Infected Bourbon County Barleywine 2015

The answer to that question totally depends on the cause of the issue, and if GI is able to identify it.

It could be from barrels, bottling equipment, adjuncts, bottles / caps and probably half a dozen other sources, so that it why it is really helpful if people tell Goose Island about it directly, and also provide as much info as they can (location purchased, bottle codes / date & time stamps, etc...) so they can narrow down the range.

Hopefully people are actually bothering to tell GI and not just bitch on here (I suspect many are just doing the bitching part) so they can find out what happened, make it up to people with those bad bottles, and fix it for next year.

I love bourbon county beers - so whatever the cause, and however limited or widespread it is, I want them to fix it so we can keep enjoying the beer in future years!

 

If we risk generalizing from the results of the poll I set up about what people do about undated beer, your suspicion will be right on the money.

 

Which I don't get. Goose's phone number and web address is on the back of the fucking bottle for god's sake. All mine have been awesome (coffee, BW, Regal, regular) but you can damn well guarantee if I got a gushing geyser of infected sour I would be keeping the bottle on the counter and giving them a call in the morning... Hell, just send them an email with a pic of the back label and 2 sentences about what happened - it takes barely a minute and you might actually get a resolution to your complaint!

 

I honestly had no idea what the number meant.
Cheers.

 

Good question...Overt sour fruit character, acetic/vinegary, very thin mouthfeel. Nothing at all like the case of 2013 I have finished, which was rich round and full bodied. I;ve been in and around craft beer for 20 years and hve logged thousands of beers on this and other sites, and have hombrewed for the last 4-5 years. Not a noob by any stretch.

 

Didn't question your expertise at all, just looking for additional details. I assume you've either called GI and logged this detail with them or emailed the same.

 

Not yet. when I've had a chance to try the others from this same run (I have 2 more) I'll make an informed opinion. But this seemed like the post to inform others of my experience.

 

They will have to put reasonable limits, but if you ask people to simply email a pic of the back label, and then take their word for it you could just limit it to one bottle per person and a $15 refund. There will be dicks who cash in, but not many people are going to bother if it is for just $15 unless they really did have a bad bottle.

The problem comes in with multiple bottles - nothing to stop someone saying they had 6 bad bottles. Given that the limits for almost everyone anywhere was 1 bottle per person, they could just quote that fact and have a limit of 1 refund for 1 bottle per person - if you have more than 1 bad bottle you need to return the bad ones (and your unopened ones) to the point of purchase for a refund.

It is pretty ridiculous to claim you opened 6 bottles one after the other, and the first 2 were infected, but you powered through and checked all 6... Most reasonable people would have stopped after the first 2 or 3 and called GI or the store they got them at to get a refund.

 

Hmm... have opened 2 of our 6... and distinctive cherry/light tart taste. Not offensive... but not what it should be, unfortunately.

 

Sort of unrelated, but the one I opened, while not infected, tasted more like watered down bcbs than barleywine. I much prefer 13 and 14.

 

I'd imagine that GI has more detailed batch logs than what goes onto the bottle, at least that's how I works in other food industries. If they can narrow it down to certain dates they should be able to check their records, narrow the field of what barrels/blends to suspect and move that forward to come up with a list of other possibly suspect bottles.

To be honest... I doubt I will follow up with GI if mine are infected. My free time during the first 3rd of the year is wayyyyy too precious to spend any of it on hold with GI customer service. Sad but true.

Now, if my Rare ends up infected.... they will be hearing from me!

 

LOL, nobody has ever accused me of being reasonable! I opened all six of my coffees (discussed in another thread, four were gushers; one sour; one delicious), took photos, saved all the remnants, logged the results and sent GI an email last night with a follow-up phone call today. Nice gal, asked a bunch of questions and said she'd follow up. Hopefully that's the case, would like to hear what they find out.

 

Well there you go - you powered right through! If you end up coming on Friday to the bottle share I have a 7th bottle in the fridge we could have a go at. Was going to drink it this week, but I can probably wait... maybe... I mean, the chances aren't zero...

 

No pattern in the data in this thread:
10/28 1219 - Bad
10/28 1220 - Good
10/28 1456 - Bad
10/28 1523 - Good
10/28 1608 - Bad
10/28 1800 - Good
10/28 1836 - Good
10/29 0839 - Bad
10/29 1626 - Good

 

Just opened this, not a gusher carbonation and look is perfect, However the smell is like opening a can of cherries to put in a baked cherry pie, that smell is not awful but its not what i want in BCBBW, the nose went right to the taste , the fruited cherries overwhelmed this BW, no toffee, no malts and most of all no signature GI Barrel aged Bourbon , the fruit masked this signature piece that we pay a premium $ for and wait in line for so sad/dissapointed in this.

 

I didn't buy any GI BC beers, so I have no skin in this game, but I am very curious to see how Goose Island/AB-InBev handles this. As pointed out by @cavedave and others it's certainly not the first time a craft brewer had a QA/QC problem with a major beer release, but it is the first time it has happened to one of AB-InBev's craft brewery acquisitions [that I'm aware of]. I'm sure they are busy gathering data and working on a public response as we speak. AB-InBev certainly has the capacity to do a lot to make this right by customers, but to what extent they are willing to go will be interesting.

 

Cracked open one of my bottles last night. No gushing but had the mildest, almost tart cherry taste/smell to it. Was still an enjoyable brew, even if seeming a bit off, but don't recall this quality in previous years.

 

I knew there was something wrong with my bottle, there was a tangy substance that was not there the previous years. I still have 1 bottle and I'm not really satisfied with it.

 

Since GI dealt with a few infections prior to the ABI acquisition it will indeed be interesting to see if they handle this in much the same way as when it was just GI, or what differences, if any, there will be.

 

Just checking in, opened my bottle a few minutes ago. It fizzed a bit in the bottle neck but can't tell anything off with the flavors. Tasting very good...... 28OCT15, 1136. Cheers!