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Barley wine is perplexing. It doesn’t contain any grapes, yet it is called wine, and it’s in the beer section of the liquor store. Unlike most beers, people are willing to pay a premium for old bottles with assigned vintages and age them for decades. The style is an anomaly — so big and packed full of ingredients that they usually take a few years to mellow out and taste their best. Many craft breweries roll out this gigantic style as a winter seasonal beer.

There are two styles of barley wine: the hop-crazy North American version, which is brash and bold when young, and then evolves into a cohesive, big, dry sipper. The British take on the style is malt-forward, with more vinous and Madeira-like notes, but still with ample bitterness. My cellar is well-stocked with both styles.

Barley wine originated in Britain, when the government raised importation taxes and tariffs on wine, making it too expensive for most people to buy. Seizing the opportunity, Britain’s brewers tried making beer so big and complex that it rivalled wine. Like some wines, these beers improve over time, growing more mature and mellow.

Three Alberta breweries currently have examples of this popular style on the market. These beers are winter warmers meant to take away the chill of old man winter, so pull out your brandy snifter, a good book, a big piece of Stilton, a spot by the fireplace and discover these big, contemplative beers.

Pick up a couple bottles of the featured examples to start your own beer cellar. For those wanting to explore the style or perhaps start building their own beer cellar, talk to the staff at your favourite liquor store about barley wines and other beers that improve with age. Cellaring beer takes patience, a little bit of beer knowledge and, most of all, willpower.

For those who want to learn more about cellaring beers, Willow Park Wines and Spirits is hosting “Build a Beer Cellar” on March 24, instructed by yours truly. You can taste aged examples of many big styles of beer right beside fresh samples.

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Barely wine sampler:

• Brewster’s Blue Monk Barley Wine, 9.9 per cent ($4.19 per 500ml bottle) — An unbelievable deal for the quality of this beer, and it’s even less if you buy a six-pack. This North American take on the style has been aged for a year and is now on tap at all Brewster’s locations. It currently tastes dry and peppery. Bottles are only available at Brewster’s locations.

• Alley Kat Olde Deuteronomy, 11 per cent ($3.23 per 341ml) — A World Cup gold medal winner and a North American hop-forward version that is very drinkable, but brash and a little rough when young. Delving into my own cellar, I drank the millennium vintage on New Year’s Day. This brew matures into a big, Madeira-like sipper with plenty of malt backbone.

• Wild Rose Barley Wine, 8.7 per cent ($10.07 for a 500ml bottle) — A second vintage by head brewer Dave Neilly that once again wows with a malt-forward British take on the style. This beer should age gracefully in a good cellar, into a port-like brew — if you can hold out that long. Sadly, Wild Rose’s marketing department has forgotten this is beer and has priced it like wine.