I've seen you type this before and I have to throw a bull**** flag down. Exactly how many batches of chocolate stout (or any other beer) have you brewed? I know what you are saying about cocoa is not true from personal experience.
Two chocolate stouts under my belt, both "chocolatized" the way I refer to above. Passing the potato back to you, have you ever added cocoa to a chocolate stout in the manner in which I suggest? There are a great many recipes that call for extreme amounts of cocoa or bar chocolate in the boil, which I'm assuming is the direction you go with a chocolate stout. I'm not saying this doesn't work, but it's unnecessary and wasteful, almost as superfluous as adding fruit to the boil. I've gotten this information directly from brewers at Young's and Austin Homebrew. Just type "cocoa" into a search at Austin Homebrew to see what I'm talking about.
I'm not saying your methods don't work, but I know what I'm doing is a very
efficient way of arriving at chocolaty ends. Adding 10, 20, even 30 ounces of cocoa to the boil is just silly given the fact that most of it is going to fall out of suspension before enough alcohol is generated to keep it in solution, not to mention leaving you with an ungodly mess in the primary. And that mess is left behind precisely because most of those gobs of cocoa have precipitated out.
Think about it for a moment: hot cocoa is about 30% cocoa and 70% sugar and other stuff. There's about 4 tablespoons of total volume in an average packet, so roughly 1 tablespoon cocoa per serving of hot cocoa (and keep in mind, this is basically a liquid chocolate drink). An ounce of dutched cocoa has about 5ish tablespoons in it. You can pretty much do the math from here (ie: about a third teaspoon per beer in a five gallon batch). An ounce of pure, unsweetened cocoa is A LOT to be adding to a brew, in other words (assuming one adds it at bottling, when it will be dissolved as opposed to suspended). If one is looking for a real chocolate bomb, up to perhaps 2 ounces can be added per 5 gallons -- but keep in mind, most good chocolate brews don't have an overwhelming or overt chocolate flavor. Rather, it's in the nose and on the upper palate, and works with the dark grains, as opposed to superseding them. The most chocolaty brew I can recall having is the Rouge chocolate stout, which flirts with the line between a lot of chocolate flavor, and too much.
Nurmey, it seems you've been around these parts for a while, and I'm not trying to throw mud or any of that. Getting into forum tit-for-tats is not my style at all. I'm sure you've done a large number of brews, and have way more overall experience than I do, but from day one a solid chocolate stout was almost an obsession of mine -- and I've successfully brewed up a clone to Young's DC (thanks to the brewers there), and a Chocolate Raspberry Stout based loosely upon the same recipe (which, again, turned out great the first time I gave it the go). I'm not saying I'm the chocolate stout expert, but I can say that my experience, and the experience of the folks at Young's and AHS, dictates a small amount of cocoa or essence at bottling/kegging -- not overload in the boil.
Boerderij Kabouter: Bailys is heavy cream my man. Lipids galore. Same thing with Kaluah, which is another one suggested above. A lot of liqueurs have a fair amount of heavy cream or other fats added for body and flavor...
...I wasn't saying they would ruin a beer in the sense of foam retention or this or that, but in terms of
flavors. I can't imagine any 5 gallon batch being good after having 750ml of any liqueur dumped into it. Someone above was talking about dumping Southern Comfort into a beer...no offense to whomever suggested it, but that thought literally makes me shudder. I'm sure there are exceptions -- and I can almost guarantee someone is waiting in the wings to point out an award winning example -- but still. And sure, cocoa has some of the same negative impacts, which is another reason I'm advocating a small amount added at bottling as opposed to the pound plus quantities some recipes push.
Ultimately, I'm just trying to help folks out and let them know what works for me. If you guys want to be so bold as to call BS, well, that's your prerogative I suppose. Healthy discussion is what keeps these boards going. But take a moment and consider what I'm saying, and what I'm trying to do.
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