Lost Abbey The Angels Share (Bourbon Barrel)

Brewed by Port Brewing/Lost Abbey
Style: Barley Wine
San Marcos, California USA

750ml bottle sampled at Sexual Chocolate Day 2010. Watery, opaque black, zero head. Aroma is mostly oak and vanilla and bourbon but that’s about it. Flavor is all booze, bourbon, sweet, brown sugar, molasses. Finish is hot and boozy. Too much, no finesse.

Some time in ’08: Bottle arrived on the doorstep this afternoon. Perhaps I should have let it sit, but.... Cork pops with a whoosh and the beer bubbles up but doesn’t overflow. It pours a deep luxurious walnut brown with an ample tan head, leaving rainbows of lace along the sides of my glass. The aroma is simply divine, a sure 10. Rich caramels meld with -- rather than being overlaid by -- deep bourbon aromas, true vanilla and oak rather than brash young burnt oak chips, dates and pecan pie, lovely. After the relatively sweet aroma, the flavor startles -- not nearly as sweet as I expected, actually some mild sour notes, a bourbon richness that is so beautifully melded it’s like no other bourbon aged beer I’ve ever tasted. This is to other BA beers as fresh wild strawberries are to strawberry starburst. I’d meant to add to my description as I savored the bottle over the course of the evening, but it didn’t last long enough. Next time! 10/5/8/4/17=4.4 ’08 bottle sampled July ’09. Explosive pop of the cork but not much spillage; everything I wrote above (which I had to seriously doubt when I re-read last week) is true. Dang this is a good beer. This is what Angels Share would taste like if it were carbonated.

This beer has benefitted from the whiskey barrel aging. Pours brown with no head and a fruit and dark malt aroma. There is a very complex flavor that is enhanced with a very complementary whiskey taste. A marvelous product.

Just a phenomenal beer. Poured dark brown into a tulip glass at Monk’s in Philly. Aromas of burnt wood, vanilla, raisins and dark fruit. Tastes of sweet vanilla, coffee beans and plums.

Pours very dark brown, with no head. Thickish like a malted milkshake. Some bourbon and chocolate aroma, and voila! it taste like well integrated chocolate and bourbon, neither overpowering the other.Nicley drinkable, its like an aged old imperial stout, and without the booziness apparent. Dangerously drinkable.

2009 bottle, pours dark almost blackish brown with a thin off white film of a head, but there is carbonation! Nice sweet vanilla, oak, and bourbon nose, with a sour twang. Flavor is sweet fig and dark burnt sugar with strong bourbon coming into play and a spicey hot whiskey, and grainy finish. Very interesting and I like it more than the brandy. Carbonation is light, but there, I don’t think it adds or subtracts from this beer.

( 375ml bottle thanks to mar) Pours opaque brown with no head. Nose of brown sugar, wood, alcohol and bourbon. Taste of molasses, caramel and brown sugar. No carbonation. Good but not great.

Courtesy of Styles

Bottle: The aroma consists of chocolate, caramel, vanilla, bourbon, and faint vinous notes. It pours orangish-brown with small beige head that quickly fades to a fine ring around the edges of the glass. The flavor starts with chocolate and caramel. The finish has moderate maple syrup, vanilla, and faint bourbon. Medium-full bodied with a slightly sticky mouthfeel.