Hel & Verdoemenis - Scottish Barley Whiskey BA
Brouwerij De Molen

 

 

This is the scotchiest, peaty-est barrel age beer I've ever tasted - which is OK for me since I fairly like scotch! But since it's so scotch forward it lacks that balance and subtlety of the very best BA stouts. I wouldn't quite call this a miss, but a somewhat enjoyable oddity. Alcohol heat is present with the scotch. Mouthfeel surprisingly thin.

Bottled date of 16 Jan 2016

 

 

black wax, small bottle, highly anticipated. this is a really neat barrel treatment for one of the better and more well known de molen brews. an already enormously earthy, heavily smoked, and extremely dense stout, it certainly doesnt need the barrel for complexity, but what this particular barrel treatment adds is tremendous. i dont know much about scottish barley whiskey, unless thats single malt scotch, maybe more barrels used than from just one producer so they cant put a name on it? either way, this whiskey i obviously earthy and peaty and heavily wooded, with a smoke profile of its own and a real intensity of flavor that seems almost built for this particular beer. in this, i taste leather and tobacco and dry cocoa. i get burning hardwood, autumnal decay, and the classic de molen house yeast strain. i also pick up peat, wet oak, espresso beans, and burnt barley. the flavors sort of unravel one at at time, with the whiskey showing up somewhere in the middle. the smoke is so well integrated with the dark grain, and the huge body lets it do its thing rather slowly, warming up really nicely, showing a bit of alcohol, but staying smooth and rich, dry and earthy, and perfectly refined. it would be fun to sit down and drink through all of the different barrel edition of this in one go! this is probably my favorite variant so far, the peaty whiskey adds a whole lot to an already absurdly complex and delicious beer. this is incredible!

Bottle purchased at One Stop Brew Shop in Rochester, NY.

This one pours a fairly dark black, with a very small head, and no lacing.

This one smells like super peaty scotch, with heavy brine, chocolate, old coffee, and smoke.

This just isn't all that good, unfortunately. The scotch barrel just absolutely overtakes the base beer. As it warms, it just starts to taste so briney, almost like I'm just drinking stout-flavored sea water. It's very peaty, earthy, and smokey, which could be cool if the base showed itself at all. There's a little bit of chocolate and coffee presumably from the base, but it's basically just overrun by the barrel.

This is medium bodied, with a slick and oily mouthfeel, and a lower level of carbonation.

This is a bit of a miss from De Molen. The barrels did not work with this beer.