Southern Tier Back Burner

Brewed by Southern Tier Brewing Company
Style: Barley Wine
Lakewood, New York USA

Serve in Snifter

660 ml bottle @ Olutravintola Pannuhuone. Rated @ 19.2.2010.
Dark amber colour with a thin beige head. Dark fruits, citrus, pine notes on the aroma. Heavy malty. The flavour is fruity, syrupy, malty and nicely hoppy. Medium/full bodied, oily texture and a hoppy finish. Nice US style BW.

Poured with a murky, purple-ruby-brown color and almost no head. Plum, cinnamon and raw dough jumps out in the aroma. Similar to the Hungarian "Szilvás gombóc" (I’m sure that’s helpful). Medium dense with low carbonation. Sweet, earthy aftertaste. I’m not a barley wine type of guy, but this one way a pleasant surprise. Can Southern Tier do anything wrong? I guess I’ll keep looking.

Medium offwhite head. Deep reddish brown body. Syrupy raisiny malty aroma with toffee, marzipan, and alcohol notes. Dry-sweetish roasty nutty faintly smoky taste with peppery toffee notes. Mid-bodied. Mild mouthfeel. Dryish nutty roasty aftertaste with smoky resiny notes. Nice, dangerously drinkable, unusual. Very malt-dominated. (0.65l bottle, Fish and Beer, Copenhagen.)

Southern Tier does a pretty good job w/ this barleywine. It pours a nice, deep orange color and has a pretty long lasting white head of mixed but mostly fine bubbles. Malt is up front in the nose w/ a bunch of toffee and caramel but the hops line up behind in full force w lots of woody pine character. It is hard to call this anything but syrupy sweet but Southern Tier does get just enough hop bitterness in there to keep it from cloying. It is a definite sipper, heavy as hell though really very mellow and mild w/ only a very slight hint of alcohol burn. The carbonation is just enough to cut through this thick full bodied beer and seems to help push the hops past the sweetness a little bit. It finishes w/ a lingering stickiness and firm resinous bitterness. My only complaint is that this is lacking in depth and complexity but it is at least well balanced and will not disappoint if you’re in the mood for a thick, strong beer.

Pours medium transparent brown with a small light brown head. Nose is a strong mix of sweet malt and bittering hops, with a bit of fruit in the background. Flavor is quite hoppy for a barley wine and reminds me of a slightly less strong version of Stone’s Arrogant Bastard, of all things. Malt is very sweet and suggest both grain and fruit; it’s offset by a healthy dose of bitter hops. Alcohol is also a factor and adds a bit of flavor to the finish. A little oily AND sticky, oddly enough. A damn good beer.

Draught at Mekong. poured a light copper red color with little head. aroma is boooooze, caramel, and great hops aroma. taste: sweet at first with a bite of a hop nugget, little caramel and then booze, dry finish.

Bottle, shared with TylerDurden. Deep, hazy burnt orange with a chunky cream-coloured head. Aroma is intensely malty, heaps of toasty bready sweet caramel, apricot jam. Chewy, flavourful palate full of rich toasty toffee, treacle, stonefruits, and subtle spices. Finish is bitter and long. Awesome.

On tap at mahars. Pours very dark and thick. Aroma is sweet and sour. Taste is very sweet and fruity, mellow but full of flavor.