Barleywine
Oakshire Brewing

2014 vintage bomber. A very malty body topped off with some tangy alcohol burn. Pours out a syrupy amber with minimal head. Malty, alcohol scent, sweet taste with plenty of alcohol warmth. Put your feet up, sip and relax.

 

Vintage 2013 bottle, properly cellared. Poured into a Fremont small snifter. Pours a medium to dark reddish orange with a quarter finger khaki head with great retention and solid lacing. Aroma of dry caramel malt, dried dark fruit, raisins and mild grassy hops, somewhat boozy. Flavor follows with caramel malt, dates, figs, raisins, aged hops, tobacco. Light hop bitterness in the finish. Medium bodied with light creaminess. The hopped (American) style barleywines are now off my list for aging because the hops just don’t age that stylishly, although the malt body of these does quite well. And that is true here. The malt is very mellow and well integrated with the dark, dried fruit flavors settled in to a even, balanced background. I don't use tobacco in my reveiew very often, but that note is clear here, more like biting into tobacco leaves than the smoke aroma. I'm guessing it's the interaction of aged hops with the malt. The hops have lost their herbal flavors, but leave a pleasant light bitterness in the finish. As a matter of fact, this is one of the best aged hopped barleywines I've had, with no off flavors from the hops. I like this enough that I owe this barleywine another tasting of a fresher bottle. I liked this one and am pleased it has survived a 5 year aging this well. I don't see any vintages after 2015 reviewed here, but I hope to see this again.

 

 

Big, bold and beautifully malty sweet, the brewers of Oakshire thread together a massive barleywine that celebrates the soul of barley malt at is highest degree. Nearly three years old, this 2014 vintage is showing signs of maturity but still stubborn with its youth.

Dark garnet and faintly hazed, the frothy ale carries a masculine color and stature, equipped with slight brandy legging. Bold malt aromas of brown sugar, maple, molasses and toffee carry a citrusy and herbal hop note with hints of dark fruit and a vinous tang. Those malty sweet flavors extend from the nose and slather the tastebuds with honey and granola.

As the beer's rich sweetness saturates the taste, its rich middle palate is cakey, sweet and savory. Plum, blackberry, currant and fig give bold impressions of fruitcake while a spicy rum-like kick sheds a light on pepper, cinnamon and red wine. Hoppy with a grassy, tea-like, citrusy bite, the beer's bold booziness catches a glimpse of curaçao liquor.

Butter rum, brandy spice and a rich port wine flavor show signs of the beer's age while its hints of leather and tobacco inch toward savory soy sauce and bitter citrus peel. Full and lavish, the beer has a still draw nearing its finish that renders the ale lighter that expected. A long and bittersweet aftertaste offers continued heat well into the next sip.

 

 

From the 2014 batch. Sampled on June 24, 2016.

I'm celebrating the start of my vacation by cracking this open.

It pours an attractive looking reddish-amber under a lasting off-white head.

The aroma has a kind of cellar mustiness with those biting Barkley malt sweet characters and a low hop profile. Still a tad boozy even after 2 years.

Medium body but feels lighter than many.

Same barley toasted bread character in the taste, a vague sweetness, with a rancid sort of bitterness to finish it off. It still holds its own after 2 years but you really have to like Barleywines to take this one in.

22oz bottle of the 2015 vintage $7.99. Dark amber color, short head. Aroma is malty, raisins, and then hops. The flavor is pretty much a tasty American style barleywine, a lot of malt, bitterness from the hops, raisins, fruits, very enjoyable. If I still cellared beer this would be a good candidate.

Score for the 2014 version. Rich caramel, sweet, with a pleasant finish of bitterness and booze. Great color. I think a year did this bottle some good.

 

 

2014 edition, i found this one to be on the thin side in terms of feel. i am used to and appreciative of the huge grain spectrum in these, ranging from sweet to biscuity, cakey, tannic, always layered in all nice, but this is a little one dimensional compared to that standard. saturated bronze color, doesnt look thin at all, and it holds a little tan head for awhile. aromas of bittering hops and molasses come out first, with the booze well behind it. not quite as nuanced in the nose as others, but it smells pretty yummy, especially on a windy chilly gray afternoon. the taste is good, it just doesnt have all that much going on, and because (at least in part) of the bitter hop finish, it seems dry, almost too dry for the style, not lingering and warming quite the way the style usually does. that said, it tastes very good, woody in some way, sticky malty like a high gravity wort before yeast is pitched, and the lightness of body makes it easy drinking for what it is. the thin body hurts it though, the big flavors have less to cling to, and the booze is way more exposed, this finishes almost hot when it comes up to temperature, and it seems to bring out the weird grain proteins in the middle before that. a worthy brew no doubt, maybe cellar time will help it a little, but not one of the more complex barleywines in the game.

22 ounce bottle, 2013 vintage

Appearance is muddy brown with two fingers of beige head, some red tint when held up to the light, decent carbonation at first but fades fast with no lacing

Smell is full of toffee, caramel malt, booze, raspberry, faint Northwestern hops, bread, and honey

Taste is pretty boozy all the way through, sweet finish with a slightly dry start, definitely more malt forward than hoppy, could be due to being over a year old in the cellar now, taste is fairly one dimensional but has a nice inviting toffee flavor

Mouthfeel was a bit thin with more bubbles than most barleywines I have tasted, got a little cloying and needed some more body

Overall I liked the toffee notes but it needed something else going on in order to shine some more, I would love to taste an extra hoppy version of this as I think it would drink more like a well balanced Triple IPA

 

2015-02-21
22oz bottle served in a large snifter. 2014 vintage.

Pours cloudy reddish amber with a small head and some fine, very slow carbonation. Smell is mild, barleywiney -- alcohol, a little dark fruit, yeast, a little wood.

Taste is not dominated by alcohol, but it's a strong theme. There's actually some light colored fruit -- not exactly pear or apple, but in that neighborhood. Definitely some oaky/woody characteristic.

Mouthfeel is quite dry and surprisingly light. Overall, good.

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2015-09-21
Same beer, seven months older.

Hop presence is very strong. Wood character is much more prominent. Less light fruit, more dark fruit. Strange for a barleywine to be so bitter.