355ml bottle (thx, Sean J.!) shared at Alex's. Bottled on 2017-10-30. Pours a dark brown with a weak beige head. Aroma is berry-bourbon, creamy, with some rosehip notes. Taste is moderately to high sweet, very complex with lots of bourbon, chocolate, cream, some toffee. Great one!

Bottle, at SinH4-5K-MoritzF-10K tasting. Pours dark brown. Aroma is bourbon, wood, lots of fermented and dried fruit, also caramel and toffee, leather. Body is heavy and strong, with lots of sugar and booze, still caramel, chewy.

Bottle, many thanks luttonm! Reddish color with tan head. Aroma is fermented berries, malty, toffee, leathery. Taste is caramel, toffee, bourbon sugar, cherries, vanilla. Silky mouthfeel. Good stuff, and characterful - but not as great as you'd expect from the ratings.

12oz bottle, courtesy of riversideAK, pours with a mahogany colored body that supports a thin tan head of foam. The aroma offers up reduced sugars, brown sugar infused prunes, a dark jammy grape note and then spicy oaky bourbon booze. The taste delivers smooth sweet malts, a nectar rich blend of molasses and spicy black licorice and then a thin yet rich cherry reduction. Toward midway the barrel character kicks in with molasses sweetened spicy oak, a hit of dates and then boozy bourbon. Solid sipper that may still have room for improvement with more cellar time.

Light brown. Not much head. Bourbon aroma with sticky, figgy, date syrup malts, and gentle slightly vinous finish. Sweet...I like the base barley wine and the treatment is well integrated.

What a gem of a beer from what is quickly becoming a familiar suspect in the category. I picked up a couple bottles of this before it even hit the site, mostly because I have been enjoying all the hoppy offerings from Skookum over the last several months, and I wanted to see what they could do with both a barrel, and a barleywine, being either seperate, or together in one incredible beer. Both in one with this one, I’m on board right away. Doing my best to ignore all the praise this beer is receiving among local beer folks, I decided to crack this bottle open at a time where both a bourbon aged beer, and a barleywine both don’t really sound all that enjoyable. This beer turned my evening around. I enjoyed a Skookum beer earlier this evening that was really good. This is really great. Further proof that these guys really have something going here. I’m extremely impressed. Barren Wood pours thick, dense, dark black with a thin, slow fading head. Complex aroma and flavor. Aroma is full of caramel and maple, maybe some licorice and vanilla, and the slight hint of bourbon. Flavor is smooth bourbon notes, under caramel, vanilla, milk chocolate, and graham cracker. Where the 10%+ is, I have no idea. Delicious. I need more and more of this beer. For about $6 bucks for a bottle of this stuff, I should be buying cases. Going off of my recent memory, this is one of the best barleywines I’ve had, and I keep unsuccessfully trying to convince myself otherwise. What an amazing beer this is.