Widmer Brothers Barrel Aged Brrrbon 2012: Day 8 of my Advent Calendar exchange with my father, featuring Widmer Brother’s Barrel Aged Brrrbon (2012 version), which is a barrel aged imperial version of their seasonal all. It is brewed at a strength of 9.4% abv and is part of their Alchemy Project lineup of barrel aged beers.I have actually had the 2011 version recently so it was great to see what the 2012 has in store for me.
Aroma and Appearance: It pours a light mahogany brown with a small layer of foam and very minimal carbonation. It’s aroma is full of vanilla with some oak bourbon notes, booze, and sweet toffee malts.
Flavour: Upfront is the bourbon oak and vanilla with some light bread malts and earth in the middle, finishing with a leathery resinous slight bitterness,
Overall Impression: The bourbon has really mellowed out in this already, it is balanced and pleasant.
Rating: Excellent at 8/10, great example of an approachable bourbon barrel aged beer.
Food Pairing: Straight up vanilla ice cream would be nice here as it would complement the vanilla notes well.
Below is a video of the process they go through to barrel age this beer, which spends about 60 days in the barrels themselves and is a fairly labour intensive job which is why these bottles cost a bit more.
West Coast Beer Geek 