3.4 AROMA 6/10 APPEARANCE 4/5 TASTE 6/10 PALATE 4/5 OVERALL 14/20
Pours from a 22oz hand bottled bomber a dark amber color. Thanks TAR! Small white foamy head, with lots of small carbonation bubble. Thick long lasting lacing. Aroma is caramel and sweet with some pine and earth. A medium to full bodied barleywine. Malts are fruity, caramely and VERY sweet. There is also a touch of vanilla and chocolate. For a 128 IBU beer the hops are kind of subtle, they are there and you can kind of feel them one your tongue every once in a while, but they don’t seem to add any of that mouth puckering bitterness you would expect. The bitterness grabs your tongue occasionally just to let you know its there. Could be the fuggles and goldings(?) Lots of sweetness, but not cloying. A multi layer beer, with lots of complexity underneath all the sweetness. Smooth tasting barleywine that hides the 10.9% alcohol very well. Great sipping beer. Mouthfeel is full and round. Finish is crisp and dry. Aftertaste is bitter with a touch of sweetness.
3 AROMA 6/10 APPEARANCE 3/5 TASTE 6/10 PALATE 3/5 OVERALL 12/20
SLightly roasted matiness to the nose. Body is sweet from the first sip. Sweeter than I would have expected. A warming beer.
3.4 AROMA 7/10 APPEARANCE 4/5 TASTE 6/10 PALATE 4/5 OVERALL 13/20
English hops? Fuggles? If so the layers upon layers of sweetness are understandable. This is well made, with a nice body, and does get close to fatiguing, but still carefully constructed. Just a bit of pine sap on the big toffee in there to shake things up, but pretty unidimensionally SWEEEEEEET, dude.
3.3 AROMA 6/10 APPEARANCE 4/5 TASTE 7/10 PALATE 3/5 OVERALL 13/20
Draft - dark amber color with an off-white head. Big malty aroma - and a malty flavor to match - with a balancing spicey hop finish right at the back of the tongue. A nicely hidden 10.9% Nice!
3.3 AROMA 5/10 APPEARANCE 3/5 TASTE 7/10 PALATE 4/5 OVERALL 14/20
Clear copper body with minimal off-white head. Aroma is mild, medium sweet, caramel. Taste is moderately sweet, caramel, fruity, some earthy. Light alcohol, but pretty well hidden considering. Full sticky body. The insane IBUs are well concealed by the big malt profile.
3.5 AROMA 6/10 APPEARANCE 4/5 TASTE 7/10 PALATE 4/5 OVERALL 14/20
Draft: Dark cedar. Tiny off-white bubbles slowly surface to form a sticky ring of cream. Muddled-yeast aroma with loads of sugared figs, cinnamon, and candied pine. Full and viscous, yet tightly carbonated. Mellow sweetness couples with a frontal assault of yeast and brandy-splashed malts. Bready malt aspects stymie the alcoholic graininess, as the vapor proceeds to warm the gullet. Slick bodied, but virtually devoid of fruity esters to balance the palate-coating meaty malt immensity. Augmenting sweetness allows for but a mere flash of hop bitterness to grip the tongue. Unruly malt thickness attains more breadiness along the way, finishing wetly fruity and medicinally sweet with hints of grainy alcohol, brown sugar grit, and a deceptively-dry breath of pepperminty alcohol. Unfortunately the yeast hides the complex aromas, and the hop bitterness fails to crest. Also it lacks bright acidity in the center, which would add another layer of flavor by suspending the endlessly sweet malt. Worthy from the tap, but such a sweet, malt-emphasized barleywine just beckons to be dry-hopped and cask conditioned.
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