Nøgne Ø # 100 (Batch 100)

Brewed by Nøgne Ø
Style: Imperial/Double IPA
Grimstad, Norway

Tasted thanks to alakanwarren sharing a bomber w/ me from his beer cellar. This is an excellent beer, but I hesitate to call it a barleywine. It has earthy and roasty notes, and it is quite bitter... we had it at the end of a flight of big beers, and the bitterness was so intense that, since I didn’t have another half hour to sit and sip it, I had to pass over and let alaskanwarren finish it. Exciting, different, and I’m glad i got to try it.

Pours a very heavily hazed/murky dark brown with a very big, small bubbled tan head that leaves fantastic lacing. Aroma is strong citrus, very heavy of a bitter from the Columbus/Centennial mix, a tootsie roll chocolate, light coffee undertone next to a late, deep Maris toasted malt note. Aroma reminds me of a brown ale with a ton of hops. Flavor is very complex - starts off with a very bitter almost resiny hops note quickly goes into a chocolate and toasted malt bite that remains through the rest of the beer. A slight coffee bitterness hits very late in the tasting with a warm alcohol feeling and finishes out with a sweet nutty caramel malt and light prune juice taste. Density is very thick and sugary with some chunks of yeast hanging around as you get to the bottom of the beer. Overall this brew has a fantastic maltiness typical in many English styles but with a very strong American hops presence that provides a great 1-2 combination containing many layers to delve into during your tasting.

A nose of malt and chocolate. The taste is of soil, and it has a roasted character and a bitterness that totally overshadows any other tastes that the beer might have.Either these two bottles from fish and beer in copenhagen had gone bad in some way, or this brew is highly overrated.

Aroma of malt and hints of licrish. Apperance is dark black with nice head. The flavor is muddy and bitter. Sweet and strong beer. An ok beer but not splending.

Bottle 50 cl. Apperance; Black, with some redish, with a nice lightbrown head. Aroma; Hoppy, fruits, plumb and some malty sence. Flavor; nice sweet malty, chocolate with a hoppy sence. Fine bitter ending.

Bottle. Pours very dark brown with an off-white head that lasts well and leaves lots of lace. The nose is quite hoppy and has aromas of malt, toffee, pine, mint, ginger and other spices. Flavour kind of similar to the nose but has a bit of chocolate, less spice but still strong mint and toffee. Full bodied, almost creamy, long finish and very easy to drink.The bottle I had was printed entirely in Norwegian so I’m not sure how it was described on the label but I would have to say that it didn’t seem too much like either a DIPA or a barley wine. More like an unclassifiable strong ale. Delightful though.

So this is brewed to be an Imperial IPA but inaccurately labeled a barleywine? One one hand it tastes like a mix of the two and on the other hand it tastes like neither. Pours a deep amber-brown color with a real thick long-lasting tan head. Some nice lacing left on the glass. Spices jump out in the aroma, interesting, with wet leaves, toffee and pine. There’s definitely a strong hop profile here, it’s interesting though, I guess I’ll call it resiny and piney with just a little bitterness to compliment the malt, until the finish where there’s a sharp bite. Sweet caramel and toffee balance the hops nicely. I also keep picking up an assortment of spices in the flavor, juniper, ginger, perhaps even cinnamon. There’s a note or two of chocolate but it stays in the background. A very interesting beer and one that I enjoyed a lot. Complex, different but very good, and really rather easy drinking for 10%.

650 mL bottle. Says "Barley Wine" on the label, but it clearly isn’t. What it is, is the most wonderfully odd IIPA I’ve ever had. Dark chestnut brown with a small head and nice lacing. Not a lot of hops in the aroma; more caramel, roast, and licorice. Almost like a porter. Hops are there, though. Hops show up in the flavour, though. But there are still elements of a really smooth, creamy porter, or even a milk stout. Beautiful, lingering bitter finish. Excellent!