Barrel Aging: When is it necessary?

Storm King and Dark Intrigue... both kinda suck unless you love Cascadian IPA. I can't believe either are classified as RIS.
Adirondack Fat Scotsman and Jack Daniels BA Fat Scotsman are both really great... but the BA version is in a class all it's own!
Weyerbacher Blithering Idiot is really good... but Insanity is just that... INSANE! One of the top BBA Barleywine's on the market IMHO!
Barleywine, RIS, and Wee-Heavy are my favorite BBA styles. I would LOVE to try Bourbon Barrel DFH Palo Santo Marron! I think that would be in the top 5 all time beers in a heartbeat!

 

This is 100% correct.
I have mad love for Insanity.
At it's price point & availability, it's one of my standards by which all BA english barleywines are judged.
Have I had better? Absolutely. FW Abacus & now Sucaba is a better example fo the style.
But I can buy a case of Insanity seasonally for the cost of 4-5 bottles of Sucaba

 

Palo Santo Marron is already barrel-aged. In fact (and I admit I may be showing an East Coast bias here) it was IIRC one of the first widely-available barrel-aged beers from an American craft brewer. See http://www.dogfish.com/brews-spirits/the-brews/year-round-brews/palo-santo-marron.htm

 

Sure it's aged in Palo Santo wooden barrels... but i'm talking about Bourbon Barrel Aging it as well!

 

Semantics maybe but the wooden tanks for Palo Santo are not really the same as a barrel. You have much more surface area and contact in a barrel than you do tanks. The barrel imparts much more flavor. I think Pale Santo is a wonderful beer, the wood deserves mentioning but I do not think it is appropriate to compare it to a barrel aged beer.

 

50/50 Totality = meh
50/50 Eclipse = awesome

 

No doubt about it Rogue Hazelnut Brown Nectar aged in spiced rum barrels is a downgrade from the original. But much love to Rogue they make great beer!

 

The barrel is meant to transform the beer with an extra dimension for the beer, and frequently it becomes the star of the show when it makes the beer a bourbon bomb (such as Bourbon County Brand Stout). The degree of additional flavor depends on how recently the barrel came from the distillery, how long the beer is in the barrel, or how many times the barrel has been previously used to age beer.

However, a clarification needs to be made here - used bourbon barrels (or barrels from other wines or spirits) serve as an aging and mellowing vessel as well as imparting a flavor from the spirit. But a used spirit barrel is different from a plain old oak barrel that is meant to give the beer a place to pick up only some oak notes in the flavor, or as a place for other things to occur such as souring.

 

I'm doing the same thing very soon. Pretty excited. That's all I have to add, sorry.

 

You put a beer in barrels when you want Beer Advocates to swarm your small brewery with hundreds of dollars in hand, create a huge mess, and then complain about it online all the while trying to trade one of their allotment for walez. Triple points for PvW barrel aging.

 

Really anything hop-forward.

Southern Tier Unearthly IPA = Awesome
Southern Tier Oak-Aged Unearthly IPA = Meh

Arrogant Bastard = Awesome
Oak-Aged Arrogant Bastard = Meh

 

I really wish more breweries utilized fresh barrels. The used barrel thing has become such a great marketing element and is so much less expensive than having fresh barrels coopered, but there is something to be said for some straight up charred oak. Some of my favorite beers of all-time (Left Hand's discontinued Oak-Aged Stout and Allagash Odyssey, to name a few) were right into the oak and they were awesome. But fresh oak I guess just takes more knowledge and patience. You need to blend it and such and really have a barrel program like a winery would to make it work.

 

Totally agree. My favorite barrel aged beers are mixed standard oak & spirits (Boulevard Rye on Rye and Bruery White Oak come to mind) - I think 100% bourbon (or other spirit aged) beers end up too strong a lot of the time without a lot of balance. Blending in some fresh, charred oak barrel beer in there really adds a lot to the flavor.

 

I have to disagree. Storm King has definite and heavy roasted flavors that I would not associate with a Cascadian IPA to that degree. Yes, it is very hoppy, but historically RISs were very heavily hopped. They were made to age, which this beer does well. It fits the style quite nicely.

 

BA Batch 9000, was excellent. It seems the barrel did wonders for that beer.

 

i assume the discussion is mostly about "right this second"? brewers will either keep re-using already possessed barrels until they wear out OR they will acquire recently spent barrels - either scenario represents changes over each batch/release/use/purchase. it would be tough to say a beer year in & year out versus it's barrel aged counterpart will indefinitely prove better/worse or even worth talking about.

this is just my opinion, but the way i view it, barrel aging should never be "necessary". my interest in barrel aged ale is from the aspect of it being complimentary - not a necessity. there will probably always be a couple of otherwise boring ales that pick up a little bit of magic from a stint in a barrel, but the majority of what's attractive is solid base ale that's been spanked & complimented with barrel influences. jmho

 

Barrel Aging: When is it necessary?

Always!!
100%
love em'
more more more

 

Im confused I thought the whole point of Palo Santo Marron is that it is already aged in palo santo wood ? Will these be the new trend to barrel age using two different wood types

 

I had the Indian Wells Barrel Aged Amber and that is a perfect example of when not to barrel age something.. Though its Indian wells and none of their beers are any good