![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/BT-1.jpg?w=640\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Black Thunder chocolate goes into every can, but does that mean this brew comes out tasty?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n No matter how old you are, visiting a chocolate factory will make you feel like a kid again. That was something our ace reporter Mr. Sato<\/strong> experienced first hand on his recent trip to the Black Thunder<\/strong> factory<\/a> in the town of Toyohashi, Aichi Prefecture<\/strong>, where they make Japan\u2019s favorite brand of incredibly cheap, but also incredibly delicious, chocolate<\/strong>.<\/p>\n \u25bc Black Thunder, the chocolate that delights taste buds even if it sometimes breaks hearts<\/a><\/p>\n But while Mr. Sato\u2019s inner child was squealing with glee as he participated in the factory\u2019s souvenir shop activity that lets you stuff as many chocolate bars as you can inside a bag in three minutes, his inner adult couldn\u2019t help feeling drawn to\u2026<\/p>\n \u2026the Black Thunder chocolate beer?!?<\/strong><\/p>\n Yes, they do sell beer at the Black Thunder factory, and yes, it\u2019s really made from Black Thunder<\/strong>. Specifically, it\u2019s made using the leftover pieces of chocolate that are broken off when the bars are formed, so as you crack open a can of Black Thunder Stout you can pat yourself on the back for doing your part to reduce food waste.<\/p>\n Though Black Thunder is famous for its low price, Black Thunder Stout is just a tad on the expensive side at 755 yen (US$5.20) a can. That\u2019s still an affordable luxury, though, and not a shocking price for a craft beer in today\u2019s marketplace. The beer is produced by Kagawa Prefecture-based brewer Setouchi Beer<\/strong> for Toyohashi craft beer company THC Craft<\/strong>, with the blessing of Black Thunder maker Yuraku Confectionary Company, and uses barley malt imported from the U.K. and Germany.<\/p>\n \u25bc The label, with an illustrated redhead in a tiger-stripe outfit, is clearly taking some design cues from manga artist Rumiko Takahashi, creator of Inuyasha<\/em>, Ranma 1\/2<\/em>, and Urusei Yatsura<\/em>, whose female lead is fond of tiger-print attire herself<\/a>.<\/p>\n But with Black Thunder being a chocolate with a pronounced sweetness, Mr. Sato wondered, and also sort of worried, that Black Thunder Stout would be a sugary-tasting beer<\/strong>. He felt a little better after asking the store staff about its flavor and a clerk told him that the beer, which has a five-percent alcohol content, isn\u2019t particularly sweet, and instead has an enjoyable bitterness to it.<\/p>\n Convinced, Mr. Sato bought a can and took it home for taste-testing.<\/p>\n As soon as he started pouring, Mr. Sato noticed the fine fizziness of the head<\/strong>, and since he likes his stouts to have this kind of creamy top, his expectations immediately rose like the foam in his glass.<\/p>\n Mr. Sato wasn\u2019t just pouring the can into a glass for the visual inspection, though. During the brewing process, the sugars in the chocolate pieces play a role in the fermentation process, and the resulting beer retains some of that sweet aroma<\/strong>. It\u2019s most noticeable with a wide-brimmed drinking vessel, and the brewers recommend a wine glass, but since Mr. Sato doesn\u2019t have one he instead used the widest-opening cup he could find in his kitchen. Sure enough, he could detect a gentle, enticing sweetness as he took a sniff before he took a sip.<\/p>\n And when he did take that sip? It was excellent<\/strong>. Gently pushing through the top layer of soft, creamy foam, he found a robust bitterness<\/strong> that gives the beer a sense of psychological weight. But the bitter notes weren\u2019t alone in the rich flavor profile, as they were accompanied by sensations of coffee<\/strong>. Surprisingly, there was no candy-like sweetness, but the flavor ends with a faint lingering chocolatey impression that tickles the nose<\/strong> and entices you into another sip.<\/p>\n Flavorful but mellow, Mr. Sato likens the Black Thunder Stout to a glass of fine wine or whiskey, something to take your time with and thoroughly enjoy<\/strong>. Sadly, while Black Thunder is available in pretty much every convenience store in Japan, Black Thunder Stout is harder to find, though it\u2019s sometimes available for online order through local products e-shop Toyohashi Tsushin here<\/a>. However, even Black Thunder chocolate wasn\u2019t an overnight success story, and at one point early in its history was even temporarily taken off the market because of low sales before word of mouth made it the phenomenal hit it is today, so maybe we\u2019ll see Black Thunder follow a similar path.<\/p>\n Related: Black Thunder factory official website<\/a><\/em> Black Thunder chocolate goes into every can, but does that mean this brew comes out tasty? No matter how old you are, visiting a chocolate factory will make you feel…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-823","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-rss"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/823\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/BT-2.jpg?w=640\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/BT-3.jpg?w=640\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/BT-4.jpg?w=640\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/BT-5.jpg?w=640\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/BT-6.jpg?w=640\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/BT-7.jpg?w=640\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/BT-8.jpg?w=640\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/BT-9.jpg?w=640\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/BT-10.jpg?w=640\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/BT-11.jpg?w=640\")
<\/p>\n
\nPhotos \u00a9SoraNews24<\/em>
\n\u25cf Want to hear about SoraNews24\u2019s latest articles as soon as they\u2019re published? Follow us on Facebook<\/a> and Twitter<\/a>!<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"