Ghirardelli Chocolate Stout

Ghirardelli Chocolate Stout appears on San Francisco Brewing Co.'s menus as the Ghirardelli Chocolate Imperial Stout, a strong stout made with Ghirardelli cacao nibs and poured at the brewery's Ghirardelli Square and Mission Bay locations.

Award

Specs

Brewery Description

Pale, Crystal, and Chocolate malts, with added Ghirardelli cacao nibs. (9.5% ABV)

Source: SF Brewing Ghirardelli Square: drink menu

Tasting Notes

Not Found

Ingredients

The menu entry is the full published ingredient list: three malts and Ghirardelli cacao nibs. The Mission Bay menu carries the identical entry (SF Brewing Mission Bay: drink menu). Hops and yeast are not named.

Hop Profile

Not Found

Brewing Details

Style Context

As category context only, the Brewers Association guideline for Chocolate or Cocoa Beer asks that chocolate or cocoa character be apparent and blend with the base beer, with malt sweetness in balance, very low to medium-low bitterness, and IBU and ABV varying with the base style. A stout with chocolate malt and cacao nibs fits squarely.

Awards History

Generated from the loaded results for this brewery and beer name, not researched separately; years not loaded are not covered.

Brewery Context

San Francisco Brewing Co. is in San Francisco, CA.

Links checked 2026-10-14: Website, Untappd.

Related

• Brewery: San Francisco Brewing Co.

Links

• Untappd (hand-read citation): Ghirardelli Chocolate Stout
• Beer page on brewery site
• San Francisco Brewing Co.
• SF Brewing Mission Bay: drink menu
• Brewers Association: beer style guidelines

Gaps

• Not Found: Tasting notes, Color (SRM), Original gravity, Final gravity, Hops, Hop form, Hop use, Hop lot or farm, Yeast, Water, Process. Checked ghirardelli.sfbrewingco.com, missionbay.sfbrewingco.com, untappd.com, sfbrewingco.com, web searches recorded in the research notes, sfbrewingco.com, sfbrewingco.com, sfbrewingco.com.
• Not Found: IBU. Checked ghirardelli.sfbrewingco.com, missionbay.sfbrewingco.com, untappd.com, sfbrewingco.com, web searches recorded in the research notes, sfbrewingco.com, sfbrewingco.com, sfbrewingco.com, Catalog.beer search by beer and brewery name.

Research Notes

• Both location menus list the beer as Ghirardelli Chocolate Imperial Stout at 9.5%; the winners list name omits "Imperial". It is treated as the same beer, which is an inference from the matching name.
• A BeerAdvocate entry seen only as a search snippet (not opened) lists a Ghirardelli Chocolate Nitro Stout at 8%; it may be an earlier nitro version and is not used.
• IBU, hops and yeast are not published.
• Researched 2026-10-13.
• Field pass 2026-10-13: The plain Chocolate Stout listing has N/A IBU and no hops. Its 5% ABV differs from the existing brewery Imperial Stout value of 9.5%, which is retained. Chocolate-Coffee variants advertise 50 IBU in search results and were excluded.
• Deep dive pass 2026-10-14: both drink menus were read again; they give the malt bill and cacao nibs but no tasting notes, hops or yeast.
• Brewery site scrape 2026-10-14: found nothing new; 4 pages tried (robots.txt obeyed, one request every few seconds per host).
• Second deep dive pass 2026-10-14 (brewery taproom menu page, web search): found nothing new; 1 page tried. Menu lists it as Ghirardelli Chocolate Imperial Stout, 9.5% ABV, with the already recorded malts and nibs; no IBU or hops published.