Big Sky Olde Bluehair Barleywine

Brewed by Big Sky Brewing Company
Style: Barley Wine
Missoula, Montana USA

Thanks to Marcus for this 750. Dark reddish copper color with a slight beige head. Aroma is cooked dark fruits. Medium body with creamy carbonation. Heat is noticeable. Flavor is sweet caramel with raisin, maple, bourbon and wood. It’s less than dry, but it’s not sticky. It’s a good drink, rather clean and quite tasty. Certainly different from many, so it stands out and that’s good.

Crushed with Carythedude and jakebra. Red pour with big head. Aroma is sweet. Very sweet. Some oak, mostly raisins. Rum. Prunes. A bit of hops. Flavor is way to sweet. It’s alright, and was cool to try. Just way too sweet.

Bottle from the Otown throwdown. mcbackus on the hookup! Pours a nice brown color wtih a very tiny head. Aroma is sweet, bourbon, oak, brown sugar, raisin bread, molasses and some dried fruit--figs and dates. Flavor is very nice. Sweet with maply syrup, boourbon, wood notes, malt and some light muted citrus hops. Good beer.

Crushed with Jakebra and Honkeybra. Huge, huge head. Incredibly sweet nose, with some hops in there. Flavor isn’t as sweet, but it’s still a kick in the teeth. Not that good, but one of Big Sky’s best efforts.

750, capped and foiled. #530/1800. Another gusher. The second one tonight. Sigh. Maybe I’ll just make this a tradition from now on. On Tuesday nights, I’ll open a gusher. If I open a beer and it doesn’t spooge all over the counter on its own, I’ll just pour some around for the sugar ants. They’ll come in eventually, no doubt.
Pours a deep, deep mahogany brown that somehow manages to look velvety through the glass. Enormous, thick, foamy, sudsy, towering head. Plenty of stringy lace. One touch of your lips and the skin oil knocks it down by half in a few seconds, but it’s comically massive up until that point.
Humongously sweet nose--brown bread, brown sugar, figs, dates, and heaps of store-bought molasses. Almost bleeds over into tawny port territory, but it really has a fresh fruit/boxed sugar intensity to the sweetness of the nose. Immediately makes me wonder whether it should sit for a few years...especially given that it smeels this sweet refrigerator-cold.
Nice body, creamy, high side of medium. Nothing sticky or cloying about the mouthfeel. The bread, figs, and molasses pick up some orange-y counterpoint on the mid-palate, there’s a bit of citric sharpness to it that’s not present on the nose. Long, slightly orange-pith-y, heavily brown-bread-y finish. No flaws, other than the wicked overcarbonation (and that goes away). But doesn’t really have much to say on its own with the dense sweetness unaccompanied by anything else. I think if they’re going to go this sweet with it and not give it more hop bite to balance, they should say something on the label about aging it for a couple years. And still give it some more hops, then, honestly, because this’ll be out of balance in two years without them.

Pours a viscous deep chestnut with no real head (as typical with a bw). Huge aroma of bourbon and slight wood. Sweetness up front with a good balance of alcohol and hops. Quite heavy on the bourbon, but that is what I like about it. Nice beer.

Bottle: Nice amber color with a large, fluffy beige head. Sweet and flavorful aroma of citrus and caramel malt. Deep, dark fruity, and light hints of sherry. Tastes rather malty with a little citrus, caramel, and light sherry notes. Some faded hops. Nice.

750 ml bottle, 868 of 1,800: This stuff is nice! Deep amber-red with a big, snap-crackle-pop head. Only medium bodied, but where it lacks in texture, it makes up for with boldness. And, I should say, even though the texture wasn’t heavy on the tongue, it was still real nice, with a great carbonation level. Malts are very complex and tasty, with very rich elements of brown sugar, molasses, toffee, caramel, toasted bread, nuts and wholesome wood. Hops are grassy, earthy and herbal. Lesser notes of citrus and blood. Very nice alcohol notes from start to finish, with some fruity qualities. Hard alcohol coziness and warmth. Nutty aftertaste. Great barleywine.