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My favorite local Eugene brewery Oakshire has been delving into single batches and barrel-aged beers lately.  One of my favorites so far is the Heart-shaped Box… a barrel-aged espresso stout with cherries, cocoa nibs and vanilla beans.  Freakin’ wondrous. Well, they’re going to start bottling and releasing some of their barrel-aged creations under the moniker “HELLSHIRE.”  The first one hits May 7th at 8am, the morning after the Sasquatch Brewer’s Dinner:

Hellshire I – barleywine aged in bourbon barrels

The official press release on Hellshire I…

For 10 months, it has rested quietly and now it is time for it’s triumphant unveiling!!

Our new line of barrel aged beers, dubbed The Hellshire Series, will have it’s first release with a grand party on Saturday May 7th beginning at 8AM. A limited number of bottles will be sold in 22 ounce, wax dipped bottles for $15 each. Along with live, local music, we’ll have complimentary coffee and we will have a local food cart on site cooking up breakfast sandwiches. Oakshire beers will be sampled and sold along with the last of the Heart Shaped Box and any other goodies we can dig out of the cooler. Come and have brunch at Oakshire Brewing!

Hellshire I is a bourbon barrel aged barleywine. It is 10% abv and spent 10 months in Heaven Hill Bourbon Barrels. Notes of vanilla, coconut and bourbon intertwine with the complex malt and hop flavors. We’ve bottle conditioned it, so enjoy it now, or store it in your beer cellar for months.

Hellshire, our barrel aged beer program, is currently underway and growing. With an inventory of 50 barrels, we’ve got plans for wild (sour) beers, bourbon aged beers, gin barrel aged beers and more. We expect someday to be able to release 3-4 unique barrel aged beers per year, but for now we’ll wait until the beer tells us it is ready. All of the Hellshire beers will be released in bottles in limited quantities at the brewery.

I’ll be camped out at 8am… despite the brewer’s dinner the night before.  It’ll be a fun morning… I’m looking forward to more bottled goodness, and maybe the Heart-shaped Box bottles will rise up one of these days.

Related Sidenote: Love Oakshire’s beers?  Wanna try a warm weather treat?  How about an Overcast espresso stout float.  Yum!

~Dan – np: Radiohead – The King of Limbs