{"id":9859,"date":"2024-12-31T21:21:44","date_gmt":"2025-01-01T03:21:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/?p=9859"},"modified":"2025-02-01T10:17:20","modified_gmt":"2025-02-01T16:17:20","slug":"12-beers-of-christmas-2024-8-sierra-nevada-spiced-barrel-aged-bigfoot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/golf\/lifestyle\/9859\/12-beers-of-christmas-2024-8-sierra-nevada-spiced-barrel-aged-bigfoot","title":{"rendered":"12 Beers of Christmas 2024 – 8: Sierra Nevada Spiced Barrel-Aged Bigfoot"},"content":{"rendered":"\"Sierra<\/a>\n

We broke our stay-at-home-with-Chinese-food-and-watch-a-movie-New-Year\u2019s-Eve string in grand fashion this year, with a blowout Mexican feast for 12 at the home of our friends Jerry Carbone and Kathy Maisto. Kathy\u2019s twin sister, Karen, was there, and nine others. The program:<\/p>\n\"menu\"<\/a>\n

Dessert turned out to be a\u00a0mango pudding and Mexican wedding cookies by Susan Healy. I brought the beer, naturally, and the\u00a0tasting blasted right off with tonight\u2019s pick, the Spiced Barrel-Aged Bigfoot Barleywine Ale from Sierra Nevada. It rolls in at a whopping 13.5% ABV. The regular Bigfoot that SN produces each year is a big beer to begin with, an annual sought-after classic that comes in at 9.6%.<\/p>\n

This is the third year that the spiced and barrel-aged version has appeared, albeit in limited amounts. The brewers take the base Bigfoot and stash it in bourbon barrels for at least three and up to seven years. Then they go through the ordeal of tasting various casks, selecting the best, and then tossing in all sorts of spices: nutmeg, orange peel, clove, cinnamon.<\/p>\n\"SN<\/a>\n

It\u2019s all there in the beer, the most succinct review of which was, \u201cThere\u2019s a lot going on in there.\u201d And it all works beautifully, and powerfully. The bourbon is right in the nose, but one sip and the tastebuds go a-swirling in all sort of spicy worlds. The beer was released in 11 lucky states, and if this is indeed a new SN tradition, the world is a better place.<\/p>\n\"sn<\/a>\n

I was lucky to visit SN\u2019s Mills River brewery when Lynn and I traveled to North Carolina in May. (A trip I wrote about at greater length for Golf Travel Wire<\/a>.) My nephew, Doug Honker, now living in Hendersonville with my sister and brother-in-law, has plenty of connections within the beer industry and he put them to good use in setting up the SN tour.<\/p>\n

\"Another<\/a>

Another successful tour of the Sierra Nevada brewery, conducted by Amy Ebling, Tour Supervisor on right, Doug Honker on left<\/p><\/div>\n

Amy Ebling, the Tour Supervisor, led us through the plant, with Communications Manager Ashlee Mooneyhan. (At one point, as he was passing in a hallway, we said hi to Brian Grossman, son of co-founder Ken Grossman.) The tour ended in a tasting room, where we sampled five beers unique to the brewery.<\/p>\n

\"Bigfoot<\/a>But then Doug and I met up with the rest of our crew in the sprawling taproom restaurant, where there are always upwards of 20 beers on tap and plenty of great grub. When heading to, or near, Asheville, a visit to the brewery should be a given.<\/p>\n

I make sure to find some of each year\u2019s Bigfoot, a beer that lends itself to aging, and I usually set a bottle or three aside to see how that goes. It always goes well. (At its online store<\/a> SN is currently selling vintage sets from years 2014, 2016, 2019 and 2022 to ten states).<\/p>\n

In a tribute<\/a> to brewer Ray McNeill after he expired in the 2022 fire at McNeill\u2019s Brewery in Brattleboro, Vermont, I mentioned the sixpack of years 2010-2015 that I had given to him for a vertical tasting we meant to have, but never did.<\/p>\n

In the cellar (garage), I still have bottles from 2010-2016. Then a mysterious gap until this year’s batch. No matter. In any case I\u2019ll likely never have another without thinking about Ray.<\/p>\n

Name: Spiced Barrel-Aged\u00a0Bigfoot
\nBrewer: Sierra Nevada Brewing Co., Chico, California and Mills River, North Carolina
\nStyle: Spiced Barrel-Aged Barleywine
\nABV: 13.5%
\nAvailability: Seasonally in CA, DC, KY, NC, ND, NE, NH, OH, PA, VA, VT
\nFor More Information: sierranevada.com<\/p>\n

[December 31, 2024]<\/em><\/p>\n

< 12 Beers of Christmas 7: Allagash Ski House<\/a>
\n12 Beers of Christmas 9: Guidon Belsnickel<\/a> ><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We broke our stay-at-home-with-Chinese-food-and-watch-a-movie-New-Year\u2019s-Eve string in grand fashion this year, with a blowout Mexican feast for 12 at the home… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":9861,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[939,627,18],"tags":[668,991995,720,1002722,722,1016782,749,1045345,1136,1045899,3703,1045900,3819,1352,676069,633,975741,597,975814],"class_list":["post-9859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beer-on-tap","category-tap-beer-of-the-week","category-lifestyle","tag-brattleboro","tag-jerry-carbone","tag-sierra-nevada","tag-12-beers-of-christmas","tag-ken-grossman","tag-mills-river","tag-christmas","tag-mcneills-brewery","tag-ray-mcneill","tag-brian-grossman","tag-doug-honker","tag-spiced-barrel-aged-bigfoot","tag-chico","tag-north-carolina","tag-christmas-beers","tag-vermont","tag-12-days-of-christmas","tag-california","tag-barleywine"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2025\/01\/SN-spiced-Bigfoot.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9859","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9859"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9859\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9893,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9859\/revisions\/9893"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9861"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/tombedell\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}