Dogfish Head Immort Ale

Brewed by Dogfish Head Brewery
Style: Barley Wine
Milton, Delaware USA

Serve in Snifter

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Clear amber, frothy tan head. Aroma of toffee, dark fruit, tobacco, ash, some smoke and peat. Taste is smokey with an earthy bitterness and lots of sweetness. Medium body, medium high carbonation, a little too sweet for me, the peat does come through nicely though.

Pours copper with some reddish/ruby tints. Not much of a head with this beer, but what little head it did have went away quickly. It smells like vanilla, maple and malt. This is a sweet tasting beer, with it tasting like vanilla, maple, oak, caramel and you can taste the alcohol in this brew. It’s full bodied and creamy.

Bottle. Smells belgianish, fruity, malty. Tastes smokey, strong, fruity. Good, wouldn’t want more than one at once. Really intense.

UPDATED: FEB 25, 2012 Deep copper pour with a thin, quickly fading light beige head. At first the aroma is light, filled with berries, vanilla, dried fruit, and light smoked wood. After only a few seconds, it really opens up and the smokey aroma comes wafting from my snifter. Taste is sweet, a little bit bitter, with a strong peat smoke finish. Turns a little more fruity, with light hints of vanilla and oak. I taste something different with every sip I take. It’s really quite remarkable. Back and forth between smokey, sweet, fruity, and boozy. Nice warming character. Full body with a little alcohol burn in the finish. One of the most unique beers I’ve ever tried and quite delicious to boot.

Had this 3 ways this year. I don’t really care for smoke, so I’m biased in that regard. First serving was in a snifter from a fresh bottle(as in just arrived). Second was on tap through a randall filled with maple syrup/vanilla/bourbon soaked bacon, third was on draft in a 9oz snifter. All tasting were at lake worths Bx Beer Depot. Review is for the bottle since I didn’t take notes after. The randall was interesting, the sweetness mellowed things out pretty well although it was a bit overpowering. A:Small notes of maple and vanilla. Big notes of smoke. A bunch of stuff that I just can’t identify under the smoke A: Pours clear garnet with a respectable head. T: Ashtray. Somebody dropped some berries and assorted other things into said ashtray. Smoke covers any flavors I’d normally detect. My buddy swears it used to be less smokey. Pretty messy, I can’t figure out what I’m tasting and I can’t say that anything is blending all that well. P: Medium body and carb. O: Not pleasant. Thanks DFHB for not mentioning SMOKE in the flavor profile. Really, why would you label it with vanilla, oak, and maple but not mention the overwhelming smoke. Not all of us appreciate smokey beers, and I definitely wouldn’t have wasted my $5.00 for a bottle of this if I’d had known better. - I left a near full glass on the counter and grabbed a Hell and Damnation to wash the taste out of my mouth.

Pour is deep mahogany red with an extremely small white head that fades almost instantly. Aroma is very complex with notes of vanilla, sweet syrup, soaked oak chips, caramel, and booze. Flavor is sweet up front but fades quickly into a smoky and boozy finish. Leans very heavy towards the malts, not dry or hoppy at all. Medium to heavy bodied.

Copper, with a ring of whitish head. The smell is sweet malt. The taste is sweet, with maple dominating on top of the old ale taste, and the alcohol is very present, and maybe takes away from the beer a bit. Mouthfeel is somewhat heavy. Drinkability-wise, too sweet and alcoholic to have more than one or two.

On draft at the Livermore Saloon. I’m shocked by the high ratings of this one. Maybe this was a bad/old keg? I doubt it. After reading the description the flavor makes more sense. What a complete mess. I’m not going to get into the details on this one because I don’t want to revisit the awful memories, but dirty bandaids and vodka come to mind. The combination of fusel alcohol, nasty, acrid, flavorless bitterness from the juniper berries (way overused here) and the peat smoke was just a bad combo in every way possible. I hate to bash any beer or brewer here, and Dogfish has made some beers I like, but this was one of the worst beers I’ve had.

UPDATED: FEB 16, 2012 Pours clear, dark amber with a small cream colored head. Smells similar to the raison d?etre. A bit of alcohol on the nose. A little thicker on the palate than I thought it would be. Maybe because of the vanilla. Tastes of vanilla, maple and alcohol. BUT a good balance of the alcohol taste....not overpowering.

2011 bottle. Maroon bottle with white lacing. Little bit of vanilla. Nice beer up front but has a smokiness that ruins the beer for me