Love, Lost at Sea
Buoy Beer Company

 

2023 Vintage: 10% ABV

Poured from a 500ml bottle into a snifter at 57 degrees.

Look- Amber-brown, plentiful small visible particulate, opaque, light brown creamy head, average head retention, slightly below average lacing.

Smell- Toffee, nutty, whiskey, raisin, vanilla, leather, medium strength of scent.

Taste- Toffee, vanilla, nutty, raisin, whiskey, oak, moderately spicy, moderately sweet, high strength of flavor.

Feel- Medium body, silky, average carbonation, moderately spicy, moderately sweet, moderately mouth warming, mildly creamy, mildly mouth coating, highly bitter, moderately astringent.

Overall- Appearance was amber-brown with small visible particulate and average head retention. The bouquet was a mix of toffee, nuttiness, whiskey, raisin, vanilla and leather. The taste was an astringent mix of toffee, vanilla, nuttiness, raisin, whiskey and oak. The feel was a silky medium body that had moderate mouth warming properties. Overall this beer was too astringent and the barrel character was not pronounced enough. It provided a slightly below average drinking experience for the style.

2023 vintage 10%

This is hitting me just right tonight, not many out there like this these days. The ABV is reasonable, it isn't super sweet or hopped to hell, and and the barrels compliment rather dominate.

Lots going on here, tons of toffee for a base accented golden raisins, marshmallow, dark honey, light leafy, tea-like bitterness, fruitcake, vanilla, and more. The booze is coming across more as rum than whiskey somehow. The mouthfeel is full and bright. If ever there was a crushable barrel aged barleywine, it's this one. Thanks Ryan, this is a great one.

 

 

Pours a rich mahogany brown color that looks slightly unfiltered in the glass and sports a sudsy tan head that leaves a splotchy cap on the beer. This definitely looks the part of a big BA barleywine.

The nose is rife with oaky bourbon aromas, which also imparts delicious vanilla aromas, and there’s buckets of toffee notes and stone fruit as well, with plums and raisins offering an enticing view into where the taste will land.

The taste is a magnificent combination of the barrel (oak and vanilla), the “candy” (rich toffee), and the hops (plums and raisins), which flows into a delightful balance between all the components, and the richly decadent mouthfeel for a dangerously drinkable high gravity beer. Exceptionally well done.

looks like they vintage this one as it changes some from year to year, fairly certain i had the 2023 vintage as it was listed on their chalkboard menu at 10% abv, but cant confirm that. relatively deep in color, english in the nose, long boiled, intense grain character, toffee, maple, brown sugar, but even with all that, its not that sweet, some obvious vanilla and honey from the whiskey barrels, nice and mature already even in its release year, light cocoa, raisin, rum, cola, and dark leather notes, boozy but not overly so, some barrel char, birch, date, and a nice fallen leaf sort of autumnal note, even kind of squashy. the flavor is all of this, just like the aroma, definite maple, oak, and whiskey through much of it, lightly hoppy and lightly astringent on the back end, both of which counteract the sugar in here well. the alcohol is warming but not insane, looks like some previous vintages of this were much stronger, i think this is about right where it is now. warms up really well, gets more hoppy as it does, not super bitter but a candied citrus vibe which is a cool wrinkle. it never feels all that big in body for how flavorful it is, and really is a fine afternoon sipper. i can see this ageing really well, and a little bit regret not getting the bottle vertical they had on offer here. they are in a makeshift taproom now, too bad the original was closed when we were in town, but it was rad to still have a site to drink their stuff, all we had were excellent!

2018 vintage (drank in 2022), 500 ml waxed bottle.

Pours a dark brown color, fairly clear, cream colored head. Aroma and taste has a great blend of malt sweetness and oaky whiskey . Brown sugar, vanilla, charged wood. Only moderately sweet. Sticky mouthfeel.

On tap at Belmont Station. Pours a nice dark brown. The nose is fairly subtle. Toffee, wheat, with a slight hoppy note. The taste is really nice. Toffee, figs, grapes, leather. Slight bitterness. Overall, this is a really nice beer that I look forward to trying from a bottle.

 

Thanks to Chris for grabbing this one for me. 2021 release. 16.9oz bottle poured into 16oz tulip. Poured a mostly clear mahogany color with about 1/3 inch of tan head that had low-moderate retention and little-to-no lacing.

Very nice vanilla, wood, and bourbon notes at the front of the nose. The base beer shows through nicely and isn't over shadowed.

Same on the tongue, better defined. All the aspects show up and are nicely balanced.

The body was far thinner than is typical for the style, was smooth, and had the expected sweet finish.

Drinkability was very good, the smoothness of the body was a big help here.

Overall, a very nice take on the style. Smooth and easy drinking. Certainly worth a shot if you see it.

 

 

Dark brown body that has a rich cherry red thing going on when held up to light. Nice off cream head with big soapy bubbles that eventually floats down and settles in with a good solid continent of bubbles. Some decent lacing.

Nose is initially indistinct sweet malts. Maybe some stone fruit and leather and faint hints of cocoa and earthy hops.

Dark stone fruits and leather again. Almost more tart than bitter, but not in a 'wild' way, more just that the cherry and plum elements come through with a bunch of dull earthy hops to blend. Hints of cocoa and tobacco lurk behind, but this is more on the stone fruit side. I forgot it was barrelled until the very end has a touch of vanilla/oak and the tobacco spice is also some of the bourbon spice. Solidly tasty, and surprisingly light on the tongue. Dangerous in that you'll definitely be sipping, but even still it's easy to forget that it's 12%.

Poured into a Fremont small snifter. Pours a dark reddish brown with little light transmission in the glass and a quarter finger khaki head that dissipates to a thin film with light lacing. Aroma of dry caramel malt, dates, raisins, brown bread and light plum. Flavor follows, with dry, somewhat biscuity caramel malt, dates, dried plums, raisins and dark bread. A hint of bourbon in this finish. Medium bodied with light creaminess. A well made flavorful barleywine that is somewhat between the dark fruity and biscuit versions of the English barleywine style. Great fruit character balanced against deep malt. The barrel quality is not very noticeable, and may be subsumed into the dark fruit of the base barleywine. Frankly, there is enough here to not really miss the barrel notes. I've not been really excited about Buoy in the past, but this is well made and fine.

Semi-sweet toffee and dark fruit malt-forward with a woody, drying back - barrel aspect much as hops.

 

Look: It pours brown with a tan head. Head retention is low.

Smell: Malty rich with aromas of caramel and alcohol. There are other notes of whiskey and hints of chocolate. Rounding out are the scents of toffee and a slight hint of dark fruits, raisins.

Taste: There are malty rich flavors with include toffee, whiskey, and brown sugar. There is also a bready element with some caramel. There is a bit of an herbal flavor as well.

Feel: It is full bodied and moderately bitter.

Overall, a good blend of malts complemented by the whiskey and herbal elements.

Excellent, with a lot of flavor. Very nice barrel flavor along with complex malt and hop flavors. It has a sweetness that is almost cherry-like. It is this dark cherry, bourbony flavor that is most forward and immediately grabs you as something different. Label says it was aged in whiskey barrels, but it reminded me of BCBS, but with some definite flavor differences. It took me awhile to decide if I liked it or not. I decided I did. I actually like it better than Sucaba, but not as much as Mother of All Storms. The sweet flavors are nice and very memorable, but drinking more than one glass at a time would be too much due to cloyingness The 500ml bottles are good to split with someone or spread over 2 days. Really great with rich food, too; though people will probably claim it is a dessert beer.

Label is interesting as well, if slightly disturbing. Probably worth acquiring a bottle just to have the label. May be hard to find any left, though. Belmont Stn. still has some, if you hurry...

Taster at barley wine night. Dark brown /amber with a small beige head. Aroma is toffee and caramel, molasses, a bit of vanilla and some of the barrel notes. Taste is smooth and sweet, a bit of heat from the ABV, caramel malts. Nice body and feel to this too.