So as part of Arizona Beer Week I went out to World of Beer for a special event put on by Oskar Blues; they had a number of cool beers on tap. I ordered a flight of different variants of their imperial stout called Ten Fidy. Named for the alcohol content, 10.5%, they had four options on tap…Nitro Ten Fidy, whiskey barrel aged Ten Fidy, rum barrel aged Ten Fidy, and 2012 aged Ten Fidy. Frankly the nitro made everything soft and easy drinking, which is crazy for a beer of such high alcohol. The 2012 had a lot of bitter chocolate-like flavors. The whiskey barrel aged version was much more interesting, softer but full of delicious bourbon-like flavors, caramel, and vanilla. The rum barrel version went a step further still and had even stronger alcohol presence, but really fantastic sweet notes of molasses and brown sugar.
All together it was a pretty fantastic lineup. I went in specifically because I knew these beers would be on and the barrel aged versions did not disappoint.