Cellared Beer Reviews

[foscorelli]

Cranbic 2016 is turning into jammy cranberry goodness. Fresh I thought this beer was just effervescent cranberry juice. ::dodges **** thrown my way::

 

[matedog]

One thing I've learned the lesson on, outside of BT and their Old Ale Annys, DO NOT AGE.

This seems right. I had 5 year Autumn Maple recently that was super oxidized. The 4 Calling Birds was better, but still showing its age pretty badly.

 

[MooseLang]

I have a few verticals that I have built up that I was always saving for some tastings, but there are never enough people around. So I decided to just crack one at a time by myself over the course of a week or so. I did 7 years of KBS a few weeks ago, and all but the most recent 2 were drain pours.

This, on the other hand, is stellar.



For the most part, I don't care for aged Stouts. But this is still perfectly carbed, and has a hint of roast remaining to balance out the aged-sweetness. Dark chocolate, sherry, and a hint of oak. Very good.

 

[stupac2]

I have a few verticals that I have built up that I was always saving for some tastings, but there are never enough people around. So I decided to just crack one at a time by myself over the course of a week or so. I did 7 years of KBS a few weeks ago, and all but the most recent 2 were drain pours.

This, on the other hand, is stellar.



For the most part, I don't care for aged Stouts. But this is still perfectly carbed, and has a hint of roast remaining to balance out the aged-sweetness. Dark chocolate, sherry, and a hint of oak. Very good.

Cool, I still have one of those. Also an '07 and '08. Should really drink those sometime soon...

 

[MooseLang]

Cool, I still have one of those. Also an '07 and '08. Should really drink those sometime soon...

Definitely exceeded expectations. I'm not a big fan of aging beers that aren't Lambic or Fantome, but this one was worth it.

 

[jdd419]

2013 death's Tar
Barrel on the nose
Lots of bourbon and chocolate in the taste. This is a very creamy stout and really goes well with the flavor.

Not sure if it was better fresh (don't remember and didn't save notes) but I wouldn't say it's a bad beer at this point.

 

[jbeezification1]

I have a few verticals that I have built up that I was always saving for some tastings, but there are never enough people around. So I decided to just crack one at a time by myself over the course of a week or so. I did 7 years of KBS a few weeks ago, and all but the most recent 2 were drain pours.

This, on the other hand, is stellar.



For the most part, I don't care for aged Stouts. But this is still perfectly carbed, and has a hint of roast remaining to balance out the aged-sweetness. Dark chocolate, sherry, and a hint of oak. Very good.

The '10 I had a year or so ago was a drain pour. I'm glad yours was better.

 

[Gene1]

Found this sitting in the back of the beer fridge. It's drinking quite well!

 

[Treebs]

DDT x-post



Oxidation on the nose, but the taste is all tobacco, leather, fig and plum with a touch of barrel. Still some heat left as well. Damn good.

 

[brentsdodgers]

Too lazy for a pic but opened a BA 6- Geese a Laying. Carmel on the nose. Gooseberries are still tart upfront with a nice bourbon sweetness.

 

[Gene1]

12/17/12 bottling. I really am sorry about my lousy tasting notes tonight. It tastes like Supplication, cellared for a few years. Pretty much exactly what you'd think that should be.

 

[KevSal]

i invited a few fellas over to watch some football yesterday

oh yea we also opened some bwines blindly too!
lots of old beer, some of the old favorites starting to show their age

here's the top 5

although this post was to talk about my favorite of the bunch. Anabasis

2 years old now but was one of the best bwines over ever had, loaded with layers of flavor but never gets to sweet.

i wasn't the only one that liked it, 7 other folks marked it in their top 3 out of 18 highly rated ba barleywines

 

[KevSal]

spending some time with aaron, batch 1

drinking left overs today, this is one of the few i hung onto yesterday.

this one has definitly improved with age. drinking it side by side with batch 2 showed some changes between the 2. hopefully batch 2 is like this in 2 years.

slight sherry on the nose, big bourbon tons of dark fruits definitly improving, in sure this has a ways to go before falling off

 

[flexabull]

7 years old now? Nice carbonation, smells boozy, with chocolate and roasted nut notes.

This is tasting really good. Chocolate, coconut, bourbon, lots of flavor, but not a heavy mouthfeel. I'm impressed with how well this has held up. Not sure it would get much better than it is right now.

 

[Beer4B]

2013 Apple Brandy Cake

I never had this fresh and had restrained expectations, but I was blown away. Incredible beer. The barrel was very prominent but not boozy or overpowering. Lots of chocolate and finished with a little pepper heat but not hot, which I'm sure has mellowed out over time. *Re-reading this I might as well have just copy/paste the label. Sorry I suck.

This may not be what it once was but it was one of the best beers I've ever had.

 

[libbey]

2012 Avery Uncle Jacobs

Heat has tapered off but the barrel notes are still super present. Big vanilla and dark fudge notes. Touch of dark fruit and leather.

Big and decadent. This has zero signs of oxidation and could go another 5 in the cellar and probably still be holding up but I can't imagine it tasting better than it does right now.

 

[stakem1]

DFH immort 2008
For whatever reason I bought this one 9 years ago thinking it was a barrel aged old ale but after getting home and seeing it had juniper berries too, I tossed it to the back of a shelf to forget about it. Thanks to operation cellar reduction this brew's time has come.

Initial impression: the **** was I waiting for? This beer is great! Maple, caramel and chocolate with no perceived juniper presence across the nose. Taste carries what the nose suggests but with a mild oxidation, oak and vinous finish. I noticed this was recently brought back to the DFH arsenal... if its half as good as this aged bottle get some.

Old Hickory 2007 Bardstown
I think this was the only year they made this? Was literally holding on to this for 10 years to share with an old friend who lived near the brewery. Waiting this long was a mistake.

It has really thinned out by old ale standards. The oak is raw and spiced almost like cinnamon/cedar. Raisons, wood and toasty malt. It is watery and almost lifeless. Glad to have put this one out of its misery.

Nils Oscar Barleywine (circa '09?)

Never had anything from this brewery - but if im reading and understanding the label correctly this brewery grows and malts its own grains. Impressive.

The brew has a fantastic currant note hat is very similar to the flavor I love about brewer's gold hops. Not sure if those were used in this or if its just a byproduct of the other ingredients. Caramel and light fruitiness across the nose. Taste is perfect balance of alcohol vs toasted malt vs bitterness. Its a little light in the body for a barleywine but so easy to throw back.

 

[stakem1]

yikes....looks like i got cutoff with too many words/images so im gonna have to break this up into multiple posts

New Glarus Iced Barleywine 2009

Was hoping the 8 years in the bottle mellowed this out - nope. Solvent, tannic and astringent. Ice concentrating this brew literally took also the harsh aspects and amplified them. If neutral alcohol flavors and pine resin is your jam you might love this.

De Molen Bourbon Wind & Weer 2011

If there ever was a 16% beer that you wanted to drink a gallon of, this might be it. Unfortunately it seems as though the yeast died/stalled out and when primed for bottle conditioning and nothing happened. This leaves quite a bit of residual sugar in this brew reminding me of belgian candy sugar but it also got a little oak tannins, vanilla, caramel herbal quality and soy going on. Would have loved to try this with proper carbonation and void of priming sugar as that sweetness is surely hiding some nuance. But overall I was not mad about this one bit.

 

[stakem1]

DFH immort 2008
For whatever reason I bought this one 9 years ago thinking it was a barrel aged old ale but after getting home and seeing it had juniper berries too, I tossed it to the back of a shelf to forget about it. Thanks to operation cellar reduction this brew's time has come.

Initial impression: the **** was I waiting for? This beer is great! Maple, caramel and chocolate with no perceived juniper presence across the nose. Taste carries what the nose suggests but with a mild oxidation, oak and vinous finish. I noticed this was recently brought back to the DFH arsenal... if its half as good as this aged bottle get some.

Bought a 4-pack tonight for $12 with a bottle date of almost a year ago to the day.

Yikes this **** is bad. Smoke galore with almost plastic phenolics, faint maple/caramel/vanilla and fruity earthy juniper/mineral inclusion. **** im willing to bet id hate myself for buying this if this was my only exposure to this brew. Time to lay down the other 3 for 5+ years and hope some magic happens akin to my 9 year old experience.

 

[trickytunadicky]

DFH immort 2008
For whatever reason I bought this one 9 years ago thinking it was a barrel aged old ale but after getting home and seeing it had juniper berries too, I tossed it to the back of a shelf to forget about it. Thanks to operation cellar reduction this brew's time has come.

Initial impression: the **** was I waiting for? This beer is great! Maple, caramel and chocolate with no perceived juniper presence across the nose. Taste carries what the nose suggests but with a mild oxidation, oak and vinous finish. I noticed this was recently brought back to the DFH arsenal... if its half as good as this aged bottle get some.

Old Hickory 2007 Bardstown
I think this was the only year they made this? Was literally holding on to this for 10 years to share with an old friend who lived near the brewery. Waiting this long was a mistake.

It has really thinned out by old ale standards. The oak is raw and spiced almost like cinnamon/cedar. Raisons, wood and toasty malt. It is watery and almost lifeless. Glad to have put this one out of its misery.

Nils Oscar Barleywine (circa '09?)

Never had anything from this brewery - but if im reading and understanding the label correctly this brewery grows and malts its own grains. Impressive.

The brew has a fantastic currant note hat is very similar to the flavor I love about brewer's gold hops. Not sure if those were used in this or if its just a byproduct of the other ingredients. Caramel and light fruitiness across the nose. Taste is perfect balance of alcohol vs toasted malt vs bitterness. Its a little light in the body for a barleywine but so easy to throw back.

Nothing would make me happier than if DFH made Immort maple syrup again. Real talk. I love Immort ale. Some folks always got bandaid off it, but until... 2014? When it was extra bandaid I mever did. And I think they pulled it right after that. So good. I should pull a vintage bottle, myself.

 

[Snarf1]

Nothing would make me happier than if DFH made Immort maple syrup again. Real talk. I love Immort ale. Some folks always got bandaid off it, but until... 2014? When it was extra bandaid I mever did. And I think they pulled it right after that. So good. I should pull a vintage bottle, myself.

That's another one that, to me, was never the same after they switched to the bigger brewhouse from their first 10bbl system.

 

[leftoverburrito]

Regular old Adam. Batch 87. Roughly 5 years old now.

Bubbles! Last one of these I opened about a year ago had more tobacco going on. This one has heavy notes of burnt sugar, molasses and leather with the tobacco coming on later. A little dark chocolate. No signs of oxidization.

I bought a case of these when released I liked the batch so much. Will revisit next year.

 

[Jnorton00]

DFH immort 2008
For whatever reason I bought this one 9 years ago thinking it was a barrel aged old ale but after getting home and seeing it had juniper berries too, I tossed it to the back of a shelf to forget about it. Thanks to operation cellar reduction this brew's time has come.

Initial impression: the **** was I waiting for? This beer is great! Maple, caramel and chocolate with no perceived juniper presence across the nose. Taste carries what the nose suggests but with a mild oxidation, oak and vinous finish. I noticed this was recently brought back to the DFH arsenal... if its half as good as this aged bottle get some.

Bought a few of these several years ago and the one I opened tasted like full on bandaids so the other has been sitting around ever since. Maybe I'll give the other a shot this weekend and see if it's any better.

 

[stakem1]

Checked in on a couple regional/local brews of interest:

This bottle is somewhere around 8-10 years old. Nose is toasty malt, raisons and vinous. Taste is caramel malt and solvent alcohol, rusty and mineral-laden. Not that exciting.

This was the first BA batch of gratitude. So, 2014 I think? Its starting to settle in to what I think it will likely taste like for the next couple years. When this was freshly released it had quite a bit of residual sugar that really tempered this beast and put all the focus on its sweetness and barrel character. Now that it has dried out a bit, the woodiness is still present but in a dried out sense that is less about the caramel/vanilla and more bourbon-like with even a boozy sort of herbal orange zest.

 

[stakem1]

Barrel aged blackbeerds of 2012 and 2013.
This proved to be an interesting back to back tasting because both of these were aged in Blantons barrels. The 2012 bottling being first usage and the 2013 bottling being a re-usage of the same barrels.

As expected the 2012 had more of the smooth barrel character like toasted coconut, caramel, vanilla, etc whereas the 2013, I really had to struggle to even find the barrel character but when it came out it was more of the raw and woody elements instead of the smooth nuance of the original usage. Having said that, I kinda liked the second usage but for different reasons. The lack of barrel character allowed more of the base beer roastiness and even smoke character come out.

 

[CommanderofAwesome]

Finally got around to doing my 5 yr (that turned into a 7 yr plus both BA releases) Bigfoot Vert.

Original BA Bigfoot was the standout, just awesome vanilla on this and still one of the the most
harshest most barrel forward beers I have ever had. 15 was downright silly compared to it. Can really tell that 15 is a blend of BA and reg.

17 is pretty much an IPA '12 &'13 were the best of the reg bunch, but to be honest none were amazing. Wouldn't cellar again but fun to do.

 

[stakem1]

Finally got around to doing my 5 yr (that turned into a 7 yr plus both BA releases) Bigfoot Vert.

Original BA Bigfoot was the standout, just awesome vanilla on this and still one of the the most
harshest most barrel forward beers I have ever had. 15 was downright silly compared to it. Can really tell that 15 is a blend of BA and reg.

17 is pretty much an IPA '12 &'13 were the best of the reg bunch, but to be honest none were amazing. Wouldn't cellar again but fun to do.

It dawned on me while drinking the trip in the woods version of bigfoot that I never had the "plain" BA version.

Pretty sure I have a bottle, just not sure which year it is. Need to investigate that soon.

 

[CommanderofAwesome]

It dawned on me while drinking the trip in the woods version of bigfoot that I never had the "plain" BA version.

Pretty sure I have a bottle, just not sure which year it is. Need to investigate that soon.

2013 was the only "pure barrel aged" release of BA BF. Every other year is a blend of BA and reg, something to keep in mind. My wallet certainly does for every release since then

 

[matedog]

2013 was the only "pure barrel aged" release of BA BF. Every other year is a blend of BA and reg, something to keep in mind. My wallet certainly does for every release since then

That's weird. I wonder why (beyond just being able to make more).

 

[CommanderofAwesome]

That's weird. I wonder why (beyond just being able to make more).

Production and $$$. Also, keep in mind majority of craft beer drinkers aren't down with the BA, making a beer more mass market approachable helps SN's bottom line.

Torpedo Room had an SF beer week event 2 yrs ago with their cellarmaster. My buddy and I were the only ones there that gave a **** so we pretty much got to drink for 2 hours with the guy which is where I first found out about '15 being a blend. He pretty much said that '13 BA BF was way too intense for most and thus they toned it down. Another under published fact that I learned that night, '13 was actually aged for 2 yrs in barrels before bottling. It's a pretty damn special beer and one that I would hold up against any BA BWs.