518. Pax Verum Brewing Company (Lapel, IN) - Dark Matter

“Awaken your senses from a spellbinding conjuring of things that reach beyond. A stout conditioned on toasted coconut and sweetened with milk sugar.”

Don’t know that I would have guessed coconut, initially, if it hadn’t been in the description. The first sip, when it’s cold, is mostly lactose and chocolate, with a whiff of something on the back end that feels like a combination of chocolate malt and alcohol. Then it starts to warm up, and all kinds of interesting things happen. The whiff of alcohol is gone, and the taste of coconut seems to…I don’t even know…rise from somewhere past the back end, long after the sip has gone down the gullet. It pairs nicely with the chocolate malt and gives way to a surprisingly dry, lingering finish. I say surprising not because it’s so dry, but because there is any hint of dryness at all; the lactose is, unfortunately, overpowering. This is a good beer that I think could have been great if they had dialed down the lactose. Upping the alcohol from a modest 6.7% ABV might have done the trick, too.