J.W. Lees Harvest Ale

1998 vintage. Deep purple with red hues and a thin beige head. Strong oxidized aroma with caramel, dates, and prunes. Sweet caramel taste with weird oxidized and burnt sugar notes. Kinda off-putting aftertaste. Didn’t age well.

9/17/08 - Bottle courtesy of santoslhalper, shared with Exec Board. Pours brown with rimming, egg shell head. Nose is caramel, molasses and brown sugar. The taste is much the same. This thing was the sweetest beer I’ve ever tried. I think it’s past its prime.

12 oz bottle

I almost wish I had held on to this for another year or two. Somehow hidden in a shipment to Chuck’s recently I decided to pick up a 1997 vintage. It’s not every day you get to try an eleven year old beer without having to age it yourself or pay more than $10. This seems like the sort of thing that you could buy when your kid is born, hold on to it until they turn 21 and still share an amazing beer.

Aroma / Appearance - The one finger oak colored head contrasted against the lively carbonation that soon fizzled out in the deep brown body. The nose was so rich that I could have spent all night admiring it before taking a taste. Mellow chocolate, caramel, wood and smoke chips formed an extremely complex and balanced symphony of pleasure.

Flavor / Palate - Thick and cream in the mouth as it is in the nose it was sad when this washed away down the throat. Like an expensive chocolate truffle with a woody aftertaste it went down smoothly. Balanced and virtually perfect I may have to buy another one if I can find room in the budget. The oily finish is more like a vintage wine than a beer. If this is what Thomas Hardy is like after ten years I will have to buy on and sit on it.

Hazy amber with floaters. Small but lasting tan head. Aroma: Caramel, dates, figs. Flavor: +Caramel, fruit, sweet, syrupy. Caramel finish. Not really complex but very good. I have had the 2001, 2002, and 2007 in August-September 2008. I am saving a 1999. It is difficult to rate what inproves with age.

2005 bottle. Pours thick & syrupy with no head and a fair amount of floaties, despite an effort to decant. Aroma is a sweet graininess with some sawdust-like smell. I also get some dried fruit and lots of alcohol. Flavor is sweet, boozy, and very malty. Mouthfeel is sticky, alcoholic, and puckeringly sweet. I’m not quite sure why this stuff is so highly thought of; many of its attributes are things that I’m not looking for in this or any other beer - grainy/cerealness, overpowering sweet maltiness, and smack-you-in-the-face alcohol flavor. I would not recommend this beer. I bought this bottle at Parti-Pak Discount Liquors in Indianapolis (probably Greenwood).