Old Guardian - Extra Hoppy (2015)
(Batch of Old Guardian - Extra Hoppy)
Stone Brewing in Escondido, California, United States 🇺🇸
Barley Wine - Barley Special Out of Production|
Score
7.57
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2015 Odd Year Release
This one-time-only release, part of our “Odd Beers for Odd Years” series, takes a downright excessive brew into uncharted, extra-hoppy territory. We did this by dry-hopping it with Azacca hops, essentially turning an American barley wine into a triple IPA. Azacca adds big candied-fruit character plus pineapple and citrus aromatics to the base beer’s onslaught of toffee, tropical fruit and vanilla flavors and robust bitterness. Like its Classic counterpart, this delicious oddity will evolve into an even more glorious beer with age, challenging your ability to wait any longer to drink it.
2015 is an odd year, so we followed our five-year tradition of brewing a variation of the classic Stone Old Guardian Barley Wine recipe. This year we decided to focus on an extra-hoppy version, using the classic recipe as the base. We dry-hopped the beer with a new hop variety, Azacca…a dwarf variety with a name that sort of sounds to us like an all-powerful genie who lives in a bottle (coincidently enough) that was recently developed in Yakima Valley, Washington, and formerly known by the decidedly less genie-like name of "13-AD-483." We’ve used it before, most notably in our collaboration beer Beachwood/Heretic/Stone Unapologetic IPA, but this is the first opportunity we’ve had to really showcase the Azacca hop at this level.
This one-time-only release, part of our “Odd Beers for Odd Years” series, takes a downright excessive brew into uncharted, extra-hoppy territory. We did this by dry-hopping it with Azacca hops, essentially turning an American barley wine into a triple IPA. Azacca adds big candied-fruit character plus pineapple and citrus aromatics to the base beer’s onslaught of toffee, tropical fruit and vanilla flavors and robust bitterness. Like its Classic counterpart, this delicious oddity will evolve into an even more glorious beer with age, challenging your ability to wait any longer to drink it.
2015 is an odd year, so we followed our five-year tradition of brewing a variation of the classic Stone Old Guardian Barley Wine recipe. This year we decided to focus on an extra-hoppy version, using the classic recipe as the base. We dry-hopped the beer with a new hop variety, Azacca…a dwarf variety with a name that sort of sounds to us like an all-powerful genie who lives in a bottle (coincidently enough) that was recently developed in Yakima Valley, Washington, and formerly known by the decidedly less genie-like name of "13-AD-483." We’ve used it before, most notably in our collaboration beer Beachwood/Heretic/Stone Unapologetic IPA, but this is the first opportunity we’ve had to really showcase the Azacca hop at this level.
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7.5/10
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Appearance 8
Aroma 8
Flavor 7
Texture 6
Overall 8
Bomber courtesy of rlgk. Pours hazy deep brownish Amber with a frothy goldenish beige head that leaves lots of sticky trace on the glass while dissipating. Smell is malty, tiny fruity, herbal and slightly earthy with caramel, toffee, grapefruit juice, mango, moist grass, pine needles, resin, grapefruit rinds and lemon zest. Taste is sweet, bitter, malty, slightly fruity and herbal. Finish is sweet and bitter with caramel, toffee, grapefruit juice, mango, moist grass, pine needles, moist soil, pine needles, resin and lemon zest. Heavy on the line and resin but a nice US barley wine. --- Beer merged from original tick of Old Guardian - Extra Hoppy on 13 Feb 2016 at 00:42 - Score: 7. Original review text: Very heavy on the pine and resin. Quite solid US barley wine.
Tried
on 12 Feb 2016
at 17:41
7.2/10
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Appearance 8
Aroma 7
Flavor 7
Texture 8
Overall 7
29.01.2016, 0,65l bottle (2015 vintage) @ home:
Nice creamy mediumlasting head. Aroma is sweet grassy, leafs, caramel malts, wet grass, minerals, bark, hops, old moss, alcohol, burnt caramel, hay, citrus peel, dried fruits. Taste is sweet concentrated grassy, leafs, sugar, caramel malts, wet grass, alcohol, hops, moss, bark, minerals, hay, dried fruits, citrus peel. Medium bitterness, sweet grassy mouthfeel. Nice.
Nice creamy mediumlasting head. Aroma is sweet grassy, leafs, caramel malts, wet grass, minerals, bark, hops, old moss, alcohol, burnt caramel, hay, citrus peel, dried fruits. Taste is sweet concentrated grassy, leafs, sugar, caramel malts, wet grass, alcohol, hops, moss, bark, minerals, hay, dried fruits, citrus peel. Medium bitterness, sweet grassy mouthfeel. Nice.
Tried
from Bottle
on 29 Jan 2016
at 15:08
7.5/10
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Appearance 10
Aroma 7
Flavor 7
Texture 8
Overall 7
Deep orange golden color with a fine off white head. Looks amazing. Rich aroma. Mostly dried fruits and toffee. Full body and an average to soft carbonation. A bit sweet with not quite enough bitterness to cover it up. Oily texture. Rice fruity, marmalade, hoppy and toffee in the flavor.
[Bottle from Systembolaget web order in Sweden]
[Bottle from Systembolaget web order in Sweden]
Tried
from Bottle
on 30 Dec 2015
at 16:16
6.9/10
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Appearance 6
Aroma 7
Flavor 8
Texture 6
Overall 6.5
Bomber from Beer Run. Hazy orange-brown, large foamy tan head, good retention. Aroma of toffee, brown sugar, earthy notes. The taste is piney, herbal hops, orange marmalade, brown sugar and toffee. Medium bodied, mild booze.
Tried
on 18 Dec 2015
at 22:57
6.6/10
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Appearance 6
Aroma 7
Flavor 7
Texture 6
Overall 6.5
2015 edition I do believe. Hard to buy these highly similar bottles and hope that RateBeer shall come through with the differentiation but nonetheless they usually do! So this is a bomber bought in Edmonton, imported north, into snowier climes than even what Edmonton could offer. So, it pours - with a deep golden body and modest carbonation, okay head. Some may complain at the lack of aggressiveness on the brew but it is a barley wine after all and it ain’t all bad. The aroma is heavy Belgian yeast - best as I can describe it, not that cheaper crap that you find from the other brewers, this is indeed aromatic. Some malt there, slight sweetness, but not foul by any measure. Sweet caramel there for sure, could ease into fusels but not quite so I won’t mention it past that. That said, Edmonton has a surprising number of attractive women - more than I expected. Not like you’d ever actually hook up with any of them at a craft beer venue, but nonetheless there you go. So this has a strong malt character with hints of malt and vague hints of hops. It’s restraining itself at eleven percent, trying not to be overbearing, but not quite succeeding. I let this one warm up and it was tasted at 21.4 celcius. Drinkable indeed but not quite appetizing; it’s more like the brewer is trying to hold things down so you don’t notice that it’s a hugely over-boozed barley wine. As it stands it’s quite a good barley wine, but I’m not detecting the hoppiness and also find that it could come off as quite harsh to some individuals. Lacking finesse is the deScription I’m looking for I do believe. But if you were looking to get smashed this is indeed a good option, though it’s hard to say it’s a stellar brew.
Tried
from Bottle
on 10 Oct 2015
at 00:44
8.6/10
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Appearance 8
Aroma 9
Flavor 9
Texture 8
Overall 8.5
Flaska från SB. Smak och doft av humle, karamell, vita russin, granskott, tallkåda, grapefrukt, torkad frukt, marmelad. Tjock, rund och len, mycket smaker i bra kombination, fruktig, fin beska som ligger kvar länge i gommen. Kanon gott!
Tried
on 03 Oct 2015
at 05:06
8.2/10
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Appearance 8
Aroma 9
Flavor 8
Texture 8
Overall 8
Flaska från SB. Mycket känns igen från den vanliga Old Guardian. Seg vätska, masiv kropp med karamell och grapemarmelad. Men här är humlen lite mer närvarande och piggare men det är i ärlighetens namn inte jättestor. Hur som helst väldigt gott.
Tried
on 23 Sep 2015
at 08:24
7.9/10
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Appearance 8
Aroma 7
Flavor 8
Texture 8
Overall 8.5
(650ml bottle from Systembolaget) Pours a clear copper-orange with a large lingering head of dense off white froth and lots of lace. Aroma of caramel, toasted whole-grain bread, oatmeal cookie, pine needle and dried fruit. Flavour sweet and fruity to start, caramel, canned peaches, banana bread, dried fruits, citrus peel notes. Earthy tones and toast bring drier, more bitter character to the middle and finish, bready, persistent fruity notes, black tea and a bit of pine needle. Tannic,earthy finish and aftertaste with tea and a bit of alcohol heat. Bitterness is moderate, not as massive as some American style barley wines but definitely quite apparent. Medium bodied with moderate but slightly creamy carb. Alright, so it’s definitely a hoppier barley wine but at this age it’s not a hop bomb either, or perhaps its fruitier hop notes have blended into a typical bw fruitiness. Extra hoppy or not it’s still a good drinker.
Tried
from Bottle
on 12 Sep 2015
at 16:32