Bells Eccentric Ale

Brewed by Bells Brewery
Style: Spice/Herb/Vegetable
Kalamazoo, Michigan USA

2000 vintage. This beer is a very eccentric, limited release beer, that is only brewed once a year, and can only be found on draught, and in a limited bottling run, at the Eccentric Cafe in Kalamazoo. A guest brewer is brought in every year to help Larry, and the recipe changes every year. The base beer is always a strong, old ale/barleywine, but over the years it has been spiced with a melange of fruits and spices, and always comes in at a warming 11% + abv. The 2000 Vintage of Eccentric Ale, which was co-brewed by Terry Farendorf of the Steelhead Brewing Company of Eugene, OR. Bell’s Eccentric Ale 2000 pours to a murky caramel brown color with slight tan head that fades, and a soft carbonation. The nose on this beer is wonderful with layers of complex malty, spicy, and hoppy aromas. Sweet malt, citric hops, spicy aromas, and peppery alcohol flood the nose. The palate is lush and full on the tongue with complex layers of flavors. Sweet and caramel malt flavors marry with hints of butterscotch, ripe fruit, orange, black pepper, and flavors of spice such as ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, glide over the tongue. Eccentric Ale finishes with more complex malty, fruity, and spicy flavors up front, then ends with a warming, peppery alcohol burn. There is so much going on in this beer, it truly is eccentric, and is one to sip and savor. As stated this beer is brewed in one batch, and is available only in December for a short time at the brewery. 12oz bottles of this beer can be purchased for $5, and the bottle run of this beer is very limited. Every year this beer is released on Eccentric Day which is held in December.

2004. Dark brown in color with ruby highlights and a thin, brown head that laces the glass nicely. Aroma has more going on than could possibly be listed. But spice, brown sugar, creme, and caramel dominate. I am a big fan of Fritz Maytag and the spiced Our Special Ale, but this blows every vintage of that away. The fat sweetness of the malt foundation is perfect for all of the spicing, alcohol, and hops within. Superb.

Opaque plummy appearance, dark and in-depth, slimmish foaming above...I can forgive small faults in this instance. Aroma is amazing, and unearthly, wafts out from cracking the crown...a complex mess of flavors to smell, here, but easily epitomized as barleywinish...brandy, cognac, berries, cherries, dates, spices, ...a little sour, but not much...hard to describe..twisted prunes on a bender..how’s that? Taste: oh, yes...ummm...whoa...doppel, no quadrupelbock, syrup, molasses, fruit, Johnson Brothers,...morass of a melange of a slick, sticky cherries and prunes, on a leather strop..grabs the tongue and rides it long and hard, kicks the sides, sets the spurs in...but gently...although I know the booze is high, here, it comes on as a cloud, and softly settles into the senses... ...gets comfortable in the mouth, but doesn’t pummel it...full flavored, but not destructive...this is astonishing, amazingly good...candyish, in the sweet, liquory effect...holy moly... I can only complain that this ought to be readily available, at the perfect age, and in plentiful supply...of course, and pardon me while I allow the pigs to fly out of my netherside portal. a lururious, luscious absolutely lovely ale...elegant...gorgeous...put this in a liter bottle with a fancy top and extragant bells and whistles, charge $50 a bottle, serve it to yuppies with too much money and tell them it’s cognac. I swear you’ll be successful. But be sure to invite me and give me a taste...this 12 ounce bottle left us too quickly...alas...poor Eccentric Ale, this world is not meant for one as beautiful as you... my glass is empty...poor, poor me...ah, well, life goes on, there are other beers, but not any such as this! Thank you, Larry!

Thick, syrupy sweetness. Lots of spices, pumpkin, caramel, vanilla. Lots of rich flavors going on. The ABV is not really noticed, just a nice warming going down. Excellent winter brew.

This is one great beer.

They've got citrus, hops, spice, caramel, etc. Amazing!!! You've got to try this one. If heaven were to bless alcohol other than wine it would bless this beer. Who needs food when you got this beer. So much flavor it lives up to Bell's excellence.

2003 draught. Well this weekend certainly made me rethink my ratings. A bells beer to beat batch 6000?? Come on. But it did. Put it to shame. This was awesome. Pure dark brown, with some deep orange tones. Lacing, and a small head that lingered. Smells of vinegar, rich malt, alcohol, raspberries?? definitely some piney hops and some oak. Begins with a big bittersweet malt flavor with the malt and hops being wedded together well. Huge amount of hops comes through in the middle, gets quite grapefruity. The finish was my favorite. Got extremely complex. Red fruits, caramel malt, alcohol soaked in oak, maple, brown sugar, cinnamon and finally a little dose of carbonation. Very full bodied. It’s all there. This one raises the ante on batch 6000. 2003 bottle aged 6 months. Wow, this is definitely as good as I remember. Huge extra full body still. Beer has not calmed down much, huge hops bitterness, stingingly large malt flavor. Needs a long nap still. Oh and the aroma is wonderfully complex with notes of maple, dark fruits, cinnamon, chocolate, alcohol and hops resin, but not quite as full as I would like.2003 bottle aged almost 18 months The vegetables or mint or whatever the leafy, green, herbal-like stuff they brew this with is really starting to show. Still an awesome pour, slight oxidation beginning to show. I think it could be cumin seeds. About 1,000 different things going on in this beer. Full body, very low carbonation, but not syrupy or unbalanced.
1997 bottle consumed 3/19/05 The spice really drives this beer now, with the body being quite oxidized and some thinning as a result. Still, the wonderful malting on this can be felt, even at this age. With much of the sediment out of solution, you can really see the dark raspberry/brown color to the body. Small, beige fizzy head. No alcohol apparency, some sugariness on the finish and plenty of complexity still exists. I find eccentric ale to be one of the most difficult beers to describe. Score reflects sort of a culmination/combination of how I feel about this beer as a whole, taking in to account the different experiences I have had with it.

A big thank you to StewardofGondor for this beer! 2004 vintage. It’s delicious! What an interesting herbal/spicy beer from Bell’s. As I’m typically a fan of their beers, I’m not surprised that I like this so much, but I’m surprised at its originality. Of course, I wasn’t expecting such a high alcohol content, and I now realize that its going to take me a very long time to finish this! Dark brownish red body, with a dainty off-white head. Heavily spiced aroma with green raisins and ginger. The flavor is bursting with luscious fruits and especially exotic herbs. Eccentric, yes; exotic, yes. Somewhat vinous and wine-like. Very chewy - great mouthfeel. I can’t believe I’m enjoying this at this very warm and muggy time of year, but Yum!