Old Bad Cat Barleywine 2006
Wolf Brewing Company

Slight tweaking and improvements over last year. Retains the strong, bold vinous characters and the vanilla-oak tastes that I enjoyed in last years batch.

The body is much more mellow, and while still thick and demandin respect, the mouthfeel is far less syrupy.

Very much still an enjoyable brew...why do I never buy enough to age?

This is my first ever Barleywine. I was expecting something a little hoppier from what I've read about the big American BW's such as Bigfoot.

Pours a nice copper red, small head that dissapates very quickly.

Smells of honey and molasses. Very sweet smelling. Again, I was expecting more hops but I can't really detect them. Strong alcohol aromas too.

I can taste a very yeasty and strong alcoholic flavour. Very very swee because of the high alcohol. There is a hop bitterness on the tongue but it is not from an aroma hop. I am tasting a lot of alcohol as well.

Mouthfeel is pleasant. Not very prickly and very subdued for such an aggressive beer.

In terms of the style, I suppose the fact that it is 12% and not undrinkable says something about the quality. I'm not used to beers over 7-8% so this is definately a big jump into the realm of extreme alcohol beers.