Bourbon County 2018

Slim to none, and slim just left town

 

Don't think of it so much as a beer release... rather, think of more as a piranha feeding frenzy after someone just dropped a piece of freshly cut meat into the Amazon River. BCBS regular is the bone and variants are the meat.

You'll be left with a bunch of bones to pick over and maybe a scrap piece of meat here and there.

 

Are we... the piranhas?

 

Really easy if you have a key to the Goose Island Barrel Warehouse. They pulled truck loads of Prop '14 out for Prop Day. Love the artificial scarcity they create to keep demand up. It's a master class is marketing. I also wouldn't be surprised if they were continually making Prop variants of year's past.

 

With fake bottling dates? Is it time for the beer industry to adopt the bottled-in-bond concept!?!?

 

It can be both. We can become the meat part if bottles are in possession walking out of the store.

 

I busted open my bottle of regular BCBS that I got via dumb luck (saving the Midnight Orange for Thanksgiving)

It's like velvet. Very good stout

I get a ton of the really big dark fruits in there and that's what I really want in a good barrel aged imperial stout. I'm too excited to try Midnight Orange. It's amazing to me that this is 15.2% ABV because you could literally chug this stuff.

 

Would you say this years is better than/worse than/or equal to previous years of BCBS?

 

I know I'm not who you asked, but after having regular BCBS as my first beer at Prop Day on Sunday, I would say it is worse than previous years. And I'm general not someone who thinks there is much variation in each year's regular - I generally think they nail it every year in a consistent fashion and that is what makes it perhaps my favorite beer.

Granted, it is not a bad beer by any means, I just don't think it's as good as prior years.

 

I appreciate your reply.

Your opinion is in line with others that I've read so far about this years release.

I've kinda been underwhelmed by the past few years BCBS releases...still a great beer...but not what it used to be. Last years Reserve variant was more like standard BCBS used to be IMO.

 

Damn, worse? I liked last year's quite a bit.

On the other hand, I always assume that 2014 will be the high point for me.

 

Interesting. This is pretty much the polar opposite of what I have heard.

 

Notes of dark fruit is kind of weird to me, not usually what I associate with BCBS...

 

I really get very little differentiation in any of the regular BCBS going back to 2012, but this year's definitely tasted a bit "less".

I heard lots of people saying the same thing as me about regular BCBS at Prop Day. It really did seem like Reserve was more in line with what regular used to be like (or, what we thought regular used to be like).

 

In general I don't really either, but 2014 was a little sweeter/more chocolate-forward than the others have been (that was the year that it was extra cold or something, so they had to keep the barrels in a warmer climate than usual to compensate...or something like that).

 

I would say the regular at prop day defintley tasted a bit “less” than I remember in previous years, but who the hell knows. It was sitting in a glass in 35 degree weather, and my hands were cold.

I’m fairly confident I’ll enjoy the hell out of BCS this year.

 

For what it’s worth I also agree that it tasted different than previous years but thought it was better. In fact, I think that I would attribute liking some of the variants more than I expected to the slightly different base. I think it held the extra barrel of reserve way better than last year, and made midnight orange and regal strong options even as someone who doesn’t like fruit stouts. If you want to hold on to the traditional taste of BCBS this year might not be for you, but if you’re willing to allow some change then I think it will actually be very well received

 

If I want fruity wine flavors in my BA stout, I just purchase shelf turding Abyss... Either the cold really messed up the flavor profile of the BCBS at Prop Day(maybe it was sitting out to long and all the bourbon traces evaporated) or GI has finally Budweiserized BCBS. It tasted cheap, different and lacking bourbon and barrel which I generally find to be the most important traits when springing for a beer aged in bourbon barrels... Seems like there is an effort to slowly cheapen BCBS and why not. They probably look at the bourbon companies with different tiers and think maybe long term GI should have that to. I would not be surprised to see in future years them running three tiers at the same time.

BCBS and Variants (this cheap BCBS we see this year) Sub $20 a bottle
BCBS Reserve and Reserve Variants (what BCBS used to taste like) Sub $40
BCBS Rare and Rare Variants (2 year stuff) Sub $60

 

Reminded me of the Abyss meets Bells Black Note. Both of them are some of my favorite stouts too.

 

Ew

I am not a big fan of either of those