Moylan's Old Blarney

Wow, has it really been almost a month?  Time flies when you're engaged.  I guess it's about time for a new review.  Generally I try to stay pretty positive about beers, looking for the good qualities of it rather than focusing on the negative.  However, sometimes you just find a brew that rubs you the wrong way.  Despite the fact that so far I've liked the Barleywine style, and this brew has won numerous awards, Moylan's Old Blarney Barleywine was just one of those beers.  I've noticed that there are some beer geeks out there who just love hops.  The more hop flavor you can pack into a beer, the beer they think it is.  This beer was definitely brewed for those people, and at this stage in my life, I'm not one of them.  I generally avoid IPAs, or any beer that boasts its strong hoppy flavors.  In the end, it comes down to bitterness.  Although hops are important as a preservative in beer and to kill harmful bacteria, one of it's primary functions is to impart bitterness to a brew.  They also can have a drastic impact on the aroma, giving beers the flowery, earthy, pine, or other scents that can be so attractive in a beer.  However, I think sometimes craft beer lovers especially can forget the other ingredients - malted barley, yeast, and water, that are equally important to the flavor and smell of the beer.  I could be wrong, but in my opinion all the ingredients have their own special role to play, and should be balanced against each other to form a quality brew.

And that's enough of my ranting - on to the brew.

The beer poured a hazy brownish-orange color, and sported a small off-white head that dissipated quickly to a thin layer of bubbles.  There was some lacing on the glass from this remnant, but it didn't stick around for long.

The smell was strongly, strongly hoppy, and had a medicinal quality to it that I didn't favor much.  The hops had a pine quality to them, and underneath sat the sickly-sweet smell of alcohol.  It mixes together to have a bit of a caramel smell to it, but cheap caramel.  Dan mentioned that it reminded him of the smell of cow-tails (the candy, not off the animal).

The taste was somewhat lackluster.  It had caramel and alcohol notes to it at first, but was strongly bitter.  The bitter flavor stuck in my mouth, and just wouldn't go away.  There was a metallic quality to it as well, like taking a big swig of the aftertaste I so often complain about with certain Dogfish Head brews.  There doesn't seem to be much of an effort to hide the alcohol in this brew, other than by covering it with unpleasant bitterness.  It's harsh, and hard to get down.

The body is medium, and the carbonation is mild.  Still, I had a hard time focusing on anything but the taste.  Maybe if it had been heavier I would have enjoyed it more.

I couldn't do anything but sip this beer.  Every bit of it was a struggle to get down.  I wouldn't say there was an enjoyable moment to the entire glass.  Dan couldn't finish his, and I didn't really want to.  I did, but it wasn't worth the effort.  I don't really know what else to say about it.  If you love hoppy beers, maybe you should give it a shot.  I know it's one I won't be trying again, and this beer alone is enough to make me skeptical of trying anything else Moylan's has to offer.  I really don't see how this brew managed to win as many medals as it has.

- Adam