Beer – #83 – Hallertau – Barley Wine

Bit of a change of pace with a Hallertau Barley Wine*, which is Brewed by the Hallertau Brewbar & Restaurant, not surprisingly in the style of a Barley Wine. This is a local beer from just up the road aways – in Coatsville / Riverhead in Auckland, New Zealand.

A whopper of a 750ml bottle of 9.4% ABV beer, in an understated way.

“Experiments, inventions, adventures. This is a limited edition brew from the frontier of beer. You may like it, some won’t. But you will never know until you give it a go.”

Told you I was going out on a limb with this. But if you don’t try it you can’t ever know.

And after the day of chores I’m going to allow myself the leeway of giving this an anticipated go.

The Aroma is fairly sweet of something, it looks like a beer, pours like a beer. Has the colour of a nicely stained Rimu, and a golden head to match. I remember from my early drinking days that a barley wine was a “finisher” something that put in with the last half of your Guinness to kick you into the afternoon nap.

This has a more gentile approach I feel, but I think that this should still be regarded as the end of a good night, as I do on the fly research 🙂

There’s not a lot to remind you that you’ve a glass of a 9.4% beer in your hand, no harsh alcohol on the palette, but there is a subtle sweetness. I’m going to be a wag and suggest that it might be the barley.

I’m liking drinking this, there’s no little gasp or frown or regret at the underlying taste, but then I’m not liking it for not really giving me a challenge to work out. As it warms in the glass there are some more intense flavours developing, but they’re all pretty solidly on top of the sweetness that was always there. The alcohol is slightly more obvious though.

Not sure that I’d recognise this as a Barley wine if you plonked it in front of me at random, and for that reason the pdubyah-o-meter mooches to a 7 arbitrary things from it’s equally arbitrary scale of things. As a “beer” beer it’s ok, perhaps you need to have a better nose or palate or something that would make your eyebrow twitch. I don’t get it yet, but that sets me a new challenge of Barley Wine as a thing.

And a reminder that if I’m twitter later, or spotify, and in my own happy place this was the reason.

*A Barley Wine is a strong, top-fermenting ale, with an alcohol contents of at least 9% and up to 13% (or more) by volume. Hops may be hardly noticeable at all or very noticeable. Sip them out of the special glass, that will concentrate the aroma. They are excellent with cigars or with dessert.