White Chocolate possibly infected; Patrick Rue responds

That's really cool. I would insist on returning it though...does any of us need an extra case of Bruery beers? I'm bursting at the seams Lol

 

Just have to add another data point. Had the 13 WC yesterday. No gusher, no tartness, no way I even thought about draing pouring it. Sounds like this issue could be pretty intermittent.

 

Yep. Just cracked my first. Tart, green apple, with a hint of the chocolate. Bottled 6-17-13.
NOTHING like last year's. As it warmed, it became very sour and puckering.

 

It absolutely is intermittent. I have opened 2 dated 6/18. First one was disgusting and I emailed the Bruery (before this thread confirmed my fears) about possible infection. Second one was better, but still not nearly as good as '12

 

Sounds like people need to wait instead of jumping to conclusions. Just the tip friends: Patrick Rue well take care of your White Cocholate.

 

Cracked another WC last night, dated 6-18-13. Drain pour. Even worse than the 6-17-13.

 

I have two 6/18s, I don't know what the previous 2 bottles were, they were long gone before I realized I should have checked the dates.

 

Just got an email back from Matt and said they will be sending out a mass email and facebook post within the next 2 days..

 

Soon!

 

Opened my first bottle of '13 WC last night. Aroma was not as prominent as I had remembered, but there was still a hint of sweet vanilla and bourbon.

The flavor stared off right, with big notes of vanilla, toffee, and bourbon barrel sugars, but midway through the sip, a distinct tartness crept in and ruined the experience. The finish is dry, boozy, and sour, which abrasively and abruptly kills any pleasantries in the first part of the sip.

No bueno. The missus and I each made it through half a glass before dumping the rest of the bottle.

Paaaatriiiiiick, you got some 'splainin to dooooooo!

 

Hi All--

After further testing and sensory (i.e. sampling many bottles), we believe that White Chocolate 2013 meets our standards for flavor and stability and we will put it back on sale in our Tasting Room and TheBrueryStore.com today.

This is a bit different of a beer from White Chocolate 2012-- lower sweetness, drier, more effervescent, with a slight tartness. In our extensive “tastings”, we didn’t find any bottles that significantly deviated from one another. Additionally, for all of the bottles sampled, alcohol and pH were within a close range and are relatively unchanged in the several months since the beer has been packaged.

We understand that many of the people who purchased this year’s vintage of White Chocolate were expecting a flavor profile which would more closely match last year’s batch, and we realize that many of our customers invested in numerous bottles under this assumption. While we believe that the beer is still delicious and worthy of savoring, we’d like to make amends to those who have already purchased this beer and feel that this beer fell significantly short of expectations. Please eMail [email protected] and indicate whether you purchased it through TheBrueryStore.com or in our Tasting Room, the date of purchase, and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can.

Cheers,
Patrick
The Bruery

 

I'd hug The Bruery if it was at all possible. Class act brewery.

 

Awesome. I liked the beer, so I won't be sending an e-mail, but very cool to offer something just for vintage variation.

 

Excellent news, and makes me much more comfortable going forward about buying Bruery beers in advance.

 

Now that's good PR, PR.

 

Classy.

 

Still extremely cautious/nervous about the 4 I ordered. Remember exactly ZERO tartness last year and the words "drier, effervescent, and lower sweetness" paired with pictures of gush-bombs don't exactly increase my optimism. Does increase sad though as I was the guy holding the "White Chocolate #1" foam finger last year.

Also still wondering where "white oak sap is supposed to be tart" came from. Never had a Bruery beer containing it that I would describe as anywhere near tart. Oh well.

A class act offering to make amends though. Thinking I'll go that route rather than risk getting 4 bottles of gross shipped to me.

 

If future Bruery beers based on White Oak Sap are this tart, I'm going to totally fucking regret joining Hoarders for next year.

The two WC bottles I've opened already were shared with non-beer geeks who were totally turned off by the tartness. I will open another this weekend to share with a couple of beer geek friends. If this bottle turns me off as much as the 1st two, I'll email the Bruery about that 3rd bottle along with the unopened 4th.

 

Hmmm, ordered 6. 1 was gross, 1 was less gross but nowhere near '12. It's like Russian roulette with the 4 left I guess

 

I'm emailing about all my bottles because the tartness is awful in these. '12 was amazing, but '13 was just a huge disappointment.

Echoing the statements about avoiding this tartness issue in future blends as well. That would be a huge disappointment for me.