Fish Tale Leviathan Barleywine (Batch 5+)

Brewed by Fish Brewing Company/Leavenworth Beers
Style: Barley Wine
Olympia, Washington USA

Smells awesome, sweet and caramelly and hoppy. Big hop aromas. Pours a deep brown color with red highlights. Nice off-white head that laces the glass all the way down. Tastes of subtle sweet hops and browm sugar. Doesn;t taste as good as it smells. Total bummer on the palate. Super thin, lightly carbonated, bleh. Smells great, tastes okay, leaves my mouth feeling flat.

1/02/2008: Fish Tale Leviathan Barleywine Reel Ale pours a hazy, deep gold to light amber color and has a lasting beige crown. It has really nice, fine lacing. Caramel malt, hints of alcohol, and traces of citrus and pine hops are found in the good aroma. This beer is malty at first (light but sweet) and then there is a huge hop presence when swallowing that leads into the dry finish. The hop flavor and bitterness smoothes out after a few sips. The alcohol content is extremely well-hidden. This beer has a medium body and is smooth. Overall, this beer is hopped like an American Barleywine, but the malt flavor and palate are more like that of an English Barleywine. Actually, while I was drinking it I decided that it was like an extreme English Bitter from a cask! Either way, it was quite tasty and a very easy to drink barleywine.

22 fl. oz./650 mL bottle (10% alc./vol.) from bitbucket. Thanks Bob! Rating #178 for this beer...

Bottle from shigadeyo. Poured clear copper color with an average off-white frothy head that diminished slowly with excellent lacing. Moderate roasted sour citrus, bread malt and alcohol aroma. Medium body with a dry texture. Medium balanced bittersweet dry malt flavor with a medium bittersweet finish of long duration. I shared this with a freind.

Pours a hazy amber with ruby hue with an off white head that dies slow. Smells of malt, some hops and a little dried fruit. Lots of big flavors with raisin, fig, sweet malt and some spice. This is a very interesting barleywine that tastes very complex. One sip its a strong beer, another its very wine like. Full in the mouth, the alcohol is hiddend considering the ABV, shes a sipper.

Poured a dark amber with a decent white head. Caramel malts, little hops. Tastes of caramel, smoke, earthy something or another, and the slightest touch of hops. Finished creamy, well hidden alcohol. Decent but I was hoping for more from this.

Have had MANY of these. This like the Immorat Ale has a strong peat-like flavor which is also somewhat medicine like. It isn’t unpleasant, just unique. It is thick and syrupy. I like this.

Pours a copper color with thin off-white head. Aroma is light fruit, caramel, notes of burnt sugar, and a light touch of hops. Taste is earthy, caramel, brown sugar, and light fruit. The 10% alcohol is very well concealed. The carbonation is moderate and the mouthfeel is a bit dry. Good, but not great.

Pours a rusty orangey brown with a medium sized off-white decent lasting head. Aroma is rather uneventful. Some earthy hops, dirt, cinnemon. leaves. Flavor is light on the malts, oddly enough. There’s some caramel, dirt, wood, and a sorta spicy cinnemon-like bitter hop flavor. Some light amount of brown sugar sweetness FINALLY shows up when the beer is close to room temperature. Finishes bitter with flavors of wood, grapefruit and a pinch of toffee and gingerbread. The worst part about this beer was the bland mouthfeel. I assume this was supposed to be thick, but it just feels watery for the style and for the higher ABV. Not creamy, and not heavy = not barleywine. I had a Hibernation ale last night, and that packed more flavor and texture into a supposedly smaller beer. Old Woody is so so good, how can this beer not even come close?