Barrel-Aged Cedar Oak
Scratch Brewing Company

 

 

 

I love how creative scratch is, and this is another winner! The juniper is punches you right in the nose off the smell, leaving pine, gin like booziness, big cedar, lemon, lime and peach in its wake, remarkable potency. Taste takes a similar path only enhance the cedar and add oak, together their tannins define the taste in a rewarding way. Add some peach, pear and flowers to the mix as well, very complex beer, a sipper for sure. Feel is uniquely sour, woody and bright. An experience in a bottle.

Big thanks, humbled thanks, appreciative thanks, to Joe for this incredible experience.

This gorgeous beer has a soft yellow glowing body. A smooth look to it as bubbles constantly rush the sides of the glass like a delicate polish. They support a stark white snowy looking powder above that leaves a mountain range of lacing around the glass. As the sips keep coming, the peaks resign to small patches and trickles.

The pop of the cap gave off an immediate tart breeze. Digging in, green apple skins with a squeeze of fresh lime open the salivary floodgates. Juniper berries are easily distinguishable giving off a drop of spruce sap. Musty and damply saturated old wooden panels end the complexities.

Each sip gives off a new experience. Initially, a funky, sweaty, lemon lime. Though I've never actually pressed tongue to surface, dive bar beer soaked carpet comes to mind. Dirty dish water perhaps? Sounds horrible, right? Wrong. It's delicious. Just as that wave crashes, the juniper comes in along with a clean, freshly cracked wheat graininess. Tannic old wood along with peach juice make the finish perhaps the best part.

Subtle tartness, less than expected actually, is complemented by a perfect blend of wild funk. Lively carbonation swirls the delicate flavors and velvety, plush feel, like fuzzy peach skin appropriately enough, all around. A very light finish makes it easy to detect its superb balance. As each sip awaits the next, a nice warming sensation cozies up the experience.

My first beer from Scratch is a friggin knockout. This is about as good an experience as the first time I had Ale Apothecary's Sahalie. Absolutely delicious with a one of a kind feel. Thanks again Joe.

Cheers.

750ml
$18.99
Open Bottle - Tinley Park, IL

Barrel-Aged Cedar Oak is the deepest of golden. It's fully saturated and bright. A minor haze runs throughout the body that diffuses the light and makes for an even, comforting glow. Tiny carbonation streams to the surface from a few pinprick spots along the glass. The foam is microbubbled, bordering on silky, with some impressive staying power. The head never falls below a finger in height and it leaves that milk mustache if you're not careful.

The nose on this beer hits nearly every mark. It's musty and fruity off the bat with gritty pear and fresh white peach upfront before the cedar boughs and juniper shows itself. The cedar more in the form of needles and the juniper with that bright herbal punctuation. Dry splintered oak and a damp minerality round it out. It's a bit floral at times but each swirl of the glass really accentuates that orchard fruitiness. Very complex yet inviting.

The flavor manages to keep up with the high expectations set by the smell. The orchard fruitiness is amazingly expressive with the white peach taking point from the pear. The pear is still there and a bit earthy. Cedar needles and juniper berries pop with a quick one-two in the middle. That damp minerality, like rain soaked rock, is soft and throughout the entirety. The oak is soft but noticeable adding a soft touch of sweetness. This stuff is pretty amazing.

A body that leans toward the lighter side of the spectrum is met by a frothy airiness that adds great texture overall. The carbonation is aggressive but never becomes prickly. A soft tarntness lingers here and there while the fizziness settles on the backend. This stuff is beyond easy drinking and refreshing and the semi-dry finish boosts that aspect even more.

Barrel-Aged Cedar Oak is an amazing beer from the folks down at Scratch. The concept alone is unique and interesting but the execution is otherworldly. It's bright and vibrant while remaining exceptionally well balanced in all aspects. This is one of the best new beers I have had in a long time.

among the very best scratch beers i have ever had, which is really saying something, as they are one of my favorite operations out there, and almost all of their beer is pretty epic. this one is a total treat, its more complex and more well rounded than so many of their sours, and for once it seems like their earthy wild weird fermentation profile flatters the special ingredients in a synergistic way, which i have sort of been waiting for in their sour beer, but this one is hardly about the ferment! the cedar is insane, easily the most forward i have ever known this wood to be in a beer, fragrant and flavorful but also really natural, not a perfume thing at all, and dense and sturdy like the wood itself, it marries in beautifully with the more familiar oak, some sweet vanilla and honey tones from the oak the the grain, and with the sort of fallen leaves autumnal character this has, really reminds me of the woods on a sunny fall day, it takes me there, incredible in that way! its smooth and well aged, the sourness is mild compared to some of their others, and there is a cool musty funk that works really well with the cedar. i taste it for miles too, it has a really long flavor journey that evolves and opens up a lot, more terroir in this thing than just about any beer i can think of, and a monument to what scratch is all about. this is the epitome of wild foraged beer, magical stuff. i need to find some more...