Origin: Ireland | Date: 2019 | ABV: 8.2% | On The Beer Nut: December 2019
I see from my 2019 review that it was brown. It seems to have brightened up over the years, because this glass of it was distinctly red, in a mahogany or teak way. There's a fresh raspberry zing in the aroma, alongside wine-like cork and a hint of toffee. Still, the sweet malt is its main feature, and there was never any fresh hop character to lose. But while the various elements were easily pulled apart for analysis while fresh, age appears to have mellowed and melded its flavours.
Doing my best anyway, I find smooth and runny toffee hitting against brightly tart raspberry and strawberry. There's a distinct background of tannin, suggesting the beer has dried out in the can as it aged. I get a spice element as well -- part clove and part pepper -- which I'm reasonably sure wasn't there when it was fresh.
It's lovely. With all the cans up in the stash these years, I was beginning to fear that beer doesn't actually mature in them, just occasionally explodes. This one indicates that fun stuff still happens under the aluminium blanket. No oxidation, no infection, just a clearly agéd barley wine, smoothed out and highly enjoyable with it.
There is still YellowBelly beer out there, contract brewed and occasionally rebadged as pub house beers. I buy them when I see them. Poignant.
