Vintage - 2008
alc/vol - 7.5%
price - $4.65 single/ $90 carton
I've been absolutely hanging out for this to be released so I could review it. Every year (almost) Coopers release the Extra Strong Vintage Ale, I have vintages going back to 2004 and I will review them all over the next few weeks to give you an idea what they look like with a few years age.
Based on the fantastic Chimay Grande Reserve (blue), the vintage ale has a secondary bottle fermentation, which means the beer gets stronger and more complex with age.
A fantastic golden brown colour with very little head when poured. A nice spicy fruit cake nose, with chocolate and mocha notes.
A fine bead when you first taste it, like the Eisenbahn beers the 7.5% alcohol doesn't seem apparent. I would really like to know what they have done differently to the last few vintages, this has a strange steeliness on the front palate, following through with more mocha and slight bitter finish. I can almost see a bit of asparagus green edge (which funnily enough I don't mind)
As always I'll be buying a carton to put in the cellar, but somehow I don't see this as being the best vintage I've tried of this beer. As I said before I'll pull a few bottles of old vintages out of the cellar and write a few reviews over the next couple of weeks.
Graham
1 comment:
Do you think it compares at all to chimay grand reserve? I can see how it tries, and I am a coopers fan, but I remain unconvinced.
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