In 1890, Peter Halajian left Armenia for Connecticut with big dreams of owning his own business. While working in a rubber factory in Naugatuck, he would side hustle homemade sweets. Five years later, Halajian opened a candy shop, then another one 25 north in Torrington, then another one in Naugatuck. He advertised with clever slogans.m Customers couldn’t pronouncing his last name, so he changed it to Paul. During World War I, the U.S. Army asked Peter Paul to make chocolate bars for soldiers. In 1919, Paul convinced his Armenian immigrant friends and family members to invest in his company, Peter Paul Manufacturing Company. The company moved to New Haven. He hired Harry Tatigian, a Bridgeport candy maker. In 1921, the Peter Paul Manufacturing Company introduced the Mounds candy bar. The Mounds bar had chocolate on the outside and coconut on the inside. It quickly became the company’s best-selling candy. Peter Paul became the world’s largest consumer of coconuts. Today, Peaks & Pints presents an in-house flight of chocolate coconut beers — a flight we’re calling, Peaks and Pints Beer Flight: Mounds.
Peaks and Pints Beer Flight: Mounds
Old Stove Hell Hawk
7.2% ABV
Old Stove Brewing fancied up their rich American stout with some local Theo Chocolate’s cacao nibs, vanilla beans, and a good heaping of toasted coconut. It hits the nose with dark toasted malt, chocolate, and light coconut, followed by dark toasted malt, mild dark chocolate, and coconut with a touch of coffee in the finish. Medium bodied with light creaminess.
Fort George Coconut Cavatica Stout
8.8% ABV
Fort George Brewery at the mouth of the Columbia River in Astoria, Oregon, excels at dark craft beers, such as its Cavatica Stout. The Latin root of Cavatica is cave, crevice, abyss, or a dark place. Just like a stout should be. Fort George brewers dump in black barley and Munich malt to get a molasses like heft. It offers a big head of sandy foam and the resolute sweetness of raisins, cocoa, and candied walnuts. Coconut Cavatica is their beloved, best-selling Cavatica Stout infused with a staggering amount of coconut.
Epic Coquito Big Bad Baptist
10% ABV
If you love coconut, creamy cocktails, eggnog, and rum, chances are you love coquito. Often described as the Puerto Rican version of eggnog, the cocktail, whose name translates to “little coconut,” is a decadently rich concoction made especially for the holiday season. Traditionally, the recipe starts with a blend of coconut cream, evaporated milk, and condensed milk seasoned with vanilla, holiday spices, and — of course — plenty of rum. Epic Brewing’s version is 100-percent aged in rum barrels, laced with rum-soaked coconut, and finished with cinnamon and vanilla.
Mason Ale Works Flat Black
14.5% ABV
In 2017, restaurateurs Grant Tondro, Zak Higson, and Nate Higson opened Urge Gastropub & Whiskey Bank in San Marcos, California, the coastal offshoot of their Urge American Gastropub in Rancho Bernardo. The kicker? They added Mason Ale Works for an elevated brewpub atmosphere. Eventually, they hired former head brewer from San Marcos’ The Lost Abbey, Matt Webster, to brew beers that paired well with their food. The Mason Ale Works trio soon discovered their beers could stand alone. A collaboration with Moksa Brewing, their Flat Black pastry stout is aged in Makers Mark barrels for 15 months with Guatemalan cacao, Madagascar bourbon vanilla, and hand toasted coconut.
Prairie Indulge Me
14.9% ABV
Prairie Artisan Ales aged a rich bourbon barrel-aged imperial stout and then layered it with toasted coconut, chocolate chips, and real cake mix for chocolate coconut liquid candy bar nose with hints of booze and wood. Their Induldge Me is thick-bodied yet smooth bringing sweet burnt chocolate sweetness and whiskey caramel with vanilla oak notes before a straight-up chocolate cake finish. When the 14.9-percent stout warms the booze could overshadow other flavors.
LINK: Peaks & Pints beer and cider cooler inventory
