Butte Creek Train Wreck

Brewed by Butte Creek Brewing Company
Style: Barley Wine
Chico, California USA

bomber 07 Vintage. Shared with Cyn after grading for me and coding for her. A reward of sorts. Pours copper orange with a tan head that faded to a ring. The nose is sweet and relatively light. Taste is sweet, but bitter way way too bitter for me. taste is hot and not so nice, it ain’t a 52 percentile for nothing, this barleywine is severly flawed. Oh well...

22 oz bottle from Pizza Port’s bottle shop. A crystal clear mahogany is for the color while a small patch of head and slight lacing will occur. In the nose, a dark malt and delicate sweetness carries the aroma for a well induced scent. The flavor is mildly hoppy and sweet with caramel but nothing special or anything I’d like to taste again.

Bottled shared by JoeMcPhee, I think. The brewers of this beer did a great thing, they were able to show the drinker how hard it is to make a pretty crappy barleywine. It’s not easy but Butte Creek nailed it. And Train Wreck is the perfect name for this beauty. The beer is a dark orange/amber color, of course very plain, they should have tried to make it pale clear to hit all the low points. The aroma is filled with astringent alcoholic cherry. The first sure sign of a bad barleywine. The taste is kind of empty icky malts. that’s it.

bottle, from Cary Wholefoods. bought several months back, drank 1/3/08. Good aroma, sweet. Vanilla, toffee, maple, grainy, cardboard, citrus-lemon/grapefruit, little earthiness. Clean copper color, good head that faded to a ring. Good lace. Bitter sweet flavor, mainly bitter, with occassional sweet streaks. Medium body, a thinner ceamy mouthfeel, sweet dry finish. Could of mellowed abit more as I thought it was a tad hot. Flavor got better as it warmed.

650 ml bottle from Bevmo. Pours a rich amber color with sudsy off-white head that lasted a while and left plenty of lacing in the glass. The aroma is strong with a citrus and sweet malt bouquet. The flavor up front is very hoppy biter; the impact of this beer is that it is an IPA or IIPA because of the bitterness. Besides the biter there is a taste of grapefruit, raisins, and walnuts. The mouthfeel is smooth and full, with good carbonation. The finish is long with lingering bitterness. Overall: this is a great beer to come home to after a hard day at work. Recommended.

Deep ruddy amber beer. Slightly sweet rich toasted malt aroma. Chewy sweet, caramel and toast with a soft toffeeish character as well. Fairly dirty and rancid backnotes behind the otherwise solid malts. Well-named, really.

650 ml bottle from Bevmo. Light brown with almost no head. Earthy hoppy aroma. Sweet caramel and alcohol taste with a big hoppy presence and decent bitterness. Gets better as it warms.

I haven’t rated a beer in a looong time. I had to write this just to say how bad this beer is. Horrible rotten garbage aroma and flavor on top of a burnt, piney tone. The flavors just do not blend well together. I can’t believe the brewers tasted this and okayed it to be bottled. YUK!