Clipper City Heavy Seas Below Decks

Brewed by Clipper City Brewing Co.
Style: Barley Wine
Baltimore, Maryland USA

At the 2nd Annual Hell With The Lid Off Barley Wine Festival at Kelly’s Bar in East Liberty, Pittsburgh. Clear reddish caramel, no head. Aroma is banana, floral, perfume like. FLavor is caramel, grass, wheat, pretty smooth.

2005 vintage bottle. This is a baby barleywine. Pleasant aroma of malt caramels and hops. A beautiful copper color with nice carbonation but poor head retention. Nice clean hop flavor and in good balance with the malts. Not nearly as bold as a ’Bigfoot’ type barleywine. I could ’slam down’ several of these without pause where as a true barleywine must be slowly savored. A great ’strong ale’ but not a very notable barleywine. If I could get this beer on a regular basis, I would buy this beer on a regular basis.

Hops, hops, and more hops. Maybe this thing needs to age more but all I got from it was a multitude of hops. In the aroma and in the taste. Unlike other barley wines which I have tasted.

12oz bottle. Orange amber with a small off-white head. Fruity, estery malt with slighty doughy caramel in the aroma. Very sweet malt followed by a ruddy turning fruit and golden raisin flavor. Syrupy caramel in the finish with residual esters and a high alcohol heat. Mouthfeel is heavy, somewhat chewy.

Bottle. Vintage 2006. Pours a clear copper-red with lots of little floaties and an average size off-white head. Aroma’s a little mild for the style, there’s faint sweet malt, fruit, hops and maybe some yeast. Flavour starts mild but there’s a significant amount of alcohol in the finish making it a little boozy. There’s sweet malt and it’s a little fruity. Medium bodied. It’s all just too subtle for me and lacks character, I like my Barley Wines ’bigger’. Just O.K.

Twelve ounce brown colored bottle. Awfully unbalanced, I did not like this beer.

Pour is a brown with a small tan head. Aroma is hard to sniff out. Some caramel malts is all i get. Flavor is caramel with toffee and coffee notes. Kinda weak for a barley wine again no hops show up and im thinking this should be a big part of the style. Alcohol is hidden well but everything else is weak for the style.

Bottle. Complex nose: caramel and toffee and chocolate dust and sticky fudge! Lightly sweet dark fruits. Dark amber body with a sticky, bubbly tan head. Body is luscious, sweet dark fruits and ice cream sundae complete with fudge; some vanilla, plum, raisin, floral with lots of malt. Caramel and light prickly hops. Body’s a little light for that abv, around a "medium," with a dark chocolate and light, dry oaky caramel aftertaste (and the occasional sweet fruity accent). Light warming in the chest and an edge of too-raw booziness to the taste. I’m not prepared to call this a world-class beer, but it certainly was a lot of fun to drink!