Avery Oak Barrel Salvation

Avery tap room 2009 GABF. Bright yellow hazy with a strong brett nose. Taste is brett and more brett, which overcomes the barrel aging. Light body and easy to drink. OK but over the top.

Draught at Avery, GABF week 2009. Pours cloudy dark yellow with a large creamy off-white head, mostly lasting with excellent lacing. Aroma is heavy malt (bread, cookie, hay, straw, meal), average hop (flowers, perfume), heavy yeast (horse blanket, barnyard, earth) with notes of apple, pear, pineapple, and wine. Full bodied, creamy texture, lively carbonation, and a bitter finish. Long duration, moderate sweetness, acidity, and sourness.

Draft at the brewery during GABF week. 2005 vintage. Winey, sweet aroma, the barrel aging vessel quite apparent, lending plenty of wine and oak, along with generous malt sweetness and honey, some lightly floral touches as well. Cloudy light amber color, head is fine and sparse. Flavor shows a truly massively winey profile, just tons of the Chardonnay coming through everywhere, along with the oak and a certain acidic bitterness, the malts largely hidden, surprisingly. Very gentle herbal hoppiness towards the finish, with some light golden apple touches and lingering wine again. Active and sharp palate, body is full. Way winey.

2005 Batch; Sampled October 2008 at Avery Brewing Company
Wow, three years of age has made this far more interesting than I expected. The beer has a pale tan colored, ring of a head that sits on top of a lightly hazy, amber colored beer. The aroma is quite interesting with aromas of fruity-sherry at first, but then in subsequent sniffs I get notes of oak that are quite noticeable. Spicy wood notes, some buttery oak character, soft vanillin are each noticeable and the spicy notes accentuate a warm, almost hot alcohol aroma. There is actually a substantial nutty note to the aroma. I took a break by smelling the dry-hopped IPA and now when I smell this beer I get a massive fig note that couples with some lighter notes of raisin that where actually quite surprising.

The flavor has massive, buttery oak note to it that really lingers on in my palate. As the beer warms some notes of fruity apple and pear mix with the buttery oak character and some soft vanillin notes start to become noticeable. The fruitiness actually becomes quite pronounced as the beer warms up and even picks up some berry flavors, like one would expect to find in a fruity red wine as well as ones found in a fruity white wine (boysenberry, currant and even a touch of apricot and pear / melon). When tasting the dry-hopped IPA before this beer, the salvation becomes a bit tart and the fruit flavors are reduced, despite the fact that it actually accentuates the fruity notes in the aroma.

This can be really quite interesting at times, but it seems to get boring at other times. Overall it is quite tasty and warming this up helps immensely as does refreshing ones palate from time to time (in this case with a different beer). This beer is definitely an experience and is much more enjoyable than the regular version.

2008 GABF week @ Avery. 2005 vintage. Cloudy unfiltered honey orange color, soft white head. White wine nose, crisp notes of grapes and sweet mead. 9% is easily noticeable, comes across slightly boozy and hot. At times it’s too sweet, but the cider and mead character is quite nice... some melon and orange fruit notes present as well.

Draft. Amber beer with an off-white head. Yeasty, malty aroma with a bit of tartness. yeasty, tart, earthy, slight almost berry flavor. Medium bodied. Yeasty, malty, tart, vanilla flavors linger.

tap at the brewery - Apparently it’s not that retired as they had it at the Karma release party. It pours deep gold with a thin white, lingering head. It has a mild malt aroma that includes some wild yeast funkiness. The flavor is at once sweet malts and tart wild yeast and/or bacterium (beasties!). It definitely works better here than it did in the Bad Karma, but I still wonder if earlier batches of this one were better. It’s just okay.

Sampled at the second annual Bistro’s West Coast Barrel Aged Beer Fest as "Salvation Crucified": Clear golden bronze color has a nicely-lacing white head. Aroma of sweet biscuity Belgian malt and a hint of mint and orange peel along with a light fruity tartness. Body starts with a nice oaky chardonnay complexity and sweet Belgian maltiness with a good balance of coriander and clove spices toward a crisp oaky vinous finish. Nice choice of barrel and good balance throughout.