FOBAB 2014

It was gone within 30 minutes of open for sure. Not immediately gone but very easily missed.

 

Even though I liked last years venue better, I really enjoyed this years event all around. I absolutely destroyed the Goose stuff and would say the best thing I had all day was the Bourbon County Root Beer Float aka Propieters and Vanilla Rye blend. The Dino'snores was a damn fine brew as well.

 

Ba abraxas was gone at 613 pm for the Saturday evening session as it was in bottles only and I was told they had 24 bottles. I watched them run out as I was about eight people away.

 

They did run out of BA Abraxas at about 6:30, but the woman said more bottles were coming in about a half hour. I swung back over there around 7:15 and it was pouring again. Much shorter line the 2nd time. I missed out both attempts however.

 

It kind of caught me off guard with being in bottles, but there literally wasn't more than 1 person in line for it.

Ps nice seeing you again last night, duder

 

Dat vainglorious was like da purple drank

 

I will add the temperature at which the beers were poured was way better than in the past. Definitely seemed closer to cellar temp didn't have to wait for the beers to warm up before consuming...except for the bcbbw coffee Randall, that stuff was cold

 

Venue was fine IMO. The middle aisle was constricted at times. Never waited more than a minute or two for a pour. They were ticket sticklers this year though.

 

Did this too.

 

Towards the end of the session #2 we were doing laps through Gi. No tickets. Took about a minute to get through. Prop and vanilla were gone but still worth it. Seemed like nobody was drinking the bcbs 2 yr aged Templeton rye which was fantastic

 

I wish I could mainline that Buffalo Trace Eisbock...

 

The 2-year barrel stuff was among the things I poured in the dump buckets. Interesting that you liked the Templeton.

I get that BA beer doesn't really have carbonation when it comes out of the barrel, but I missed that bit of forced carb they add to the bottles/kegs. The flavors seemed off a bit too... lots of sherry notes, which made it seem oxidized (to me).

But, it could have just been palate fatigue by the point I had them. Rare did the 2-year barrel thing, so I know it can be done, and I think the Straightjacket that was there was also a 2-year variant, and I loved that.

 

Probably help that I kept stopping off at the bcbbw coffee Randall first

 

I didn't see much of that. Keep in mind that the 1/6th barrel for the first session is also what is used for judging and what the brewers are drinking from before the VIP/IMBIBE pre-session even begins. So, there is probably 550 ounces of some beers, when the IMBIBERS get in, which means only about 220 pours, assuming a 2.5 ounce pour. If half the people in the IMBIBE/VIP pre-session got a pour of a particular beer, it would kick. The Side Project sours kicked in about 20 minutes in the other sessions too. Basically, unless you were near the front of the line and ran straight there, you were likely to miss out. Each session had 1500 attendees, which means only about 1 in 7 got any particular beer that kicked. But that size of crowd is also what allows for 300 different beers.

 

Oohhh, so that's what that ridiculous line of people was around the perimeter of the room. Whenever I wanted a BCBS variant, I simply walked up to the GI booth and that one attractive blonde women from Session 2 filled me right up.

 

Question for anyone who worked the event and has also done in the past? Was there more emphasis on taking tickets this year? Seemed.like almost all pourers were very adament about taking them which I haven't seen in the past.

 

I would definitely agree. I asked some volunteers about it and they just said there were told to take them.

 

Way too much of it, we only like rare stuff.

 

Yeah id say at least 3/4 of the time they asked for a ticket. Compared to less than a quarter of the time in 2012 and 2013. Maybe the organizers read this thread and really hammed it into the volunteers to ask for tickets. It is a public forum after all.

 

It's weird, a few people were never getting asked for a ticket, while I was always asked for a ticket. Only two volunteers didn't ask for a ticket, one because I knew him and the other wasn't checking anyone's. Thankfully my friends who were not being asked for tickets gave me plenty of extras.