chocolate bittering

[grrtt78]

i was just wondering hypothetically could one brew a beer and use chocolate instead of hops since pure cocoa is bitter? i am asking to kind of get an idea of my next recipe. wen using cocoa should one cut back on bittering hops, add lactose to balance?

 

[Denny's Evil Concoctions]

I wouldn't cut back. I used pure cocoa powder and I never noticed any additonal biterness to the beer.

 

[grrtt78]

did u balance the chocolate bitterness with lactose or something?

 

[delboy]

I had an overly sweet beer that i didn't fancy the taste of that much, before kegging i boiled up some cocoa powder and added it, the bitterness of the cocoa did go a lot of the way towards dealing with the cloying sweetness, was also pretty damn nice in the beer too

Obviously this is miles away from bittering a brew just using cocoa instead of hops but for my scenario it hit the spot.