Bottle pours a light orange amber with a small white head. No real lacing. Aroma is a smoked bacon flavor. Seriously...it smells like BACON. Not sure if beer is suposed to smell like this. But its good. Flavors are smokey and meaty. That the best I can describe it. Just not sure a beer should taste like that. Smoked Salmon. Delicious but wierd. Thanks to HerferyyDiferyDorferyDirptyDork for sharing this one

Bottle Pours a hazy peach/apricot color with a small but fine head of white that settles to a thin ring that generates spotty thin lacing. Aroma is sweet and fruity. Like melons or apricots. Flavors are a dry earthy musty floral flavor. Very soft carbonation and a mild plain finish. Pleasant and interesting. Thanks to HerFtyDrf for sharing this one.

2000 bottle consumed 11/04. Thanks to Mike (eydrinkale) for the bottle. Wow. Amazingly murky pour, looks like melted caramel with some toffee mixed in. Light beige head, obviously unfiltered and bottle conditioned. . . .which means, this has aged spectacularly! You can sense it as soon as you smell it; light yeast, dates, peaches, raisins, chewy caramel, a touch of earth and plenty of wonderfully rich toffee/malt feel. Flavor is full, body is medium-full and this thing just pours on the good qualities. Chewy and rich, but yet balanced and not overbearing. Caramel, figs, toffee, raisins. If you mixed a Harvey’s Elizabethan with Old Numbskull, I’d imagine it to turn out something like this. Wonderful qualities from the yeast (phenols and a dusty vintage quality). At four years old, the flavor hasnt suffered. I left a glass of this out overnight and in the morning, the body was as strong as ever. Fantastic!! English barleywines are truly divine!

2001 bottle consumed Feb 2005 Yikes, it’s amazing to see the changes in just one year. Sourish lactic notes, much higher alpha hops than the 2000. More loose of a body, with less fruity yeast. Bitter roast astringency, heavily thin on the finish. 6/5/5/2/11
Final score is an average of the two.

Deep black, no head. Looks like oil, but not as thick as I had anticipated. Bitter hints of chocolate malts in the nose, lots and lotsa of roasted, toasted, something-or-others. Taste is yummy...

2004 Draught @ BBF. Dark yellow color, with some beige and oranges swirling about. Quite clouded with little to no head. Aroma of stiff, pungent alcohol, lightly sour yeast and a strongly bitter citrus presence. Flavor is sweet and yet sour, with tons of yeast, a stiff, large, malty body. Notes of dark fruits abound, with a big bitter citrus attack balanced by a large sweet malt presence. What’s not balanced is the alcohol presence, which is intense and burning. It’s an interesting sipper, but it gets too sweet and alcoholic. Delicate this is not.

2004 draught@BBF. Good moderately dark pour, woody brown and deep yellows mix, lightly hazy with a small yellow head. Aroma of light wood, balsamic vinegar and a hint of brown sugar. Flavor is tremendously to style, with plenty of cedar, balsa and vinegar notes. Dry on the finish, with a light yeast apparency. Has lightly sweet brown malts up front, with just an immense deep wood feel on the end. Balsa wood lingers forever. Medium bodied, not terribly sour, more a moderate bitterness in the middle/end. Notes of tobacco, brown sugar and light toffee.

2004 draught @ BBF. Following up another spiced beer (Offshore Rye Not) with this proved to be a great comparison. This one was much more balanced with what seems a big sweet gale and rosemary body, mixed with a lightly sweet malt. Dull pale yellow, small white head, mostly cloudy. Light fruit notes mix with a dose of alcohol. Not overly astringent, and not overly sweet, I like it, but I would like to see some more yeast apparency. Smells very herbalesque, with spicy yeast notes, almost like a trippel.

2004 bottle from Eyedrinkale. Pours a deep bronze, auburn and golden color, hazy and bottle conditioned apparently. Huge white head. Aroma of charred paper, smoked salmon, burnt grease, light spiciness from the yeast and a firm sweet malt. Flavor is superbly smokey at the start, with a nice even applewood smoked bacon. Immediately following this are some crisp moderately bitter hops. Wow, that caught me by surprise, I didnt smell any hops. Adds a nice layer and then we get the sweet honey and nut malt. Caramel and dough mix together with the smoke to create a full flavor. Body is medium-full. If you think the smoke dominates this one, you’d be outraged at Aecht Schlenkerla. In my opinion, the smoke does not dominate this one at all. I like to taste the smoke up front and throughout, which you can, but there is ample sweet malt to balance it and a moderate dose of alcohol on the finish. The alcohol is probably a bit overdone, and the malt gets quite sweet and strong as this has warmed, but all in all, this is very well-made. Strikes a balance somewhere between Spezial Rauchbier Lager, Christoffel Blonde and St Georgenbrau Kellerbier.

An amber beer with a disappearing white head. The aroma contains hops, malt, and some alcohol. The flavor contains a lot of alcohol, but also malt, fruit, and spices while the body is strong.

A black beer with a brown disappearing head. The aroma is of chocolate and butter with hints of hops. The flavor is sweet with notes of caramel and coffee, leading to a dry hoppy end.