Barleywine Appreciation Thread (2022)

Night before last:




Tonight:


Plus Home Alone 2 with the family. Windchills in the minus thirties today? Quadruple IPA appetizers.

 

Just had one of these last night. So jammy and delicious.

 

Amazingly, my first post of the year on this juggernaut of a thread.

I was in West Lafayette, IN last week moving my son home from school and found this dusty bottle in a liquor store near campus.



330mL bottle purchased a week ago off a room temperature shelf. Bottled 29/10/14 BB 29/10/24 10.3% ABV. The beer pours opaque dark amber with mahogany highlights and khaki colored head. The head recedes to a thin ring and island of various sized bubbles. The aroma is moderate in strength and brings notes of caramel, toffee, old leather, and molasses. The taste is semisweet toasted barley malt with an emphasis on the barley. Tastes like Maris Otter with nice earthy, caramel and tea like notes on top of the leather and ever so slight oxidation. Mild bitterness. The mouthfeel is medium bodied with much less that average carbonation and a semi dry finish. No way you would guess the ABV based on aroma or taste. Overall, excellent. This has held up amazingly. Nicely complex even though it appears to be slowly dulling to oxidation.

I do love a good English barley wine and they are becoming increasingly harder for me to find. Happy to have stumbled across this bottle.

 

... and in the nick of time. Don't wait so long in 2023. (Will we see a fresh thread in '23 or a continuation of this one @DIM ?)

Fun beer choice. I remember Anglo Mania.

 

I am drinking a 2014 Old Guardian, and damn is it good.

It pours a beautiful cloudy orange with plenty of off white/orangish head that quickly dissipates, leaving a nice ring around the edges. All it takes is a little swirl in my tulip glass and the head comes back briefly.

Aroma is very familiar: sweetness, barley, dark fruits, a bit of alcohol in the background.

Great creamy mouthfeel.

Amazing taste! Full bodied, fruity, with bit of bitterness in the rear roof of my mouth in the finish; no off flavors. Could not tell this was eight years old! This is one of the best barleywines I've ever had.

 

Can you see the image? Because this is the first time I have tried to post an image, and it is not showing up on my end.

EDIT: I finally got it! I had to use the "Direct Link" option in PostImage.cc

Thank you to Snowcrash000 for suggesting I use PostImage.cc in this thread https://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/help-adding-images-to-forum-posts.620136/ !

 

Similar to @jkblr, I got my first post in under the wire.

On & On: Part 2 from Half Acre Beer Company. A BA Rye Barleywine in collaboration with Revolution Brewing. A blend of Willett Rye and Willett Bourbon barrels aged 15 months time.



First off, need to give a shout out to the artist, Matt Gordon. What a lovely label. Please indulge me as I have appended the full label in all its glory below as it's warranted imo.

Now for the beer itself.

Canned on 8/30/2021

a: very dark ruby red, one finger khaki colored head which recedes fairly quickly to a thin line. A modicum of lacing thereafter.
s: dark fruit (plum/raisin), brown sugar, caramel, molasses
t: follows on from the aroma - dark fruit (plum/raisin), brown sugar, caramel and molasses. Barrel and rye come through as secondary characteristics here, likely due to time as I do recall these being more present on earlier experiences with this beer.
m: sticky. medium-low carbonation. medium body. Did I mention sticky?
o: a perfect sipper for a -2F(!) evening. I do think I enjoyed this more in its fresher days as the barrel characteristics seem to have faded a touch but it's still drinking quite well. This collaboration with Revolution was a home run as far as I'm concerned. I only can only hope they make it again one day.