Chocolate syrup vs cocoa powder

I'm putting together a recipe for a chocolate stout, however, I cannot figure out which is better for the flavoring. Good ol' Hershey's syrup or cocoa powder??? It would be added to the last 5 minutes of the boil as far as I see. Any suggestions?

Cocoa powder. Take a look at the Hershey's label: High fructose corn syrup, sugar, water, cocoa, preservatives, vanillin. Maybe 5% cocoa. Mind you, it's ok on ice cream, but not in MY beer!

The first thing I looked at were the ingredients. High fructose corn looked like instant headache to me.

Any recommended cocoa powders to use?

Well, while I have never used cocoa powder in a beer, this stuff is very good:


https://www.scharffenberger.com/prodinfo.asp?number=POWDER&gclid=COT4mYju2YsCFQkjWAodrQ2kaA


Although I don't know if really need a top quality cocoa powder for this particular application.....





Gedvondur

I used Ghiardelli Cocoa Powder that I got at the grocery store, seemed to work well in my Chocolate Raspberry Milk Stout, nice cocoa essence, if you want it sweet, you should maybe add lactose or some other unfermentable grain sugars in the wort, the cocoa can give a bit of a bitter taste (i.e. Tommyknocker Cocoa Porter).

I used 1/2# of cocoa in mine, half of it for full 60' boil, the other 1/2 for 15 min for aroma.

I'll second Ghiardelli. I've never been impressed with their chocolates, but the baking cocoa is first rate.

Any Dutch-processed cocoa powder would work though. I've used Scharffenberger's and Hersey's Special Dark.

Thanks for the input everyone. As far as amount goes, will 1/2 # be enough for the flavor to come through if I put it in the last 5 or 10 minutes of the boil? Too much?

Also, does the cocoa powder contain fermentable sugars?

cocoa powder doesn't have any sugars, it is just ground, roasted cacao beans. I won't really be able to comment on flavor for at least a few weeks/months until my stout matures. I boiled half for an hour and half for 15 mins so that it would be like hops, 'bitterness' and flavor....may 'dry cocoa' for aroma too...

Last question... I think.

Does anyone know if cocoa powder has any oils that would inhibit any head retention or carbonation?

I have not noticed any head retention problems.

Make sure your powder is unsweetend. I used 4 tablespoons in my boil... wasn't enough, put 6 tablespoons in before bottling. If using cocoa in a stout, you might consider adding some lactose as well.

Make sure you boil the cocoa before adding to your bottling bucket. Otherwise it will all settle out in the bottles.

Cocoa powder will have small amounts of cocoa butter, but not enough to be a problem.

I found this article last night and thought it might be relevant to this thread.

http://byo.com/feature/333.html