Cellar Cuvée 11
Jackie O's Taproom & Brewery

 

 

Cellar Cuvee 11 (2021) from Jackie O’s. Received from brewery 02/02/22. $ 15.82 (Including tax and shipping)/12.7 oz bottle ($1.246/oz). Stored at 37 degrees at home. Reviewed 27/06/22. Note that I use DD/MM/YY protocol.
“2021” on label, otherwise undated bottle. Served at 55.5 degrees in a hand washed and dried Jester King Snifter. Final temperature 62.7 degrees.
Appearance – 3.5
First pour – Deep Amber (SRM 15), clear initially with slight haze at the end.
Body – Brown (SRM 30), opaque. When rear-lite, opaque with light penetration at the edges - olive. A large amount of precipitate rests on the inside curvature.
Head – None. Aggressive center pour. A ring of bubbles briefly appeared but was gone in < 5 seconds, leaving neither crown nor cap.
Lacing – None, as expected at 13.2% ABV.
Aroma – 3.5 – Weak bourbon and dark fruit with a ghost of roasted malt. No hops, no yeast.
Flavor – 3.5 – Begins with mild bourbon and some sweet, dark fruit, primarily dates. No ethanol (13.2 % ABV as marked on label) aroma or taste. Mild gastric warming. No dimethylsulfide or diacetyl. Ends moderately sweet.
Palate – 4 – Full, creamy, weak carbonation. When allowed to further warm in the mouth, very fine tingly carbonation, like 400 grit sandpaper.
Final impression and summation:4 Still and darker than a Scottish loch, the ethanol is well-hidden beneath layers of date-ish sweetness and flavor. The lack of any remarkable aromas or flavors work against this otherwise excellent barleywine – everything is blended and low-key; so remarkedly so that it's unremarkable! A great sipper but don’t expect any flashes of brilliance, just continual enjoyment.

On draft at CLAG Brewing. Poured a dark, dark brown color with a small, off-white head of foam. It left sudsy trails of lace on the glass. It smelled of rich toffee, caramel, booziness and bourbon. Strong bourbon, oak and vanilla taste with a toffee backbone.

12.7oz bottle poured into a tulip

A- pours brown in color with a one-finger foamy off-white head that reduces to leave nothing behind

S- smells of caramel and toffee, followed by raisin, fig, creme brulee, leather and tobacco. Complimenting undertone of oaky bourbon barrel

T- Sweet and malty up front with an immediate note of barrel that adds wet oak and barrel juice. Mid-palate brings out a bold note of fresh caramel candy, followed by dark fruit notes of raisin and black cherries. The finish gives slight faded hop bitterness, as well as more barrel and caramel

M- medium body with moderate carbonation leads to a foamy mouthfeel that continues into a warming finish

 

 

 

Opaque brown body, no head. Smell is intoxicating: brown sugar, molasses, barley, barrel, vanilla, sugar plum. Taste is barley and barrel focused, but relatively the same. Lighter bodied but oh so smooth and with well defined boozy barrel character. A more drinkable blended Ba barleywine if there is such a thing. The wife loved it

12.7 FL. OZ. bottle
Served in a Jackie O's snifter

This beer pours dark brown. It produces minimal tan head.

Brown sugar, caramel, dates, figs, oak, and toffee.

The taste is brown sugar, caramelized sugar, dates, and figs. I get hints of booze as it approaches room temperature.

Full bodied with a smooth mouthfeel

It is always nice to have a good barleywine. It is even better to have a good barrel aged barleywine. Not the best I have had, but it is very good.

2021 13.2% ABV

Lots of fruity sweetness at work here, plenty of figs, raisins, and apple brandy. There is also honey, molasses, caramel, and toffee. Finally, the bourbon barrel impact is wonderfully over the too. It brings massive amounts of whiskey plus coconut, tobacco, and earthy vanilla. The carbonation is gentle, almost non-existent. Stellar blend.

Look - super dark brown with a nice foamy tan head and lacing
Smell - fig, raisen, toffee a ton of barrel
Taste - caremel bready toffee fig
Feel - medium full body light carb
Overall - really tasty BA BW

 

 

2020 vintage; consumed on 1/7/22

Pours a deep off-black with sharper mahogany highlights and capped with a finger of frothy, pale beige foam; sub-par head retention fades to an expectedly bare cap, creamy, moderate collar, and minimal lacing clinging to the walls of the glass.

Aromas of wildflower honey are accented with shreds of sourdough toast and a hint of Sherry upfront before welcoming charry bourbon oak and antique wood over the middle; chocolate-covered raisins pronounce on the back end, while toast fig and smoked toffee mark the closing impressions of the bouquet.

Taste highlights the restrained decadence of honeycomb enmeshed in nougat as accents of distant raisin find milk chocolate and toasted fig over the mid-palate; the back end builds to notes of fruit cake, as splintery oak phases into nutty toffee on the finish.

Mouthfeel shows a medium body sporting mild carbonation, with a subtle char transitioning to slicker textures with an edge of creaminess over the mid-palate; a moderate dryness belies a more subdued richness as the body steadily thins into the back end, a soft warming expanding over the finish.

Cleverly blended and deftly utilizing its hoppier components as a tool to temper a more one-dimensional richness in favor of wispy oak barrel and spirit imbued across the profile; a collected blend firmly anchored in the subtler nuances of barleywine.

Purchased for $12 on a dark Friday afternoon. I was in the mood for some barleywine this weekend so i picked this up. I've had other Jackie O and they always seem to be high in quality. This is apparently a blend of 5 different barleywines aged in bourbon barrels. Cuvee means a blend of the best beers so hopefully this is good. I'm not usually a fan of blended beers, as i've never had one i thought stood out, but i'll give it a try. Poured out dark brown toffee colored, with a creamy half inch head that recedes into a thick ring around the glass. The nose on this is absolutely incredible. Very strong and robust, with a heavy malt smell, full of butterscotch and caramel, toffee. This is like a wonderful perfume, absolutely a 5 on the scent. Taste is a lot like the smell, although i'm repeating myself it's full of flavors of heavy malt, butterscotch, toffee, caramel. The bourbon is a nice delicate wash on the tail end of the swallow, enveloping the mouth in a slight but present heat. This taste really wraps itself around my palate. Mouthfeel is on the thicker side, with a delightful little sparkle from the carbonation. Overall, I'm impressed as this may be the best blended beer i've had. Another success from Jackie O, i'm beginning to really respect their brewery. not the absolute best barleywine i've had - that's reserved for insanity by weyerbacher. however, it's perfect warmer on this chilly december evening.

Pours a murky dark brown, minimal loose, soapy head. Great aromas of caramel, toffee, down sugar, and bourbon barrel; slightly boozy. Taste is brown sugar, sweet caramel, lightly burnt sticky toffee, molasses. Carbonation adds to a creamy texture, making up for an initially perceived thinness to the body.
Overall, glad I tried it. Seems to have aged nicely.

11/9/21
500 ml bottle, 2017 vintage.
4.25 rating

 

Thanks to the legendary fiver29 for this 375ML bottle & for helping me along to my liver MRI next week. No, not really.

The pour is a dull acorn brown with no head, represented by the nearly absent whisper released when the cap was popped. The nose isn’t prominent, but one might pick out bourbon (OK, that one’s hard to miss), generic cola, caramel, booze.

Cellar Cuvee 11 has quite a lot going on, as one might expect from a complex blend. Bourbon & caramel make up quite a lot of the experience (with attendant booze, of course). Mid-palate brings sticky molasses, moderate spicing (wondering if one of the components is aged in rye barrels), with a touch of cream & vanilla. Did I say sticky? The brewery did nail the appropriate size container for this one.

A belly-warmer for sure that’s not quite the sum of its parts. Good beer.