Beer of the Week: Double Barrel-aged Dark Sour Ale

From the Beer Writer: For craft-beer fans, particularly those stocking scores of beers rare or distinguished enough to merit special-occasion status, New Year’s Eve is an excuse to break some of those bottles out of their cellar-temp prisons. In selecting quaffs for the last night of the year, one can base their decisions on rarity, though I think it’s more fun to select a beer, the very existence of which is an accomplishment in itself; something barrel-aged that had to have special oak vessels procured especially for it, then get inoculated with cultures and be babysat over the course of months or even years. I’d like to think the ambitious, fastidious brewers of such creations would smile knowing someone set aside their passion project to celebrate the dawn of a new year. This year, I’ll be toasting the arrival of 2022 (and demise of yet another weird, COVID-stained year) with Double Barrel-aged Dark Sour Ale, a beer from Sorrento Valley-based California Wild Ales which slumbered in not one, but two different barrels for two years. So much has changed since this beer settled in for its lengthy hibernation. Here’s hoping we get back to where we were two years ago sooner than later.

From the Brewery: “This beer is the first in our ever-growing Double Barrel Dark Sour Series. We started by adding our dark-sour wort to freshly emptied bourbon barrels and letting it ferment and age for an entire year. We then transferred this splendid sour into a freshly emptied maple bourbon barrel that previously held a Modern Times stout. Finally, after another 12 months of rest, this glorious liquid was ready for the wild. The use of various barrels brings a new life and complexity to our beer. As this beer conditions over all those months, it incorporates bourbon and stout characteristics. The beer has a light, roasted character with deep notes of plum and a malty sweetness that is a pleasant compliment to the acidity, making it an extremely well-balanced dark sour. Our next Double Barrel Dark Sour is currently resting in a barrel that previously held mead from our friends at Lost Cause Meadery. Something to look forward to in the New Year.”—Bill DeWitt, Co-founder, California Wild Ales