Hair of the Dog Fred

Brewed by Hair of the Dog Brewing Company
Style: Barley Wine
Portland, Oregon USA

Bottle. Pours a slightly hazy gold-orange, hugely effervescent, with a thick, creamy, long-lasting off-white head. Nose is orange and vanilla, spicy alcohol and apricots, sweet caramel. Hugely rich, sweet, and fruity, with different aromas wafting in and out of the mix. Taste is superb - balanced from beginning to end, but ever changing. Starts off with a toffee sweetness, some citrus, and dry, spicy alcohol that never turns boozey, all the while with a restrained hop bitterness sitting underneath the flavors without truly emerging. As the flavor progresses, the alcohol comes out a bit more, with the hops poking through on the palate just long enough to leave a restrained bitterness to counter the sweet, over-ripe golden fruit and rich toffee that also assert themselves towards the finish. A bit of alcohol bite contributes to the dryness of the tail end of the finish, along with just a bit of spicy yeast presence. Mouthfeel is effervescently creamy, if that mikes sense - soft but persistent carbonation and a medium mouthfeel, with a head that never goes away.

12oz bottle served in a Duvel tulip, from batch 59. Pours hazy orange-amber with a one inch off-white head. Smells of dried fruit, caramel, and a kiss of chocolate. Sweet toffee and rum are the main flavors as well as some vanilla, citrus, and light spiciness. Full bodied, nice carbonation. Get some!

Nice hazy copper pour with decent and retaining head. Caramel and vanilla are right there to be enjoyed, as well as light woody notes. Easy to drink and layered with complexitites. Nice

BATCH 69 picked up at NYC Whole Foods and shipped back to SD, poured into a Duvel tulip glass. Appearance is a cloudy light orange hue, big huge sea-foamy head dominates the glass like thick shaving cream and sustains, big blocks of lacing. Smell is a mix of light fruits and berries, sweet honey, grapefruit and citrus hops, caramel malts, and alcohol. Taste is surprisingly sweet and light initially, pears, apples, and apricots peak through a veil of moderate alcohol, transitions to some citrus hops and caramel malts, finishes with yeast and alcohol. Mouthfeel is full-bodied, oily and thick texture, moderate carbonation. Drinkability is moderate, relatively high for a barleywine, the 10% is well-masked behind the wide ranging taste profile, this is a unique b-wine that I would love to try with some aging as well as on draft.

12 ounce batch 71 bottle in Westmalle chalice. Hazy orange with no head. Mild toasted toffee and orange marmalade aroma. Toasted honey and orange marmalade with mild hop spiciness and lingering mild bitterness. Full body and lifeless low carbo. Just not handled well or something. It has no life. Still there are some nice flavors in there. Interesting how some raters got beers with beautiful foamy heads and some had nothing. Why? What happened to mine?

Bottle, 10%. Creamy and malty aroma, hint of vanilla. Muddy caramel colour. Small creamy white head. The flavour is quite bitter, but also sweet. Some alcohol to balance along with teaish hops and vanilla. Slick mouthfeel, almost slimy.

Bottle. Pours out amber with a foamy off-white head that leaves lots of lacing. Rich hoppy aroma, grassy, floral. Syrupy sweet, caramel up front. Piney bitterness is subdued making for a very sweet, rich, tasty barleywine. Full and creamy on the palate.

Amber pour with zero head. This bottle was flat as hell. Aromas of sugar, syrup, malt, dried fruit and caramel. Flavor is sweet as hell with some dried fruit and a slight hop bite at the end. Intersting for sure, but too flat.