Mikkeller Big Bad Barley Wine

Formerly brewed at Mikkeller
Style: Barley Wine
Copenhagen V, Denmark

A hazy red-brown beer with a thin orange head. The aroma is sweet with a very big bad alcohol presence. The flavor is sweet malty with notes of caramel, cascade hops, and lots of alcohol, and with a dry end. Nice one.

(Bottle 50 cl) 11% version. Pours a dark amber with a reddish hue and a slight haze. Delicate, creamy, beige coloured head settling cappuchinoish on top. Very intense and lightly perfumy nose full of aroma hops. Full-bodied all right, but not really when you take the 11% ABV into consideration. Notes of caramel and an underlying sweetness. But the bitterness builds up on my palate to become quite massive and overwhelming. And for a malthead like me the last 10 cl were tough. Heavy yeast sediment at the bottom. But this really is a monster of a Barley Wine - American style - and a great beer by all standards. 180206

RB#2100. 50 cL bottle, tasted head to head with Big Worse Barley Wine, my outmost thanks to Ungstrup for provinding me this fantastic opportunity to taste my most sought after DK beer. Pours deep orange with a fizzy head. Aroma is FULL, dired fruit and filling malty roasted, alcohol and with a totally gone sweetness, worse seems slight faint in comparison. Full bodied. Flavour starts woody and slowly, and I mean: s l o w l y, goes into a nice liqourice finish and then again leaves some deep dried fruity, barley and woody tones in the far finish. Fantastic. Worse is more fruity and sweet compared to this, and clearly lacks a lot of cellaring.

Draught at RBESG. Dark amber. Big grapefruity aroma. Boldly malty with lots of caramel blown away by massive hops. Still young with some raw sugariness, but already pleasant with developed flavours. Very dalty, bitter finish.

Draught@Nordic, Tampere. Deep rubyish murky brown colour with smal beige head. Aroma is a bunch of alcohol, raisins, sweet malts, fruity rather sweet hops, plumpudding and some spices. Flavour is very much the same in a rather wellbalanced way. Some of the sweetness is a bit too much though. Still pleasant.

2005-08-12 : Draught at RBESG 2005. Hazy brown coloured with an off white head. Sweet aroma of hops and pine needles. Sweet flavour with lots of caramel, hops and pine needles. 8-4-9-4-17. 2005-09-02 : Bottled. Orange brown coloured with a small off white head. Sweet aroma of caramel, malts, dried fruits, hops, pine needles and alcohol. Flavour of pine needles, caramel, hops, malts, dried fruits and fruits. Long hoppy finish. Oily palate. 8-3-9-5-18.

Date: 03/15/2006
Mode: Bottle
Source: Tasting

hazy dark amber, sweet carmel malt aroma with strong aged earthy hops, creamy body, big carmel malt flavor, lots of hop flavor to ballance, nice carmel sweetness tries to break through, very well balanced overall

Aroma: 7/10; Appearance: 6/10; Flavor: 7/10; Palate: 6/10; Overall: 15/20
Rating: 3.5/5.0
Drinkability: 7/10
Score: **4

Mahogany color with red shades; huge creamy head; it deserved my original Cuvée de l’Ermitage Grand Cru glass! Very nice aroma, medium strong, malty of course, with an elegant hoppy note, developing over time. Full mouthfeel, very good balance of malts and hops, powerful but not cloying; good hop fruitness and excellent final, long and fruity, with enough resins.
A monster, just my kind of beer, that I could drink over and over!