English Barleywine is a style of beer made for aging with their high alcohol, sweetness, and focus on Malt and Fruity yeast ester being the main sources of complexity. The beers are typically very tasty young but, in my experience, they improve with age.
I've taken to the habit of drinking half the batch of these beers each year and then leaving the other half to age. In support of this I only drink one of the aged beers each year. It is a real treat to revisit these and, by rationing, I should be heading toward a point where I'll have 24 beers to sample side by side (in a mere 14 years from now). May have to consider a swirl and spit method of tasting when it comes to that though as even doing a small tasting of each of the 6 current beers left me quite tipsy last night.
Vertical Tasting:
- 2014 Version:
- Overview:
- Brewed with Maris Otter and 3 lbs of assorted light crystal malts. I was hoping for a light colored beer - got a bit darker than I'd hoped.
- Fermented with S04 and Nottingham
- The beer fermented all the way down to 1.016 from 1.101 which is 11-12% ABV
- I aged half the beer on oak that had been soaked in Brandy. I'd been tasting both of these each year but they're fairly similar so this year I'll just do one - the Brandy Soaked Oak portion.
- Tasting Notes:
- Aroma:
- Boozy. Fruit ester along with a bit of bready malt. Maybe a bit of honey as well. Musty kind of aged sherry-like aroma
- Appearance:
- Light brown and pretty clear. Pours with no head
- Flavor:
- Slightly fruity up front followed by malt which is like toasted bread. Get some caramel as well. The finish is kind of musty and blends the malt with a smooth aged alcohol character
- Mouthfeel:
- Medium-light bodied with a little sweetness. Has a slight bit of astringency but not enough to be unpleasant
- Overall:
- Really richly flavored and nicely complex beer. It's like a fruity and alcoholic caramel. It has continued to age very nicely
- 2015 Version:
- Overview:
- Brewed with Maris Otter, Vienna Malt and down to 2 lbs of Crystal. Still was trying for a more pale beer but ended up darker.
- Used Wyeast 1968 London ESB Ale Yeast
- Beer fermented from 1.096 to 1.006 for 12-13% ABV
- Aged with 1 oz of pre-boiled oak cubes
- Tasting Notes:
- Aroma:
- Has a pungent fruit ester character - sort of odd. Very musty smelling. Maybe get a bit of caramel and bready malt
- Appearance:
- Dark golden brown and clear. Pours with a think layer of foam that quickly dissipates down to nothing
- Flavor:
- Fruity flavor up front which fades into toasted bread, caramel, and maybe a bit of chocolate. malt lingers through the finish. The ester character is sort of like an overripe peach maybe. Some smooth aged alcohol character comes through in the flavor
- Mouthfeel:
- Medium bodied with a bit of sweetness. Has a slight astringent bite
- Overall:
- Boldly flavored beer. I think the fruity character of the beer is a bit overwhelming and not particularly pleasant. Has some other things going on but that they are fairly far in the background doesn't help the complexity
- 2016 Version:
- Overview:
- Brewed with Maris Otter, 3 lbs of Rye Malt, and 1.5 lbs Double Roasted Crystal 120 L
- Fermented with Wyeast 1335 British Ale II
- Beer went from 1.093 to 1.012 which is 10-11% ABV
- It ended up forming a pellicle during aging although I never really picked up any flavors I'd attribute to wild yeast or bacteria
- Tasting Notes:
- Aroma:
- Very strong musty and estery aroma. Not a great aroma although it improves as the beer sits a bit. Maybe a bit of wet cardboard oxidation smell. Get a bit of malt coming through all this
- Appearance:
- Pours with a finger of head which fades down to a thin ring - leaves some lacing. The beer is brownish red and clear
- Flavor:
- Really rich malt flavor up front - sweet and toasty and kind of Grahm-cracker-like. This lingers into the finish. There is a very slight bitterness in the finish as well. There is a bit of fruity ester that comes through up front and a mustiness that comes out in the finish
- Mouthfeel:
- Medium bodied and a bit sweet. Pretty smooth beer
- Overall:
- Really nice rich malt flavor to this one - very bold. I'm very pleasantly surprised it still has a good amount of hop bitterness left at this point. Not quite as much going on as the others in terms of fruit ester. Still very nice
- 2017 Version:
- Overview:
- Brewed with 2 Row and Golden Promise as base malt and 5 lbs of white wheat malt. Only used 4 oz of Crystal. This finally achieved my goal of a pale barleywine.
- Fermented with Wyeast 1335 British Ale II again
- I'd wanted to get a fairly sweet barleywine on my previous version but had kept on getting more attenuation than desired. This time I finally got one to stop at 1.034 (from 1.098). So this is an 8-9% ABV beer.
- The beer was aged with 15 oz of Rum soaked golden raisin along with 0.5 oz of oak
- Tasting Notes:
- Aroma:
- Light fruit and a bit of bready malt - might call it overripe fruit
- Appearance:
- Golden in color and clear. Pours with a bit of head that quickly fades to nothing - logs of cascading bubbles though
- Flavor:
- The fruit from the nose very much carries over to the flavor. I know what is in it so, this may be cheating, but it's a grape/white wine kind of fruitiness. The finish is sweet bready malt.
- Mouthfeel:
- Fairly substantial body with a good bit of sweetness. Slight astringency
- Overall:
- Has a very interesting fruit forward flavor compared with the other beers. Lacking in the bold malt character. The most mild of the group and, although the flavors are pleasant, not that complex
- 2018 Version:
- Overview:
- Brewed using a historical recipe for Eldridge Pope's Hardy's Ale from the Shut Up about Barclay Perkins Blog
- Used a mix of 2 Row and Maris otter, 3.5 lbs of Flaked wheat, and 1.5 lb of crystal
- Used Nottingham yeast and, per instruction, allowed it to ferment in the 70s. It was an agressive fermentation which produced a very strong and estery aroma. The beer didn't turn out to be overly estery fortunately.
- Fermented out to 1.030 from 1.105 for an ABV of 10-11%
- This was the most aggressively hopped beer so far (7.5 oz of low alpha acid English hop in the boil) with an IBU target of 84. Was very bitter just after fermentation but this had settled to a nice balance after 6 months of aging.
- Aged the beer on 2 oz of boiled and toasted oak
- Tasting Notes:
- Aroma:
- Light fruity ester and caramel malt. Also pick up some herbal hop character faintly
- Appearance:
- Pours with a finger of head that fades down to a ring fairly quickly. Leaves lacing. Reddish brown in color
- Flavor:
- Toasty bread and caramel malt up front. Yeast ester comes through next although it is mild. The toast then rides through the finish. There is also a fairly firm bitterness that balances the malt in the finish. Get a bit of herbal hop flavor in the mix as well
- Mouthfeel:
- Medium bodied and a bit sweet. Smooth drinking beer
- Overall:
- Really lovely flavor to this beer. It has a bold maltyness with a very nice hop presence. There is also a good yeast character that mixes well with the other elements and lends complexity. Pleasure to drink
- 2019 Version:
- Overview:
- Brewed using a historical recipe for Eldridge Pope's Hardy's Ale from the Shut Up about Barclay Perkins Blog
- Used a mix of 2 Row and Maris otter, 4.5 lbs of Flaked wheat, and 1.5 lb of crystal
- Used WLP 099 Super High Gravity which is supposed to be Eldridge Pope's house strain
- Fermented from 1.120 to 1.010 which is a crazy 16% ABV
- Hopped with 8.5 oz of Fuggle
- Aged with 1 oz Cabernet soaked Toasted Oak
- Tasting Notes:
- Aroma:
- Herbal hops are pretty pronounced in this one. Fruit ester also plays in the background. A bit of malt but it's overcome by the other aroma. Alcohol comes through in the background as well
- Appearance:
- Pours with a 1 finger head that fades to nothing fairly quickly. Brown and very clear.
- Flavor:
- Toasty caramel malt up front. A good amount of hop flavor comes in next and then the toasty and cramel-like malt character lingers in the finish. This is balanced by bitter hop flavor. There is a fruity yeast ester character that also comes through in the start. It also has a pretty smooth alcohol component that comes through all this slightly
- Mouthfeel:
- Medium-light bodied and slightly sweet. Very smooth. Warming alcohol presence
- Overall:
- Very nicely flavored beer. Really rich set of flavors with the malt being the star. The hop flavor rounds things out nicely. As the youngest beer here it's quite different in terms of prominence of yeast character. I imaging this will become more apparent as it ages and the bolder hop flavors fade
2020 Rankings:
- 2018
- 2014
- 2019
- 2016
- 2017
- 2015
No comments:
Post a Comment