Life Cycles
Masthead Brewing Co.

This one pours a caramelly looking brown color, with a small head, and a little bit of lacing.

This smells like toasted bread, toffee, maple, caramel, and bourbon.

This has such a wonderfully sticky and candy like malt character. It’s quite mapley, even with no maple added, with lots of caramel, some peanut brittle type flavors, toffee, oak, vanilla, and spicy bourbon.

This is medium bodied, not super boozy, and quite drinkable despite the heft of this.

Masthead is really good at these big barrel aged beers, and I want to keep drinking them.

 

Poured from a can at fridge temp. Pours a very dark brown with minimal head. The nose is boozy. Toffee, vanilla, bourbon, molasses, and more bourbon. This smells like the ABV that it is. Also getting some bready notes, along with some mild dark fruit - mostly figs and raisins.

The taste is intense. Again, quite boozy. There is a syrupy sweetness that is a bit off-putting at the beginning. I'll circle back to this as it warms up a bit and my palate acclimates. Vanilla, pecans, molasses, brown sugar, prunes. Now that I've been at this one for 5 minutes or so, I do think the initial syrupy note is passing. Actually, it definitely has. The bourbon sweetness is really striking hard, and it's really good. They did a good job incorporating the barrel aging with the brew. Not too hot - just a really nice bourbon flavor. I'm really digging this one.

Mouthfeel is medium bodied and the aftertaste is bourbon, vanilla, and some toffee.

 

Picked up for about $13-14. Drinking it on a night I slept in til 4pm. Wtf was I thinking? Now I’m just drinking. This is dark brown/amber. Smells and tastes like caramel and toffee, dark sugary crystallized in amazing clarity. The coolness of the beer really makes it a smooth sipper. The bourbon flavor is not heavy. I drank their Soil and Sky last night, a BA stout, and that had extremely strong bourbon notes. I don’t know why it’s more subdued in this barleywine. Maybe the sweetness of the brew offsets the bourbon, which only shows up after I swallow. Light wonderful carbonation makes this beer dance. Overall this is incredibly good. I love it!

16 ounce can into a snifter. Canned 9/21/22, had 4/28/23.

Pours a copper color, mostly clear, with no real head and light foamy lacing. Aromas of bourbon, caramel, malt, oak, figs, some plums and brown sugar, light char. Flavors of bourbon, caramel, malt, figs, herbal hops, some brown sugar, light oak, light alcohol warming. Smooth, a very good medium body, appropriately carbonated.

A little lighter for the style, but with distinct aromas and flavors, and prominent barrels. Very nice.

 

Masthead is one of the best stops in Ohio for breweries. On hand here is Life Cycles, a complex and boozy barleywine. Caramel is the leading role that is backed up by the strong barrel accent. Dark fruits start to come through as it warms up to complete the profile. An overall solid barleywine.

This 16 oz. can is my fifth beer from Masthead & they’ve been all over the place, kind of like trying to guess how the new Placebo album is going to be.

Dark amber with a few drips of brown to darken it up with a nose of caramel & leather. No bourbon in the immediate vicinity.

Life Cycles is the definition of what you seek in a random BA barleywine. Savage lick of caramel that’s been infused with a shot of bourbon – full stop. Oh, & alcohol. That’s it. Not particularly complex but tasty as hell. Should have drunk the entire can on my own.

Very good beer.

Murky brown ombre pour with a tan head. Bourbon, barley, dark oak, prune, and molasses nose. Taste is a clone with some toasted caramel underneath. Feel is very warm, sharp barley. Standard ba barleywine in that there are no real weaknesses, and the barley, barrel and malt all star complimentary

Dark amber body with a slight haziness; excellent carbonation; thick, creamy, light khaki head; thin, sticky sheets of foam form a descending curtain down the glass. Fine caramel nose enhanced with a note of lightly roasted grains. Huge caramel and bourbon flavor; toasted grains; leather; pecans. Heavy mouthfeel; chewy; big boozy warmth cutting through the smooth residual sugars.

Definitely a barleywine, definitely boozy, definitely good.

Pouring temperature: 38.7 ℉; canning info: 09/21/22

16oz can at share. Dark brown pour, thin off-white head. Aroma is malty, boozy, leathery. Taste is sweet and malty, tobacco, bourbon, brown sugar. Sweet, strong and delicious.