A chocolate stout is one of the more specific pleasures in the British ale tradition — not chocolate added to beer, but the particular flavour that heavily roasted malt produces on its own: cocoa depth, slight bitterness, a sweetness that reads as chocolate without requiring the ingredient itself. Samuel Smith Old Brewery in Tadcaster, North Yorkshire, has been brewing since 1758, and the Chocolate Stout is one of the most widely exported expressions of the style: opaque black, rich chocolate aroma over roasted malt, a smooth full body at 5.0% ABV. If you are British and living in Tokyo and the Friday pub night has moved indoors to a Tokyo flat, the Samuel Smith Chocolate Stout is the bottle for the part of the evening when the conversation has slowed and the beer needs to hold its own without anyone having to think about it.
Tadcaster’s chocolate stout, brewed since 1758
Samuel Smith Old Brewery was founded in 1758 in Tadcaster, North Yorkshire — Yorkshire’s oldest brewery, still operating on the original site and still using the Yorkshire Stone Squares slate fermentation vessels that most British breweries replaced with stainless steel generations ago. The brewery draws its water from a well sunk in 1758, and the combination of Tadcaster’s hard water, the Stone Squares fermentation, and the house yeast produces the creamy, rounded mouthfeel that is consistent across the Samuel Smith range.
The Chocolate Stout is described in the brief as the brewery’s organic chocolate-stout flagship — a stout brewed with organic ingredients and the roasted malt character that produces the characteristic chocolate flavour without chocolate addition. The pour is opaque black, and the aroma is immediately rich: cocoa, roasted grain, the dark sweetness that makes a well-made chocolate stout identifiable before the glass reaches the table. The body is smooth and full, which the Stone Squares fermentation contributes to alongside the malt bill, and the finish carries the roasted character without bitterness that overstays its welcome. At 5.0% ABV, it is more sessionable than its flavour intensity suggests — a beer that drinks slowly by character rather than by strength.
How Samuel Smith Chocolate Stout Beer is drunk at home
Cheers, mate! (CHEERZ-MAIT) — the British toast, reliable at every occasion from the pub to the kitchen table. Bottoms up! when the glass is nearly finished; Down the hatch! when someone ordered a round without consulting anyone. For a chocolate stout from Yorkshire’s oldest brewery, the toast tends to be said once and then the evening finds its own pace.
In the UK, a chocolate stout belongs to the Friday pub night’s later end — the beer that arrives when the session ales have done their work and the evening is ready for something that demands a different kind of attention. The Sunday roast is not the primary pairing for a stout of this character, though a glass alongside the dessert course — a chocolate pudding, a bread and butter pudding, whatever the Sunday table closes with — works better than the main course pairing would. The ploughman’s lunch is more accommodating: the mature cheddar alongside a chocolate stout produces the same logic as a cheese board alongside a port — the salt and the fat of the cheese cutting through the roasted sweetness and deepening both elements. Fish and chips is an unexpected but workable pairing, the clean fat of the battered fish and the salt of the chips providing a neutral backdrop against which the chocolate malt character comes forward more clearly than it might against a richer dish.
Premier League football viewing is standard-lager territory for most of the afternoon, but the Samuel Smith Chocolate Stout is the beer that appears when the match has finished and the table has moved from the game to something more deliberate.
How to drink it in Japan
The Samuel Smith Chocolate Stout is a winter beer in Japan without qualification — November through February, when the combination of the opaque black pour, the rich chocolate aroma, and the smooth full body suits the cold and the slower evening pace. It is also the beer most suited to the occasions that British residents in Japan organise around darkness and warmth: Bonfire Night on November 5, Christmas, and the year-end evenings that close December before anyone is ready for them.
At FamilyMart, try it alongside a chocolate lava cake from the bakery counter — the warm, flowing chocolate centre and the chocolate stout’s roasted cocoa depth find each other directly, the slight bitterness of the beer cutting the sweetness of the dessert in a way that makes both elements sharper. For a composed pairing at home, serve it with dark chocolate fondue and seasonal fruit — strawberry, banana, mandarin — where the fruit provides the acidity that lifts both the chocolate of the fondue and the roasted character of the Samuel Smith, and the smooth body of the stout provides the close that the dessert alone does not. It is a pairing that asks very little of the cook and delivers considerably more than the effort suggests.
Samuel Smith beers appear occasionally in Tokyo’s specialty import shops at per-bottle prices that reflect the brewery’s reputation and the scarcity of the import. By the case from Omori Mart — 355ml × 24 bottles — the per-bottle cost is considerably more accessible, and the case covers a British winter in Tokyo from the first cold evening to the last.
Get Samuel Smith Chocolate Stout Beer delivered in Japan
Samuel Smith Chocolate Stout Beer is available from Omori Mart in a 355ml × 24 bottle case, delivered nationwide across Japan.
- Free shipping on orders over ¥15,000
- Pay at FamilyMart, 7-Eleven, or Lawson — or by bank transfer or card
- Nationwide delivery to any address in Japan
Rakuten and Amazon Japan do not carry this label. Omori Mart is where British residents in Japan find the Samuel Smith ales that belong on a serious winter shelf — including the one that smells like chocolate before the bottle is open.
[Shop Samuel Smith Chocolate Stout Beer →]
https://omorimart.com/product/samuel-smith-chocolate-stout-beer-355ml-x-24-bottles/
Cheers, mate in Tadcaster, where Samuel Smith Old Brewery has been drawing water from the same 1758 well and fermenting in the same stone squares for over two centuries, and kanpai at a Tokyo table in December — opaque black, rich chocolate, smooth to the finish, and exactly the beer the evening needed.
No products in the cart.