Bells Batch 4000 Ale

Formerly brewed at Bells Brewery
Style: American Strong Ale
Kalamazoo, Michigan USA

This is one of those beers I never thought I’d get to try. HUGE thanks to Styles for this one. Pours a hazy amber color, with a small white head towards the edges. Aroma is like an aged american barleywine, fruits, caramel malts and a little bit of hop kick. Flavor is sweet, lots of fruit and tartness, witha malty kick towards the end to smooth it out. very nice!

Bottle courtesy of styles shared with jeffin7: Mostly opaque dark amber/brown body with a tiny light tan head that fades to a small ring. Aroma is grains, light butter, earthy hops, mild yeast, caramel syrup, light oxidation, toasted malt. Medium bodied, medium carbonation, slick, yet clean. Taste is light fruits (apple, pear, peach), sweet light malts (grains, biscuit, caramel), lightly spicy hops and malt.

Pours medium orange with a thin head. Aroma is those orange and black cheap halloween candies (yet it works fairly well), caramel. Flavor is sweet malts bordering on sticky sweet, those holloween candies, slight oxidied caramel/cardboard. Nice rich sipper.

Many thanks to walleye for parting with a bottle of this rarity! Murky orange-brown body with lots of yeast sediment, thin light cream head. Caramely, toasty aroma with subtle remnant hops, a bit oxidized. Mellow, full caramel and toast malty flavor with light buttery notes and hints of earthy hops, but these were mostly faded. Nice, tight carbonation for a five year-old beer. Still solid after all this time.

Incredible aroma of apples and other sweet flavors, namely caramel or syrup. I guess it was oxidation, but the almost cardboard-ish taste was mild and made the drink very smooth and pleasing. I would call it a "soft" beer. Smooth finish, almost like oil... Very glad my brother let me have half of an aged glass. GREAT beer.

Bottle pours a dark muddy caramel, large off-white frothy head, visible sediment sits stationary, soft carbonation, with quite attractive lacing.   For a five year old beer, it certainly looks good.   Unfortunately the nose isn’t as nice, overcooked vegetable and light butterscotch on the nose.   Certainly not what I expected.   If there was any hop presense, it is all gone now.   As it warms the alcohol becomes more noticable.   Flavor of diactyl and oddly enough, Tootsie Rolls!!!   Guessing this beer has already peaked.   Wow, damn Tootsie Rolls.   Body and mouthfeel are fairly medium, but I can see where it mighta been mighty fine back in the day.   Finishes with very soft caramel/toffee, but with that fake Tootsie Roll flavor lingering... blech.   Thanks goes out to jtw for giving me the opportunity to try this one!

Vinous aroma - cider vinegar and cardboard. Opaque orange-tan with plenty of yeast in suspension and shy white head that recedes to ring. Strong meaty, vinegary flavour with cardboard-like oxidation. Prickly carbonation. Very dry. Sadly this one seems to have been aged longer than it should have been. Tulip glass, just above fridge temp. Bottle sampled with ClarkVV, MartinT, muzzlehatch and Rastacouere.

New England Road Trip Easter ’05 with MartinT, tiggmtl and Rastacouere, beer #40. Sampled in our motel room, joined by the locquacious and sagacious ClarkVV. 12 oz bottle, 2000, provided by munificent Clark. Thick, yeasty amber-brown with huge floaty chunks...cider-vinegary nose with dry citric bits...sour, vinous body, apples and clay, some interesting brown sugar and maple separated out...too old or not stored that well, but still somewhat interesting.