To me had characteristics more similar to Barley Wine and had chocolate-raspberry overtones with a balanced malt/hop finish, whatever it was it was nice

This suffers from the same fate as a large majority of Canadian winter beers....the alcohol overpowers everything else Re -Rate Nov 28/06 Brown with no head. Unappetizing nose of tobacco and aluminum foil. Good malt profile with lots of brown sugar. Alcohol bite is masked considerably better than it used to be, a big improvement.

Fresh, in 2007 Very dark brown. Not much head in my ceramic Hacker mug but there never is with this beer. Aroma is light molasses with an earth accent and a hint of alcohol. Rich, with a thick syrupy toffee/earth character, a hint of chocolate and a boozy, woody finish. Nice balance. The biggest difference this year is the significant decrease in carbonation...that was a major peeve in recent years and they’ve worked it out. Now the malts show through much better and quite frankly it really comes across as the most eisbocky Hermannator I can remember. Past editions hovered around the 3.5 range.

2005 Vintage, aged 10 years. Pours dark brown, flat, with some sediment. Aroma of soy sauce, and some sweeter darker malts. Some richer soy sauce notes, but quickly these fade into not much...it is just sort of thin. Basically the impression I get is a thinner, hollowed-out version of fresh Hermannator. Definitely not worth aging, at least not this long. 2 6 5 2 9