Kane Brewing (September 2017)

Carefully opened my first a few minutes ago, from my fridge about 37 degrees. Used and old school pry opener. Nothing at first, then slowly the foam started to rise. So I stuck a wine stopper in and let it sit for 5 mins. When pulled the stopper still a slow rise; poured first glass and everything is great. I suspect "gushing" was temperature related.

 

BTW drinking great though not getting any pepper at all. I have never had this beer but someone above mentioned that they thought that the peppers used this year are different than in the past and she/he thinks it is milder this year. In response Glenn L said that they've been using the same type of peppers every single year. That does not necessarily mean that the spice is going to be the same though. Could be a less spicy batch of the same style of pepper I guess.

Either way definitely a great beer. But I must say I do not quite understand people that chase whales. At 17 or 18 bucks for the 750 this beer is good. If I paid a multiple of that too get my hands on it I would be severely disappointed. But frankly I could say that about any beer. There is great beer everywhere nowadays despite the market being flooded you can always find the gems. If someone is trading or paying a premium for any Kane beer frankly it should be sneakbox. That beer is heady topper level

 

So I guess if I want to have a chance at the leftover bottles, I should go and line up some time today and just camp out? ....

Just had my last bottle of Mexican Brunch from last year a few weeks ago and the pepper is very subtle... but that is how its supposed to be. Personally I prefer this to the in your face spiciness of something like Mexican Cake but can understand a preference either way depends on tastes!

At 18 bucks a bottle I will gladly purchase 2 bottles if I have the chance. I refuse to over pay though in the secondary market that is just crazy. I saw people listing the bottles for upwards of $100 and can not believe people are actually paying that...

 

Corrected me if I'm wrong but I believe they use ancho chilies which are not as spicy but give a smokey flavor. At least that is what I remember from last year

 

Yes, Glenn has said this a handful of times here whenever Mex Brunch is brought up. He said they always use Ancho and they add them for the smokiness not the heat. Granted every pepper is different so its possible one year there was more "heat" than another, but that isn't the intention for the addition of the Ancho Chiles

 

Cracked a bottle on Saturday. No gush, but I also put the bottle in a ice filled cooler in the car when I left the brewery. Not much of any pepper. It honestly reminded me of 2016 Sunday Brunch, which is a good problem to have.

 

I think the gushing issue might actually have to do with the bags they were in. I have a bag like that at home and whenever I use it to bring a few bottles somewhere, they almost always clank together like once or twice, which invariably causes them to gush whenever I get where im going and open them.

 

Plausible, but I know at least the BBA morning and evening bell were sold in those bags, haven't heard of ant gushers.

Was SB and regular MB sold in those bags this year?

 

Sunday Brunch was in the red bags. Not sure on MB.

 

Morning Bell wasn't, they were selling it in case boxes b/c the limit was a case. BA MB/EB might not have "clanked" since those bottles were smaller and everyone only got 2 of each, kind of makes sense.

I've put all my Mex bottles in the fridge, I have my co-worker one today, let him know about what some people said and what Mike/Glenn said as well. Haven't opened any of mine, but I will report back once I do

 

I've opened two without issue so far. They went right into a cooler after picking them up and then into the fridge when I got home. The heat is definitely more subtle compared to last year but it was still great.

 

Really? wtf

 

yeah, wave tank fell off a cliff. it got really malty and then just bad, very BAD.

 

Hey just an update from Michael on what's going on after looking into everything a little more:

Over the weekend we became aware of some incidents of Mexican Brunch bottles foaming when opened. We take any potential issues regarding quality seriously and so starting Monday morning we began investigating the issue to determine whether there was a problem. As with all our bottled and canned beers, Mexican Brunch went through a series of laboratory tests to detect any beer spoiling contaminants in the tank and once again in the package - all of which came back negative prior to its release.

Our first step was to re-run all those tests yesterday to confirm that the beer was negative—which it is. We also re-tested the carbonation levels in the bottles. The result was between 2.2-2.4 volumes of carbonation which is in the correct tolerance for this beer (Head High is carbonated at 2.5 volumes as a point of reference). We then proceeded to open a few cases of archived bottles that we save from each release that were from different points in the bottling run.

Our results mirrored what we are hearing in the market place. A large portion of our bottles were fine, but we did encounter some that foamed when opened. Since we ruled out contamination and over-carbonation, we then considered other causes of foaming in beer--specifically nucleation points.

After some research, we believe that the foaming in some bottles was caused by nucleation points which is attributed to the abundant amount of the specific spices we used in Mexican Brunch. As we got closer to the end of the bottling run more of the spice particulates that had settled to the bottom of the tank ended up in some of the bottles. Since we have no way of knowing which bottles or how many are impacted, we are issuing a full refund to anyone who purchased Mexican Brunch. We are not asking for the bottles back or that you discard them because there is no issue with the beer and the flavor should not be impacted. There is also no need to store them cold, but we do recommend that you chill the bottles down completely prior to opening and pour quickly into a glass once opened.

Since we opened in 2011 our focus has been on setting and maintaining a consistently high level of quality for all our beers. With this bottle release we didn’t met those high internal standards we set for ourselves. We are continuing to research this issue to prevent this problem in the future. If you have any questions at all please email us at mkane@kanebrewing.com.

 

The hospitality here is absurd

 

It really is.

 

So much so it's just overboard--I'd feel bad trying to get my money back. Simply wouldn't do it.

 

Bolero?

 

if they are giving full refunds are they literally just going to give everybody their money back and this was basically a free release of beer to anybody who got it?

 

just got an email.. they are processing the refunds automatically
going to spend double next time I visit.. they did not have to do this

stand up move though!