Better than I thought, get the maple on the nose, first sip I get a caramel pumpkin, not much barrel however I get some rum flavor, spices are subtle, maple sugars smooths the finish and hides that 13.1%. 🎃🔥
Nothing too exciting, the blueberry is definitely there but the over powering sweetness covers up the bourbon or barrel aged characteristics. Pretty much what I expected from this.
2018 bottle holding up really well, pours copper red, carbonation still, sweet malts, molasses, toffee, burnt sugars, mellowed out from age the maple seems to have disappeared, and I feel it is at its peak right now at 5 years. Drink them NOW.
The Utopias works super well with this, better than WWS imo, 120 for me was almost a Barleywine and this enhanced that idea, lots of rich caramel sweetness, great barrel notes, vanilla stickiness, so easy to drink at 17%abv. This is 🔥🔥🔥
Oh the memories of the late 2000’s when this used to be 22oz bombers and sought after. Currently this is super fresh and a little hot, but has great barleywine flavors, malty, dark fruits and biscuity. Tasty.
Strong bourbon hits hard at first, oaky, slight booziness, vanilla, some bitter chocolate notes, slight roastyness but for me not getting any maple. Overall not bad.