Goose Island Amps Up Bourbon County Brands For Black Friday Release

I will just say Central Wisconsin. I am friends with the owner of the liquor store and do not want to get anybody in trouble. The way I understand it is that he told the distributer it shouldn't go on sale until Black Friday and the distributer told it was OK to sell it now.

I also heard that the allocations have changed this year. Stores had to sell all Goose Island product and not just the seasonal or rarer beer to get bcbs allocations. A couple liquor stores are ticked off because they were not told this earlier and chain grocery stores with a liquor dept. will be getting bcbs this year but not the liquor stores.

 

Just to reiterate what others have already said: the same Bourbon County recipe they have been making for at least a decade* goes into the barrels every year. It's an 11%-11.5% stout, the abv variation being entirely natural for a beer of that strength...it's very difficult even for brewers as consistent as Goose Island to make a beer that strong come out to the same alcohol percentage every batch.

What actually comes out of the barrels will vary even more greatly every year. Variables include how quickly they were able to get the barrels (that is, was the time between bourbon and beer a few days or a few months?), the quality of the barrels themselves, how long they sat in the barrels, the humidity of the barrel room and what the ambient temperature in the barrel room was, among other variables.

And to further elaborate the point: there were two batches of BCBS 2013 and they each had different alcohol contents (one was 14.2%, the other was 14.9%).


*they've been making BCBS since 1992 but I'm not sure if the recipe has changed at all since 2004, it's been the same at least since then

 

Yup, that's the article I saw.

 

I can't speak for this year's base beer, as I didn't have it yet, but I did have Vanilla Rye and a nitro version of BCBS, and both are (unsurprisingly) fantastic. I'm sure others who were at FoBAB will back this up, but there shouldn't be too much worry about quality on these badboys.

 

I'll reply here if I find any

 

Perhaps. Last year, we got 1 or 2 cases to each store of Backyard. I'm not sure if Vanilla's numbers are lower than this, but even at 1 case per store, that's still pretty crappy.

 

Glad to hear this but I'm sure it's not making its way to CA

 

Maybe not the right place to ask but can anyone shed any light on how this release goes down in Chicago? I've heard that Binny's allocates 3 bottles per person and you pick whichever 3 you want, whereas other stores have varying methods of releasing whatever BC products they receive. I may find myself in town on Friday and I'm not sure if this is a 4elf type thing where you're in line all night or do folks just arrive an hour or two before the store opens? Any info from people who have been in Chicago for the release would be appreciated.

 

“Unfortunately, Coffee and Vanilla Rye will not be available in Colorado. While we have been working to increase capacity – we have focused that on the base Bourbon County Stout. Excitement has continued to grow for BCS in Chicago, as well as the rest of the country. We need to make sure that we are taking care of our home market.”

http://brewtallyinsane.com/2014/11/18/goose-island-bourbon-county-brand-stout-colorado-update/

 

DAMN.....Hope CA gets better news, sorry for your loss

 

Go check out the Binny's thread in the Great Lakes forum. You'll need to be there around 6AM or slightly earlier if the timing stays the same. Allocations to customers will be determined dependent on how many people are in line.

 

California is getting variants, not exactly positive on prop at the moment. Very very limited supply of barrels are making it to the entire oc area of bw and coffee. Vons/pavilions is also allocated bcbs for Black Friday.

 

I know absolutely nothing, but I can grantee CA does not see prop. Hope you're right about the rest...

 

Where in ca are you ?

 

Santa Cruzish

 

Ah can't help ya out finding them up there.

 

Prop is Chicago only

 

I've had the entire lineup already and must say that it has affected the beer quite a bit. If you really like the heat you will be disappointed, but I found them all still very enjoyable. I might add that coffee seemed much weaker this year than in past years. If you can get a hold of Prop, do it! Might be the best beer I've ever had.

 

What did you personally think of the vanilla rye?

 

With upping their storage space for the barrel aged program, and the ability to pump out even more expensive beer, was it really necesary to hike the prices like this? I could see a couple bucks but no way $7 each 4-pack and bomber!

And then to hear that the final product is not up to snuff with years past.... Wow!