Lagunitas Olde Gnarly Wine

Brewed by Lagunitas Brewing Company
Style: Barley Wine
Petaluma, California USA

Poured from bomber. Pours a hazelnut-and-ruby-red color with an attractive creamy tan head. Beautiful pour! Nutty aroma, with a sizeable helping of flowery hops. Flavor is full-bodied and vibrant, and carbonation is tastefully subdued. I tasted walnut, dark fruit, light caramel, wood. I keep sensing traces of milk chocolate as well. Very, very tasty. Finishes with a warming touch, probably the well-hidden alcohol. If I were to have one minor complaint, I would say the body is a touch thin. But overall, this is absolutely delicious. Olde Gnarly Wine is simultaneously a great intro into the world of big beers for newbies, as well as a very satisfying beer for BW-style junkies.

aroma is very citrusy, VERY pineappely. really nice cirtus/evergreen flavor. really drinkable. abv is nicely hidden.

Red plum colored pour with a small off-white head. Aroma is quite nice; lots of caramel malt, sourdough bread, chocolate orange, plum, raisin, and other dark fruit notes. Most of the smell is characterized by the malt content, but the citrus hop notes mix in beautifully, and there’s some foreshadowing of booze that I’m sure will be on the tongue upon sipping. Flavor holds tons of sweet caramel, and seems chewy and thick like caramel as well. This heavy sweetness, along with more dark fruit, is balanced by a clearly discernable hop bitterness. Palate is extremely full and rich, and the booze mixes with the bitterness to really create a nicely aggressive mouthfeel. Really a solid American style barleywine.

22oz bomber from State Line. pours cloudy red-browm with a thin white head and light lacing. nose of candy apple, brown sugar, fig, plum, prune, and alcohol. taste is bitter with heavy malt backing. brown sugar, caramel, dark fruit, and a slight woodiness. alcohol warmth comes through nicely without overwhelming. a firm bite from the hops towards the finish. oily, syrupy, its a lovely barleywine. inexpensive too!

Impressive barly wine. Not overly hoppy like similar NoCal brews. Little alcohol and smooth nutty caramel finish. Nice.

Drank alongside FFF Behemoth and Victory Old Horizontal. Similar to both, it was more like Behemoth in IPA quality: caramel and citrus in the nose. It was "cleaner" by taste with a less impressive palate and had a little more alcohol present. While still a great beer, it doesn’t match up to the aforementioned two.

Really not super complex, but really darn good. Whiffs of chocolate and citrus. Flavors of chocolate, soy and sugary lagunitas goodness. Thick and overall a nice treat. This was a 2008 Vintage.

22oz bottle. Beautiful color, a dark ruby/copper color. It had a nice white head as well, clung to the glass all the way down. Smelled like toffee and raisens. Nice little hop bitterness to it initially and then it just layed softly on the tongue, delicious.