OHanlons Thomas Hardys Ale (vintage 2003 and later)

Brewed by OHanlons
Style: Barley Wine
Whimple, England

dark ruddy orangy glow.... no head... thin lacing. Aroma is warming with some alcohol... malts and a warm stewed fruits. The flavours are strong and warming and complex... I’m getting alot here... It has a sweet fruit wine tang to it on initial sip that flows back and warms the tongue and laces the bitters along the sides of it.... sounds sultry.... the body I have a hard time adjusting to ... very little carbonation and seems just flat and syrupy. Interesting... I will be cellaring this one.

Bottle from LCBO. I really didn’t like this one. But I will make sure to age the second bottle I bought for a long while. Very offensive to the palate. No carbonation and overly sweet. Brandy and rum on the tongue. For now, I will have to shake my head in disappointment.

2007 Edition. Deep brown, opaque. No head whatsoever. Smells sharp, cognac and sweet. Very young, obviously. This could certainly use some aging. I’ll be storing a bottle and re-rating in the future. Flowery and has a strong bite. Very complex, but I prefer a little more malts. I’ll age this a bit and see what develops.

Pours a murky murky brown, with no head, none. The aroma is dominated by sweet caramel, licorice. The flavours reflect the aroma, with a vintage port finish. The palate is nice and chewy, all the flavours come out and compliment eachother, but a little thin on carbonatoin. A very tasty brew non the less.

LCBO bottle sample- Pours murky brown, topped with a dusting of beige spider webs. Huge blast of burnt brown sugars open the initial whiff, caramel, butterscotch, lots of wood and spices, fig, candied prunes, malts, rye bread, I am sure the list goes on and on. The flavours are bold and upfront. It’s big on sweet caramel, toffee, malts, burnt sugar, cotton candy, a little wood, and molasses. Bitter and quite sharp in the finish. Very full bodied, and its quite tight and young. It certainly needs some age to mellow, and round out some aspects, but I’ve had American barley wines that tasted like this after several years of age. This one’s a keeper.

Wow. Color is perfect (dark not misty). No head. . .No foam at all. It -yet it still has a bite to the texture. Delicious sweet woody malt flavor slight hop bitterness . . .. Little bite of alcohol. Almost a barley wine meets a scotch ale.

Bottle. Vintage 2006 - bottle #48065. A rather clear ruby color with no head. A quite vinous aroma of malt, caramel, raisins, a bit of plums, notes of wood and some alcohol. Very sweet and malty flavor with brown sugar and some dark fruits. Finishes on a drier note with very subdued notes of hops and a slight alcohol burn. Medium to full body. Surprisingly for such a sweet ale, it grew on me more and more with every sip. A very good and quite complex beer (even at this young age). Let’s see how will this one do with some aging.

250ml bottle, 11.9% a/v 2007 vintage. Pours a very murky brown with pretty much no head at all. Smells like dar malt, apricots, and raisins. Tastes very alcoholic, with alot of dark notes, deep caramel, licorice, chocolate, slight coffee and spice. Full mouthfeel and a very deep warmth in the stomach from the alcohol.