Sierra Nevada Bigfoot

Brewed by Sierra Nevada Brewing Company
Style: Barley Wine
Chico, California USA

Bottle. 2009 vintage. Woodsy pineish aroma, slightly sweet with caramel. Hazy dark reddish amber body, small beige head. Delightfully powerful flavor, with piney hops and chewy malt. Moderately sweet, with bitterness in the finish. Fantastic.

Bottle. Poured a deep reddish brown. The aroma is pretty hoppy and sweet. Flavor is omewhat sweet with hint of fruit, BIG hops, and alcohol. Good!

2009 edition. Pours a nice red-brown color with a thinner off-white head and the beer has low carbonation. Aroma is a mix of citrus, pine. light alcohol and light malt background as well. Flavor is a nice kick in the mouth of bitterness which takes a few moments for it to be sorted out. The first flavor that appears is a slight citrus which slides into a great pine bitterness. This fades into a slight sweetness from the malt and it finishes with the carrying on of bitterness. The beer is very heavy while the carbonation is fine, lending the feeling of a very thick beer in your mouth. Overall I enjoyed this beer immensely and can’t wait to see how the flavors change with aging.

Red pour with a fluffy white head. Strong aroma of malts, hops, and alcohol. Equally strong flavor of hops and malts, some heat at the finish. Heavy mouthfeel with a syrup like texture. Potent stuff. I’m going to sip this one.

TAP: based on the ratings, I think I must have had a lousy batch of this. Appearance was fantastic - nice ruby red color, great lacing. But a barleywine? I got almost no barleywine character, just an overwhelming pine hop nose and taste, completely unbalanced by any malt. So bitter it was undrinkable. I drank half my glass, left the rest, and a full glass of water couldn’t cleanse my palate.

12 oz. bottle, 2009 vintage. Pours an amazing red copper with a slight haze and a creamy beige head with good retention that laces nicely. Really a very attractive looking pour. The Chinook hops are obvious in the aroma, and this early in the beers life they are particularly fresh and dominant. Some hints of caramel are apparent, but the aroma is really mostly hops. Flavor is very hoppy also, lots of bitterness and resin, a good deal of earthiness and pine. This really seems more like an imperial IPA at this point. But behind all the hops is an abundance of caramel and dried fruit flavors. Mouthfeel is big, but not for the style. Starts out fairly sticky, but perfect levels of carbonation result in a certain velvety feel as it rolls over the tongue. A very, very good barley wine. In it’s fresh state, it’s saved by the fantastic hop profile. As it ages, I can only imagine that the malt will really begin to shine.

12oz brown glass. 2009 vintage. First vintage available in Vermont! Appearance: Thin off-white head. Deep deep mahogany (reddish-brown). Nose: Boozy nose. Dried leaves, banana leaves, dark brown sugar, palm sugar, golden raisins, new leather. Earthy and sweet smelling. Palate: Prickly, sweet and bitter all up front. Medium bodied with lots of texture. Lots of bitterness all the way through sweeps up the initial sweetness of the malt. It goes back and forth between this deep malty raisin-y character and bright, dusty hop flowers. It’s almost resin-y and dusty at the same time. Notes: Lots of ageing potential. The hops will fall away (with some luck!) and that will balance the beer out between bitter and sweet over the next year or two. After that, I suspect the malt will play more of a role. This beer might live for 10 years or so given proper cellaring. Drinkability score suffered due to unbalance in hops...but it’s those very hops that will allow this beer to age for a long time, so a tough call on the scoring.

On tap at Belmont Station. Amber with a foamy cream head. Crisp, fresh hop aromas. Long flavor profile starting with malt, mixed nuts, and smoke, turning into bitter hops. I thought of Bigfoot gnawing on some pine needles. The finish was also bitter and a little metallic. Overall it was a bit spicy and I wondered how it would age.