I get very little of the 'milky sweetness' it normally exhibits; vanilla, apparently added here at some point, is all but unnoticeable and this is regrettable, as I love a good whiff of delicate vanilla in this kind of beers. Enjoyable enough, in all, still bold and powerful as it ought to be, but not entirely satisfactory with regard to what it promises - I expected more, to be honest.

Lots of foam, but pretty unstable. High carbonation. Nicely bitter, lots of roast, and tons of coffee. Smooth, but without the sweet lactose flavour. Dark chocolate, only a hint of vanilla. Carbonation is the biggest issue. Not boozy at all, drinks as 8%.

LCI

440ml can. Pours black with a large tan head, quickly fizzling away. Aroma of coffee, vanilla, chocolate. Taste of milky coffee, chocolate, sweet vanilla, boozy finish with coffee and alcohol aftertaste. Medium bodied, decent flavours but carbonation is way too high, it's like drinking a fizzy Coke.