Rye-on-Rye - Boulevard Brewing, Kansas City
Style:
Rye Beer
Serving Type:
Bottle
Alcohol by Volume:
11.0%
Aroma:
Caramel and cinnamon notes at first, then the whiskey becomes very obvious
Appearance:
Opaque dark brown body is topped by a generous tan khaki colored head. The top of this glass is covered in beautiful lacing
Flavor:
Spicy cinnamon and whiskey flavors demand your palate's full attention. Some sweet stewed fruit and vanilla are present but very hard to isolate because of strong oaked whiskey
Mouthfeel:
Full bodied and creamy but spicy and full of heat which makes this a sipper
It's not very often that you run across a beer like Boulevard's Rye-on-Rye and that makes it a little to set expectations. I expect this beer to be different, to push the boundaries a little and bring something to the table that other Rye beers, or other barrel aged beers, don't. I started to worry a bit when I saw the label for the Rye-on-Rye, it says that this bottle contains 33% ale and 67% ale aged in rye whiskey barrels. That's a 2:1 ratio in favor of barrel aged beer, meaning this beer is going to taste a lot like a whiskey barrel. That sounds a bit dangerous...
Whiskey has a very distinct flavor and it's definitely abundant in this beer. You notice right away that this beer was aged in barrels that were used in the production of whiskey. I'm not a whiskey aficionado but I'd recognize that vanilla and cinnamon flavor anywhere.
As an interesting side note; the Rye-on-Rye came about after a bottle of Boulevard's Bourbon Barrel Quad make its way to the Templeton Rye distillery in Iowa. The Whiskey-men really enjoyed that barrel aged beer and asked the folks at Boulevard if they could put some old Templeton Rye barrels to use. Sure enough, Boulevard took the barrels and filled them with this rye beer, then lagered it for about eight months. The rest is history.
Now, back to beer itself... was all that trouble worth it? Boulevard already has a bourbon barrel aged beer, is there room for a whiskey aged beer in their portfolio? I'm a bit torn...
This is a good beer. It tastes like I'd expected, spicy with some whiskey afterburn while still smooth(ish) and malty. But that's just it, it's pretty much exactly like I'd expected. Good, but not great. The more I drink of this beer the more it grows on me. By the same token, with every sip I take I'm reminded more and more of the Bourbon Barrel Quad. I do like the Bourbon Barrel Quad better than the Rye-on-Rye but I can't hold that against this beer.
In the end the Rye-on-Rye is one hell of a novelty. It has a great story behind it, and it does taste genuinely good, but it's not a beer I'll be longing for when it's left the store shelves. That being said, I got a couple bottles that I'll hang on to and if time makes the palate grow fonder.
Comments
Whiskey Beer
I love a good bourbon and a 2:1 ratio of a whiskey beer just sounds perfect. Was the rye just too overpowering or were you hoping for more ale flavor? Some of the barrel aged ales I have tried have left me wanting more of the flavor of the barrel imparted into the beer so maybe this is what I've been looking for. A big bold flavor.
I think the Rye Whiskey was a
I think the Rye Whiskey was a little too strong for my liking. I would've liked to have tried a 50/50 blend of the Rye-on-Rye, I think less barrel flavor would have been a good thing. This was still a good beer, but there are things I wasn't too fond of...
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