Barley Wine and Bitter

Parti-gyled from 14.5 lbs of malt. The strong one will be a malt worms' delight as it is a mix of Maris Otter and Briess Ashburne Mild Malt. A starting gravity of 1.103 will make for plenty of alcohol for the coming winter. On the other, we a nicely balanced bitter at 1.030. Kent Goldings and Fuggle whole leafs all around.

This has been a long brew session for me. usually I can crank out my saison in 5-6 hours. Already 9 hours in today and the bitter still has over a half hour to boil.

Les Framboises du Mal: Vintage 2010

The fresh one. Fruity and juicy with enough acidity and funk to balance things out. Darker than previous years as some of the raspberries were actually blackberries.

Still not quite in condition but quite enjoyable.

Les Framboises du Mal: Vintage 2009

This one still tastes like raspberries, but not as cloyingly as it did a year ago. Still very sour but seems to be getting more funky with time.

What to do with the remaining bottles? They should continue to age well but the raspberry flavor will fade. With this year's batch ready that should serve as a fruity sour beer and I could keep the 2009 around to let it's funk progress and do its thang.

Les Framboises du Mal: Vintage 2008

2 years in and no more raspberries. The funk has won. Le goût d'Orval! Mais rouge.

That was the last bottle. Makes me want to brew a batch of beer, add Orval dregs in secondary. Then stick it in the basement and forget about it for several years.