Every year, nearing the end, I would go on my lone hunt for London's "other Pride" (other than "London Pride") - "Fuller's Vintage Ale" - released that same autumn, which has been an "institution" amongst Ale lovers for 12 years now. No exception two months ago: I hunted it down from my local Waitrose. As if to compensate for the "action-less" Boxing Day (no mood & no-where for shopping), I conducted a "one-man vertical tasting panel" for the 2000 and 2008 versions of this Vintage Ale. Both are sublime, as you'll find from the following tasting notes - you'll hate to miss it, even if you're not such a BIG fan of British Ales!    

* Basic Information:

2000 Vintage (00): purchased at the Fuller's Brewery Shop, No. 56359, BBE 2003, alc. strength unspecified, bottle-conditioned; coming in the nicely presented gift box and a brown bottle of 568ml. Using 1999 Champion Optic malted barley, served in a wine glass.

2008 Vintage (08): purchased at the Waitrose supermarket, No. 02964, BBE 2011, at 8.5%abv., coming in the same nicely presented gift box but in a smaller bottle (500ml). Using Challenger, Northdown hops and Maris Otter malted barley, served in the same wine glass as (00).

* Appearance:

 (00): 4/5 translucent, dark reddish-russet in colour, with a slowly dissipating off-white creamy froth, and next-to-static carbonation - looking quiet and truly "vintage"~~

(08): 4/5 clear, dark amber to light copper, coming with a quickly disappearing white foamy head on top of very mild but constant streams of tiny carbonation - looking very healthy for a young vintage ale!

* Smell:

(00): 4.5/5 the smell comes akin to a super thick barley wine - oily barley candy comes with honey comb and bite of overripe fruits that is slightly apple-ly as well as melon-ish, with hints of marmalade; a swirl brings out smooth hints of well-aged brandy mixed with elegant syrupy red grapes (pineau-wine-like!), while the alc. touch comes at the minimum throughout. Overall, well-settled and rounded, gearing towards the sweet side at the expense of hoppiness; but for a well-aged ale, this is so... enticing and I can't ask for more...

(08): 4.5/5 marvellous aroma, much lighter than a 8.5%abv. Barley wine "should" be like and showing a richer presence of hop aroma - the gristy, aromatic pale malts and caramelised sugar are nicely balanced by the almost piney and oily hops, lemon-blossom honey, fat raisins, on top of random berry jam (even strawberry here!), and an unique edge of earthy, pungent, but also citric Challenger hops... Compared with (00), the aroma here is more lively and "dancing in the air", with loads of fresh hop elements to boot.

* Taste:

(00): 5/5 the foretaste comes honey-ish, flowery, raisiny & date-ish, plus hints of melon-paste and dried figs; then an incredibly delicious & aromatic Chinese tea and lovely vintage-sherry take over, scattered with dryish nutty hints of (maybe?) roast malts... slightly dry and faintly spicy/peppery in the finish, with a surprisingly clean-textured but deep-running flow of bitter hops... In the aftertaste, the fruity undertone of apple- and tangerine-liquor seems to outlive the other elements, rendering a beautifully fruity finish to go with the lubricating bitter-sweetness of malts and herbal hops.

(08): 4.5/5 deliciously sweet-tea-ish, aromatic and rounded from the start, hinting at black-tea-syrup, caramely malts, well-mixed dark-berry fruitiness, with a texture that is chewy but always balanced by mellow-textured bitterness that gradually expands along with a melon-ish, aromatic finish, where a very low level of alc. stays in the deep rear of the tongue, along with Sauternes-like lemony-honey undertone and more bitter-sweet aromatic malts.

* Mouthfeel:

(00): 5/5 sublime on the palate, the carbonation is the finest and most subtle I've ever encountered for any bottle-conditioned beer, flowing ever so smoothly almost like a "spongey" platform to carry through the rounded, complex flavour...

 (08): 5/5 as superb as (00), in a totally different way that plentiful microscopic fizziness flows endlessly onto the palate but always in the most soothing manner. The potentials for ageing are tremendous, maybe even more so than the 2007 vintage that I've found the most interesting since 2005.

* Overall:

(00): 5/5 superb vintage ale, mellowed for so many years and it's still on TOP form! Cracking booze! Almost the best English vintage barley wine I've ever had. It's a pity that this bottle was the last one I could find at the Brewery Shop - the rest maybe at a sky-high price on E-bay?

  Yau (25/01/09)