Return of the Barleywine
Barreled Souls Brewing Company

Sweet caramel and toffee malty, caramel red apples and dark fruity, and a rye-spicy bourbon barrel boozy nose on this one! Taste follows exactly with a balanced bourbon/apple brandy barrel boozy finish. This is good!

 

Pours a very dark, tawny, plum-black color with an overly large dark khaki head that quickly settles into a half finger and slowly dissipates from there into a lasting crown that leaves minimal lacing.

Leather, strong carbon dioxide, grape soda and a hint of fig in the aroma.

Similar taste: leather, cocoa, caramel, light grape soda and some peppery rye. Semi-sweet finish.

Chewy feel with light carbonation.

Tasty beverage.

Im reviewing this beer at cellar temp and pouring into my snifter. Beer was bottled on 9/25/2023. Apparently I added the photo for this beer about a year ago. yay me.
The beer pours a deep mahogany color into my glass. I small dense beige head foams up about .5 cm. This foam fades to a thin edge layer and a few wispy islands on the surface. Beer looks like a barleywine.
The aroma is malty and barrel driven, I get some toffee and dark fruit mixing with a bit of rye whiskey and a good dose of fruity apple notes. Never any hop presence and the ABV is muted here, with no fusol booze notes or peppery spice hit.
Beer feels pretty thick and has a sticky texture, carbonation is mild and fairly soft on my palate.
First sip reveals some more toffee and brown sugar with fig rolling in too. Definitely a sweeter barleywine profile. Again some fruity apple kicks up and carries through to the finish, which is generally sweet and malty, but the finish does allow for some booze. I get warming on the swallow and some peppery bite at the end of each sip. I also get some earthy cinnamon each sip. Not listed as an ingredient, seems an interesting flavor to pick up. It also definitely works with everything else on this beer. Hops never really show through though.
This is a tasty barleywine with interesting flavors that work well together. Glad to have tried this one and would recommend to fans of the English side of barleywinetown.

On tap at Barreled Souls Brewing Company in Saco, ME.

This one pours a fairly dark brown color, with a small head, and not much lacing.

This smells like caramelized apples, nutty malt, peanut brittle, chocolate, caramel, and molasses.

The apple brandy provides a lot of the barrel character in this one, even though it’s only 40% of the barrel lineup here, with 60% of the beer going into rye barrels. There’s a distinct nuttiness to this, almost like peanut or walnut, with some light cacoa notes, and then more typical barleywine flavors of caramel and molasses. The apple brandy and rye playing together give this the vibe of a spiced caramel apple, and I love that.

This is medium bodied, not very boozy, and pretty drinkable for the style.

This uses some interesting barrels to create a very unique tasting barleywine.

Thanks to zeile33 for this true gem.
Received in NBS BIF #18.
Pours deep and mysterious. Profoundly dark brown with a hint of viscosity shown. Sandy head forms and sticks around for a few minutes. Light lacing, great retention for a barleywine.
Nose is definitely on the sweeter side, like English style. The usual suspects chime in: caramel, dates, figs, toffee. But the barrels whisper as well. A deep, mildly fruited brandy note starts off but then makes way for a warm, gently spicy whiskey note.
The flavor starts off with a warm embrace. Rye barrel. Slightly peppery and gently charred. Then the firm barleywine notes come in, but not as sweet as expected, tamped back by the rye barrel I'm guessing. As she warms there is this back and forth between the sweeter notes raising their voices: toffee, dates, and caramel, followed by a hefty apple brandy that is lush and comforting. Then the rye barrel asserts itself, brings things around, and finishes warm and a smooth bitterness tames a bit of the sweetness on the end.
Mouthfeel is warm and a tad chewy for style, try nice.