A Barley Wine for Every Day

Glad you're back - and with a bang.

 

Can't wait.

 

Awesome Jess. Be careful, your interests beyond beer are showing. I've never heard of SPBW! You failed to mention the daylight spilling into the bar on the album cover... great for a photograph, and also great for a sense of drinking culture outside of America - where daytime drinking is barely accompanied by any light. Wish you would have saved a Bass No 1 for me.

 

Great post. Any barrel character would have probably gotten in the way.

 

Thanks utopiajane. Would love to try this.

 

I had three... down to one. Decicco's Ardsley might still have some. They were purchased there over time and it felt like I was the only one buying them.

 

I am drawn to that old "stock ale" approach.

 

Howdy folks.

I've resurrected this thread just so I can properly put a stake through its heart. I have had a few more relevant beers since my last post and I plan to mention all of them shortly. For now, it's "New Beer Sunday", and I've opened a barley wine.



Port Jeff - Cold North Wind, Apple Brandy Barrel version

The one time I visited this brewery, I had a flight of many of their beers. Their Cold North Wind barley wine was my favorite of the lot. It was very approachable for a barley wine. I left the brewery with one 22 under arm - their Apple Brandy Barrel version of the same beer. Less than a year has passed since that moment, but the beer in my glass today seems very different from the "un-aged" version had at the brewery.

It's a nice mahogany color. Carbonation is in a very good place for the style. The alcohol in this beer announces itself right at the start. It feels much boozier than the 9.5 stated on the label. Perhaps this is the result of influence of "apple brandy." I've never had apple brandy, but I've had beers aged in apple brandy barrels before. Taste is: sweet, rich, alcohol, fruit, grains, and slight oxidation. It's decadent. I could see someone really liking this beer as an after-dinner treat, but I find the alcohol presence gets in the way. You do get accustomed to it, but the rewards don't feel exceptionally high once you do. On the other hand, there's some big character here. It's listed here as an American barley wine. If I didn't know that, I'd call it "English" despite the barrel aging.

Cheers.

 

So... a while back, I threw in that McEwans bottle when I was supposedly wrapping up the thread, and it occurred to me: "I ignored Scotch ales the entire time." I was thinking of an old post by Ron Pattinson, where he claimed that he wouldn't want to define the difference between a strong ale, old ale, barley wine, scotch ale, burton ale, and stock ale... you get the picture. At one point he jested that they were all the same thing. At some point after me thinking about this, I responded with the following post in a thread about "Irish Reds":

I couldn't keep the "Scotch ales / Wee Heavies / 12 Guinea ales" out of this thread any longer.


The McEwans beer was one that I really liked when I had it previously. It's very dark. It's sweet, relatively simple, easy to drink, tasty... and I'd even go as far as to say that it's frail compared to other beers in the category. It's a nice beer.

Looking back to others I've enjoyed in the past, I initially grabbed a Founders Dirty Bastard. Frankly, it's been so long since this event that I no longer feel like I remember my reactions... except that Dirty Bastard agrees with me less and less the more I have it. Here's a pic anyway:


Following through with others I've enjoyed before:
I had a Cottrell Perry's Revenge on tap... which I recall even less... not a good sign. Sorry, no pic.
I grabbed a Dark Horse Scotty Karate single, and then told the person at the check out that I no longer wanted it when I realized it was $7 a bottle. No thanks.

I did splurge on Traquair House Ale though. How can anyone resist that?
That beer was a beautiful dark brown color. (Sorry, no pic again.) Carbonation was very soft. The beer is on the thinner side given the style. There was a slight smell of oxidation. It was fruity without being overly sweet. Ultimately, malty and delicious. A treat.

Eventually, I arrived at a beer that was new to me:
Magic Hat's Champ


This beer was a dull ruby brown. Carbonation was prickly. The malt presence was unsatisfying and there was a bitterness that didn't really work with the beer. A lackluster brew.

 

Barley wines somehow rarely hit their mark when I have them on tap. I think this is mainly due to me and whatever mood I'm in when at a bar. Barley wines go so well with one's living room.

I don't have pics of any of these, but in one night at a bar, I drank:

- Bear Republic Olde Scoutter's (a disappointing and harsh beer)
- Brooklyn Monster (I enjoyed this beer back when it used to be bottled, I can't tell if they are still making it for keg only... bars always advertise it as being an aged keg, but I'm not sure I buy it)
- Against the Grain "This Is Not a Beer" (whoah, this was really unusual, tasted like berries, weird and quite nice)

I can't say I was in the mood for all three of these, but I did it for science.

 

I managed to travel to Pennsylvania, and when I get a little south of NY, I always look for Duck-Rabbit.

Lucky me, I grabbed two singles fit for this thread.


Duck-Rabbit Wee Heavy

This beer missed the mark for me. (Apologies for the slim reactions... I'm firmly in the "too much time has passed" mode of this thread).


Duck-Rabbit Barleywine

Yikes, this beer was a home run. Absolutely delicious. It's listed here as an "English" barley wine, but I'd put it in the American camp. This is probably the American barley wine that suits me better than any other one I've tried. It's not brash with the hops (hence it's classification here as English), but the distinctive hops are most certainly there. Bigger and bolder than the Wee Heavy. I seriously wish this was available in my neck of the woods.

 

Southern Tier Back Burner

This beer was a total surprise. I went into it with little expectations. The beer was very interesting. Darker than most 12 oz barley wines. There was an unusual fruitiness to it. A sweetness quite different from other barley wines. One that I'd like to revisit down the road to get a better reading of it. Hopefully, they'll continue to produce it (in this format). A very nice beer. One of a kind.