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Lucky Lab Big Beer and Barleywine Tastival Fri. 3/8 - Sat. 3/9 12pm - 10pm Lucky Lab Beer Hall 1945 NW Quimby

If you think the title of this post is tongue-twisting, wait until you try some of these beers!

Cold and rainy March in Portland begs for big warming beers and every year the Lucky Labrador delivers with their Big Beer and Barleywine Tastival. This year will mark my 7th year in a row at this event and it's always a great time. With over 50 beers rotating through over the weekend, you're going to have to go both days for some pretty long sessions to put a dent in the list. Whether you only drink a couple, or a couple more, these beers are high octane facemelters, so please get a ride to this event.

Festival organizer and  Lucky Lab brewer Ben Flerchinger (pictured above) invited a few media folks to sample some beers that will be featured at the tastival. Ben picked the beers to cover a wide variety of flavors and we dove in:

• 2011 Terminal Gravity Bucolic Plague Barleywine—Huge malt nose, very thick, mouth-coating, apple, not too hot for 13%.
• 2011 Reel Ale Ten Squared Barleywine—Towards the bitter side, very Imperial IPA like.
• 2009 Old Market Barleywine—Brown sugar nose, palm sugar finish, sweetness everywhere, tempered with light bitterness.
• 2009 Old Crustacean Barleywine—Thinner body, bitterness and yeast flavors, heavy and warming alcohol bite.
• 2011 North Coast Old Stock—Phenomenal: smooth, perfectly balanced, rummy flavor.
• 2011 Laht Neppur Barleywine—Made with a wine yeast (most likely chardonnay), this beer is odd and delicious. Unknown ABV (tastes around 9%), nice big start with a quick dry finish. I think this beer will polarize people, but definitely worth a try.
• 2010 Lucky Lab Bourbon Barrel Son of Old Yeller—Huge vanilla nose, big bourbon and light sherry taste, little to no carbonation.

All of the beers had very unique flavor profiles, indicative of trying to balance such a huge beer. Every brewer crafts theirs a bit differently and discovering these nuances in barleywines is what makes this a great event. See you there!

Pricing

• 2 tickets and tasting glass for $9.00 (Tasting glass purchase required--or you can bring one from a previous year)
• 1 ticket = 4 oz.
• Additional tickets $1.50 (Rare beers 2 tickets)

Barleywines

Big Beers