A short resume
Another year has passed. Looking back, is like it was almost normal, but we need to keep our feet in the ground and still accept that things are not like they used to be before. The pandemic situation still affects us and people around us, but the best we can do is to continue brewing beers and doing our jobs with passion.
2021 started slowly, we gathered our forces and hoped for the best. The first beer released of the year was a “naked” Quadrupel, or our most famous barrel aged beer, but this time in a version that was simple and plain without the maturation in the wooden barrels. A rich and intense beer of 10.3%, that helped us accommodate through the cold winter days.
The second release of the year was a long awaited one, as we described it at that time, our second collaboration with Wicked Barrel brewery, was a beer that reminded us of the times before, See the light armagnac barrel aged for one year, a beer brewed just before the pandemic came. 11.5% and a playful, aromatic, dense beer with a blast of chocolate. The duality is always the answer, it does not matter if you are enticed by the light or by darkness.
We kept our optimism at a high level, releasing in April another barrel aged beer, a new version of Quadrupel aged in bourbon barrels, but with a base of rye malt. And yet again, 12% of pure joy. We continued with a reinterpretation of the famous italian caffe corretto, also in a Quadrupel, by adding star anise and espresso. Yes, we do have a thing for strong beers, we can’t help it.
We were expecting some sort of festivals and beer events for the beginning of the summer, but unfortunately, again, they were canceled, so, we needed to take everything in our own hands, and we decided to do the first beer event after almost two years, the launching of a new range, Oriel Wild Ales. As you all know us by now, we like to play a lot with different yeast strains, brettanomyces in particular.
And with the help of White Labs, we fermented our first mixed fermentation beers, Cuvée Nora and Cuvée Lisa. The first real sour and funky beers of our range in new bottles, new labels, new glass, everything done by the book. The beers launch event was like a breath of fresh air after all that time, The Beer Institute, our hosts, helped us with their location and we were happy to toast a glass with friends and beer aficionados.