Flying Dog: Horn Dog Barley Wine

It smells of molasses, yeast, and honey.

It tastes of WOW-holy-jeeze-this-is-freaking-GOOD.  Blurted out all at once.  My brain has problems separating and processing the flavor.  It’s complex and it comes at you in a rush. 

Other beers will have a wave of this, a rising of that, a hint of so-and-so.  Not this one.  It’s like Flying Dog loaded all the flavors into a shotgun shell and blasted it into your mouth.

Let me take another sip and try it again…

First impression is sweet.  Then molasses, then hops brown sugar medium malt…

I lost it.  Another try…

There’s a nuttiness in there somewhere.  Not walnut or pecan, more like a hazelnut.  Just a hint, a ghost.  Here and gone in an instant.

Another try yields nothing.  It tastes like what it is:  Flying Dog’s take on a Barley Wine style ale.  And it’s absolutely awesome.

This isn’t my first try of it.  I must admit, I’ve been drinking it for about two months now.  It always disappears before I have a chance to review it.  This is my last bottle.

That’s why I’m reviewing it, now, before it’s gone and … I have no idea if I can get more.  These specialty beers come and go.  You have to make the best of them while they’re around.

To summarize, I have to proclaim this as a Holy Beer Contender  and rank it rather high, 9.7 even, on the Holy Grail Scale.  It’s just behind the other premium Flying Dog brew I’ve fallen in love with:  their Gonzo Imperial Porter.