Old Ale, also known as Stock Ale or Keeping Ale, is a style of English beer, often of high original gravity, featuring complex flavors produced by long aging, often in wood. This style was also traditionally known in England as Strong Ale, although that term is now also used both to refer to a separate style of unaged beer as well as a generic term for Imperial beer styles and other strong beer styles.

Old Ales, contrary to expectation, do not have to be especially strong: they can be no more than 4% alcohol, though the Gale’s and O’Hanlon’s versions are considerably stronger. Neither do they have to be dark: Old Ale can be pale and burst with lush sappy malt, tart fruit and spicy hop notes. Darker versions will have a more profound malt character with powerful hints of roasted grain, dark fruit, polished leather and fresh tobacco. The hallmark of the style remains a lengthy period of maturation, often in bottle rather than bulk vessels. Old Ales typically range from 4% to 6.5%.

Old Ale recalls the type of beer brewed before the Industrial Revolution, stored for months or even years in unlined wooden vessels known as tuns. The beer would pick up some lactic sourness as a result of wild yeasts, lactobacilli and tannins in the wood. The result was a beer dubbed ‘stale’ by drinkers: it was one of the components of the early, blended Porters. The style has re-emerged in recent years, due primarily to the fame of Theakston’s Old Peculier, Gale’s Prize Old Ale and Thomas Hardy’s Ale, the last saved from oblivion by O’Hanlon’s Brewery in Devon.

Other examples are Fuller’s Vintage Ale & pictured here is Great Lakes Nosferatu Stock Ale.