Harveys Imperial Stout

2000 vintage. pours thick black with a minimal brown head. very strange aroma for an imperial stout. sweet nutty banana bread with some coffee and alcohol. flavor sweet and fruity with bit of roasted bitterness. full thick body with a nice lingering dry finish. interesting imperial stout. i have never had one that is this fruity.

Bottle. 2001 version. Creamy light brown fair mostly deminishing head. Black colour. Very powerfull and complex aroma. I sensed rasin, vaniolla and grass. Powerfull good flavor of chocolate caramel and licorice. Very wine-like beer. Fantastic palate.

Blackish colour with a small creamy brownish head. Notes of licorice and port. Complex taste of spices, licorice, malts and port.

2001 vintage poured into an English pint glass. I had a devil of a time pulling the cork...nearly gave myself a brain hemorrhage. Also it was dry and crumbly- an ominous sign. Poured tarry black and developed only a few scattered dark bubbles of a head. This one smelled more like wine than any other beer I’ve ever tried. I’ve never had sherry, but I wondered if this is the "sherry-like" flavor of oxidation. I also noticed a slightly smoky aroma of roasted/ dried beef. There was barely a hint of carbonation, and the alcohol warming sensation was evident. This beer reminded me of a thick, slightly smoky wine, and I despise most wines, so that’s why I rated it so low. I will admit that I may have had a bottle that was past its prime, but at that cost I’m not going to try another.

Dry, alcoholic, sour grape aroma with some tiny note of black licorice. Some roasted, dark caramel in the body, but the finish is what gets me: there is a strange, Buddig ham meat flavor in it. Hard to believe or describe, but hezron mentioned a beef jerky flavor, so I don’t think I’m totally crazy. Thanks to Brigadier for this treat. It was more complex than I expected, which was a nice surprise.

Medicinal chocolate aroma with a hint of iodine. Looks like a deep black oil that sucks in the light like a black hole. Spicy, chocolately first impression with a sourness and bitterness that soon fades. Roasted coffee beans and cabernet soon follow. The finish is dry and smooth and doesn’t kill the palate. Unusual and distinct.

2001 vintage. Pours jet black with absolutely no head. This beer has a funky flemish sour aroma. You would never believe this is a stout from the aroma alone. The aroma is more like a wine than a beer, with the sour grapes and only a touch of licorice malty aroma. With its dark color, you would think this was balsamic vinegar. The flavor is incredibly complex. There is an initial sourness that is also just a bit sweet, with a bitter finish. I swear it tastes like a cross between an imperial stout and a flemish sour. Gotta give it props for the unusual taste. The texture, however, is terrible - very oily with hardly any carbonation. Overall, this is a strange beer - great, intense and complex flavor, but everthing else about it sucks.

2001 vintage. Pours a dark black with a thin head than dissapears almost instantly...little to no carbonation. Aroma is like sourdough bread and vegitable soup. The flavor has a vegitable broth,sherry, and sour taste...not very pleasant...more like a vegitable/spiced beer than an imperial stout...nothing much besides the appearance reminds of the style at all. There’s an absence of maltiness, sweetness...just salty, sour, and bitter.