Project: Bigfoot

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surlytheduff1

Well-Known Member
Joined
Apr 12, 2013
Messages
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Location
Flint, MI
The problem:
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When the hell am I supposed to drink all these damn beers? What's the right setting for drinking 250+ ounces of American barleywine with varying degrees of oxidation? I'm nowhere near fancy enough to have 22 x four or five fancy glasses to pour a table full of samples for a select group of my highbrow beernerd friends to come over and sample with me (plus who would want to have one long non-stop uninterrupted session of one kind of beer like that? Not me!).

The solution:
A two(ish)-month long random blind cellared beer review. I get my wife, or else start corrupting my ten year old son, and have one of them pull a random bottle from the box, pour it into a vessel of my choice, and commence to liveposting to you folks about all the sweet/caramel/toffee/leather/musky/oxidized-ass flavors that I experience, while trying to guess the vintage.

So stay tuned, if you like.
 
A two(ish)-month long random blind cellared beer review. I get my wife, or else start corrupting my ten year old son, and have one of them pull a random bottle from the box, pour it into a vessel of my choice, and commence to liveposting to you folks about all the sweet/caramel/toffee/leather/musky/oxidized-ass flavors that I experience, while trying to guess the vintage.
You should definitely recruit one or two other people to do a "tasting panel" on each bottle.
 
Mark & The GWAR, I have multiples of all these except '94 and '00. I promise to chug some of the oldies with you and the boys in a down-the-road tasting. Preferably after we've had way too many other beers, in a small dining /rumpus room, out of dirty glasses, while talking **** about Chicago pro sports teams.
 
Ok, so finally getting around to starting this. First, I had to craft me a fancy bottle opener. I didn't want to bend the crowns, and I didn't want to have to teach my wife to pop a cap with a lighter and/or use a opener+quarter. So I went ghetto, and threw this together:
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Based it on an opener that a Detroit guy brings to the tastings. His is a lot nicer .. oak handle appropriately sized, fancy moleskin padding. Mine was made with a leftover chunk of wood from a pinewood derby car and a hot glued little piece of a shamwow for padding. The thing that his opener and mine have in common though is that they both use the same type of screw.

Next up, I got the bottles put together someplace where I won't be looking at them. Finally, I went over the process with my wife - random pull, pour into a big Duvel glass, save the crown, bring it to me.
 
Bottle 1

Allright, so I don't want to have to be taking pictures every time I drink one of these bottles ... too much work, and honestly, there shouldn't be a big range of difference in what it looks like. But I'm going to start this with a picture of the first bottle.

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Dark, slick looking. Not a damn bit of head to it. No bubbles, no lacing. It's an old one.

Smell is great .. slightest bit of soy, dried prunes, burnt marshmallow, leather.

***PSA: a lot of these reviews are going to be using the same descriptors. I'm not much of a wordsmith, and I don't own a thesaurus.***

Mouthfeel was just as slick feeling as it looked in the glass. No carb whatsoever.

The taste is truly unique. If I was given this blind there's no way I would think 'old American barleywine'. Reminds me of an old 90's JW Lees. Doing that one thing wine people do, where you swish it around a bunch vigorously in your mouth really does bring out some nuances. Sweet burn sugar on the frontend, fancy Harry & David quality dried dark fruits, sweet maltiness. The finish is pleasantly weird. A bitter aftertaste is left after you swallow, which is probably from residual old ass hops. The net effect is, it makes you want to take another sip.

Really tasty beer. I'm going to go ahead and guess that she started off with a '94. Will run down and check what cap she left out to verify.

THE REVEAL: '93.
 
Bottle 2

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So the head was a bit billow-ier when the glass was first brought to me. About one fingers worth, that left a little lace after it receded back. Fairly dark, with amber-oxblood tones at the upper edges. Smells malty, not at all hoppy, sweet. Alright, so it's another older one. Lightly carbed, soft mouthfeel. It's not really oxidized, but there is an incredibly hard to place slight tartness there. If struggling to put a name to it. Not really offputting - just strange enough to make you want to get another mouthful after you swallow it to try try to decipher the flavor. Anyway, it's sweet and pleasant otherwise, not hoppy, lightly bitter finish.


I think this is a late 'mid stage' aged BF. I'm gonna guess about ten or so years old - 2003 vintage.

Now, to go find out.

The Reveal:

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Bottle 3

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I thought tonight was going to be a Bigfoot break for me, but decided to be lazy and keep rollin' with it. First up: yeah, dirty glass, suck it. With the acknowledgement of my filthy habits out of the way, let's get it on. First, it's not as dark as the picture indicates. Dark stained walnut with some crimson peeking out. Nice head (this pic was closest I've come to taking a snap right after the pour). It stuck around for awhile. Tons of little nucleated streams of bubbles zipping up the sides, no doubt caused by my crappy scouring of the glass from the night before. Still though, a strong visual indicator of the mouthfeel to come. Sweet malty nose, with a not dominant but noticeably present old hop aroma. Medium-heavy mouthfeel, well carbed, slightly astringent. Third night in a row that I've gotten flavors from a Bigfoot that I'd never before experienced. There's the usual stuff - light burnt caramel, some fruitiness, raisins, a bit bready. But then there's this almost perfumey/floral component (not standard hop flavor) that, although unexpected/out of place, isn't entirely unpleasant. Finish is bitter, but not lingering.

So this one is tougher than last two. It certainly isn't fresh to 3 years. I don't think it's a 90's one either. Hops are more pronounced than last night. Gonna say it's ... an '05.

Now off to see what it is.
 
Dammit, the time limit ate my edit.

The Reveal

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Maaan, off by six years. WHAT IS THIS WIZARDRY?

Now I gotta try to remember that other profound stuff I had typed in the edit.

Two things before I forget them as I progress through this endeavor: first, Bigfoot at a decade plus really evolves into a different animal. No, it doesn't transmute into some kind of nectar of the gods. And no, most nights I'd much rather have a well crafted fresh(ish) beer, but as a change of pace it is something that isn't common, and is very pleasant.

The other thing is tasting aged beers blind is the way to go, although I realize that in most situations it's not practical. Personally, when tasting a vintage beer that I've had in the past at that age, I go in with a set of expectations. Doing it this way eliminates that distraction and lets you focus on what you're putting in your gullet at that moment.
 
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Bottle 4

Hola amigos, it's been a few days since I rapped at ya. The crappy snow in Michigan tonight has me hitting the Bigfoot trail again.

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The pour left a pretty billowy light head. Color is a rich amber, more dark than light. Nose is lightly hoppy, but old hoppy. Malty, biscuity, sweet. I'm getting a little gasoline also, but I'm pretty sure that's from my hands, from working on my stupid snow blower earlier tonight. Light alcohol flavor up front, with a sweet malty middle and a lingering bitter finish. Mouthfeel is coating, with a medium body.

I'm thinking this Bigfoot is greater than 10 years old, but not into the Seinfeld 90's. Gonna guess 2001 on this.

Off to the dungeon to see what it was.

The Reveal

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Im impressed with how close your guesses have been
I'd love to see a multi year vertical comparison (i know that explicitly NOT whats 's gonna happen here) just to see the color differences.

Maybe i can just display all your pics togther when you're done with the project.
 
My first batch of 2014's have been purchased & squirreled away, and a bottle of it as been added to the pool. That gets me to an almost-round 22 bottles (24 woulda been better).

Self critique: now that I've done a few of these, I realize that my process is a bit flawed. As I drink/guess/reveal, I'm shrinking my pool every round. Towards the end I'm not going to be able to impress you all with my beard-strokingly powerful Bigfoot sensory deduction skills, since there'll be only a small number of untried vintages.

I think it's still probably the right way to go. Holding off on the 22 reveals till the end, while forcing me to work harder (& probably be wronger), would have made the individual updates less interesting, IMO. It also would have been harder for me to put the vintage into the proper context for evaluating how it aged, if the experience of drinking it wasn't fresh.
 
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Bottle 4

Hola amigos, it's been a few days since I rapped at ya. The crappy snow in Michigan tonight has me hitting the Bigfoot trail again.

AHxslHZ.jpg


The pour left a pretty billowy light head. Color is a rich amber, more dark than light. Nose is lightly hoppy, but old hoppy. Malty, biscuity, sweet. I'm getting a little gasoline also, but I'm pretty sure that's from my hands, from working on my stupid snow blower earlier tonight. Light alcohol flavor up front, with a sweet malty middle and a lingering bitter finish. Mouthfeel is coating, with a medium body.

I'm thinking this Bigfoot is greater than 10 years old, but not into the Seinfeld 90's. Gonna guess 2001 on this.

Off to the dungeon to see what it was.

The Reveal

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Anchower!
 
What the hell, two weeks since last Bigfoot post? I had better have a good excuse.


Nope, I don't. Let's get it back on.
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First, I need to get some product photographing schoolin'. I really suck at capturing the browney tones on these beers. Color is rich auburn, cloudy, red highlights. As you can see, it was foamin' like a rabid dog. "Must be a fresh batch!" I think.

The nose says 'no.'. Hops there, but fading, bready like a hot bakery, sweet. Definitely not fresh-fresh. You stick this under the schnoz of just about any fancy beer smeller, and they're not going to think 'fresh American Barleywine'. Me included - I have no idea what the hell I'd think this was, without context. I'd know it's old. And formerly hoppy. And sweet. And malty. Ok, maybe I'd take a guess that it was an older bigfoot, but probably I'd just think it was a DIPA that magically transformed to an old barleywine*.

I've been down this taste alley before, a couple times already on this journey. Chewy sweet molassassy, fig, slight oxidation, hops a shell of their former selves, biscuits. Quite nice. Mouthfeel is soft and well carbed, with a bitter finish.

It's older than fresh, but how older. I'm going to say, magic 25th year, the only unique label (no, I ain't counting the old B&W ones) .. 2008. Maybe newer, but in that 'older new' category. Whether or not I get this one right, I'll tell ya this much ... it's quite tasty.

The Reveal:
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I DEMAND A RECOUNT! This one really tasted a lot older than 3 years. I think my wife is screwing with me.


*DIPA's don't turn into barleywines.
 
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