Before I even tasted them, smelled them, savored them, I added this caveat: I find hops tend not to age well when they become the focus. A little cardboard is one thing among the sweet, flavor-filled, well aged Bigfoot or Foghorn. I find it adds texture, a pleasantness. But when hops are THE balance factor, unless you’re brewing one of those Belgian brews that use specific type of hops that age well, uh, no. I have done assessments of up to 10 different years of Sierra Nevada Bigfoot. Thomas Hardy too. I have an almost 20 year bottle of Hardy Big Bob gave me from Big Bob’s Barleywine Bash just before he died. Some day we’ll savor it. Almost hate to: once it’s gone that’s it. Like Big Bob dying all over again.
So let’s see how aged 120’s stack up. BARELY aged. Not sure I’d want a 20 year 120 due to hops, but I’d be open to the experience. My original plan was to have 3, but Midtown in Nashville stocked them wrong. They had them labeled as 17, 18 and 20. I ended up with 2 2020’s and one 2016. But 2 days later found a 2019. So 16 v. 19 v. 20.
The comparison was, well, educational. We’ll start with mutual characteristics, then move on to 2020, and from there go back in time.
No fermentation characteristics in any of them. Two of them have a dry, yet slightly sweet, sense to them. Makes for an interesting balance, enticing. One? Well, we’ll get to that. I do have a question: does Dogfish vary they recipe for 120? That might explain the 2019.
Let’s see what 1 year, then 4 years, does to 120. Continue reading “Comparison: 2016, 2019 and 2020 Dogfish 120”
Nose- banana and slight banana peel-like, brown sugary sweet with cream sense, chocolate behind all that, no cardamon, slight vanilla. No yeast sense.
I’ve had this belief, for a long time, that it is just as possible to “know†a person from their social media posts, their work ethic, their stances on social and environmental and human rights issues, and their SENSE OF HUMOR and humility and decency, as it is to know someone we’ve met face-to-face. What we respond to, unless we’re hopelessly shallow, in those we choose to call friends, is their character, their intelligence, their humor, and their values. Maybe social media friendship is even more possible, since the first way involves a distilled version of their character, minus all the self-conscious glad-handing of most in-person interaction. In writing this, I’m testing that theory…but also saying something I really believe.
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