Yorocco: Y/B/A/P #10 Blueberry Quad (Japan: Fruit Quadrupel: 11% ABV)
Visual: Very dark brown to black. Thin bubbled rim rather than a head. Possibly a purple edged hue when held to the light?
Nose: Blueberry. Menthol. Blueberry liqueur. Blueberry cheesecake. Bourbon. Vanilla toffee. Coffee beans. Spiced chai. Thai seven spice.
Body: Bitter charring. Oolong tea. Thai seven spice. Blueberry. Earl gray. Bitter red wine. Malt chocolate. Cola bottles sweets.
Finish: Bitter red wine. Spicy red wine. Ear gray tea. Brown sugar. A drying air. Blackcurrants. Brown bread. Chocolate loaf bread. Peppery.
Conclusion: This is, interesting, omoshiroi (面白い) you mights says since we are in Japan, though from what I heard, used to describe food 面白い can have negative connotations. Does that apply here? Well, we shall get to that.
When I first did these notes I wrote “I would be interested to find out what wine barrel was used to age this as it has a very spicy red wine character – some could be attributed to the blueberries added, sure, but I wonder if the oak added some of that to it”. As mentioned in the background I later found out this was aged in ex Cabernet Sauvignon barrels, so definitely red wine, and a reasonable chance a quite spicy wine. Go me.
The blueberry and red wine notes mix dominate the main body and the finish. The aroma promises a more subtle blueberry range, but as soon as you hit the body a spicy vinous character absolutely dominates.
A pity then that the base quad really gets lost behind that. The mix of unusual ingredients and aging means you get a whole host of unexpected tea notes, from oolong to earl grey, but nothing bar the texture is discernable something I would call a Belgian quad. The closest it gets is a cola bottle sweets and brown sugar mix that hints at the rough edge sweetness you get with a good Quadrupel.
That is why i can only call it interesting rather than great. The heavy layered vinous notes, bitter wine, spice and fruit make for a hearty mulled wine mix of a drink, but a lot of the possibilities of a beer are lost, Which, for something as big as a quad beer, is a shame. As it warms you get a bready hint of a base beer here, but it never 100% shows.
A great show of those special ingredients, but you lose the beer with it.
Background: This was, yet another, beer grabbed from Tanakaya Liquor Store, seriously if you are a beer nut in Tokyo, visit it. A barrel aged quad made with added blueberries caught my eye as something worth spending some time with as something a bit different. Even better , looks like wild yeast was added during aging of this if I read the translation right (I used google translate I will admit, this went beyond my limited skills with Japanese). Y/B/A/P stands for Yorocco Barrel Ageing Program and they seem to have quite a range of beer in it. As I wrote the notes I wondered what sort of barrel aging was used – from that same translation “The wooden barrels used for barrel aging were given to us by Okunoda Winery in Yamanashi in 2015. French oak. At the winery it was finally used for Cabernet Sauvignon. After that, it was used for beer several times at Yorokko Brewery. “ and it sounds like the beer spent 12 months aging in the wood. So, something very interesting to try during my time in Japan.
