Local brewery, Sarris Candy team up for Valentine’s beer
Courtesy of Susan Walker
Whitehorse Brewing’s chocolate covered strawberry stout
Courtesy of Susan Walker
Whitehorse Brewing’s chocolate covered strawberry stout
Courtesy of Lisa Black
Whitehorse Brewing’s chocolate covered strawberry stout
Whitehorse Brewing has teamed up with Sarris Candies to make a seasonal beer for Valentine’s Day – a chocolate covered strawberry stout.
Susan and George Walker, owners of the brewing company had been thinking about doing a special Valentine’s beer for months, Susan said.
“I love chocolate covered strawberries,” she said. “And collaborations are really popular, so we brought Bill some samples of our beer.”
They asked Bill Sarris, owner of Sarris Candies, if he’d want to supply the chocolate part.
“This is new to us, so it was interesting to see how they would take our product and make it theirs,” Sarris said. “I really wondered how they would do it.”
They used an oatmeal stout and used about 20 pounds of Dutch cocoa powder, the same cocoa Sarris uses for its chocolate. They included 132 pounds of strawberry puree. It was a three-week process to make the 5 barrel batch, or 155 gallons.
A special release of the beer will be at both the Washington and Berlin Whitehorse taprooms Friday, with a limited amount of six-packs for sale out of the taprooms only.
“I think it’s going to be busy,” said Lisa Black, manager of Whitehorse Brewing at The Street in North Strabane Township. “When we posted about it, we already had people saying they were going to have to come try it.”
The beer will also be available as a draft at multiple bars and restaurants in Washington County, including Liberty Pole, President’s Pub, West End Bottle Shop, The Meadows Casino, Cannon’s Chophouse in Southpointe, and the Union Grill. The beer is also available as a draft at certain bars in Somerset, Cambria, Westmoreland and Allegheny counties.
“It makes a nice Valentine’s present,” Black said. “It’s one of those beers that people have to wait to get.”
Sarris said the beer is perfect for folks who need to “cover all their bases” for Valentine’s Day, or who have exhausted the typical flowers and chocolates combination.
“You can’t drink flowers,” he said.