Goose Island Bourbon County 2019

11 year then 12 year barrels? Not a whole lot of noticeable difference in the flavor profile I'd imagine, there though a valiant effort. Hopefully no infections so Heaven Hill doesn't get a bad rap due to ABI's less than stellar overall record.

 

I’m so glad that the standard bcbs continues to sit in stores far and wide, it’s still entirely exceptional and I pick some up whenever I come across it. Then drink it. I’ve been averaging one every other week or so lately and it still holds its own against many of the super limited releases and in many (most?) cases exceeds them.

Definitely curious about the double EC bottles, hope they find their way to the east coast. I’m no fan of the predatory practices of AB-INBEV but the bourbon county line is pretty hard to pass up. Crazy that there are stacks of regular, orange, vanilla and wheat wine available at multiple locations near me.

 

I'd have to travel or trade for BCBDBS, presuming it isn't distributed across the GI distribution footprint. I am looking forward to our second year of getting variants, and the banana split variant sounds good

 

Got my first taste of this last year and was duly impressed. Might make half an effort to find a variant this year but will definitely pick up a bottle or two of regular if it comes out our way again

 

With variants hitting our market for the first time in 2018 and selling out quickly, we still have regular on the shelves where previously it was gone in a couple of hours. Now I'm just not into regular BCBS as much, might buy a bottle or two this year.

 

No one does barrel aging beers better than goose island.. Going to get my fair share

 

There are actually 7 Variants informally "announced" so far including an Oyster Stout and a dry-hopped stout. I also suspect we'll see another decoy variant this year as well.

 

"...wait are you serious?"

::checks join date::

"Oh, you must be new here."

 

The truck chasers are already starting their cars. We never get a lot of the variants, hell sometimes none at all, but the double barrel sounds good, but as mentioned I wouldn’t think there would be any noticeable difference between 11 and 12 year old barrels. I haven’t bought BCBS in years as I much prefer the older bottles, the current one is a bit unwieldy.

 

Imo.... Every goose island Reserve variant ive had has been the best barrel aged beer ive had all year long... I'm not the only one who thinks so according to untappd highest rated beers

 

You were clearly not around for the infection catastrophe that would have put basically any other brewery out of business. In 2015 GI had to recall 4 dates of brand stout, 2 barleywine, all bottled coffee, most (or all?) of the prop. They issued millions in refunds AND STILL managed to screw tons of customers by putting in a hard stop/ arbitrary cutoff that was not publicized, for submitting for a refund.

"The best I tell ya, the best!"

I'm not saying the beers are bad, because they are good, but to call them the best at barrel aging is laughable. They made probably the costliest mistake in the history of brewing, not even five years ago.

 

Ive never had an infected bottle.. Every bottle of every year ive had has been spectacular with depths of insane flavor imo.. Its just something I look forward to every year

 

Except Firestone, and Fremont, and Kane, and Modern Times, and... well, you get it. I like the dried fruit tasting notes. No more infection recalls, right?

 

I believe all bottles of 2015 Prop were bad, but kegged 2015 Prop was okay.

Someone send this man a 2015 Barleywine...for science!

Seriously though, I'm a big fan of BCBS. I've been into craft beer for 20+ years. But when I tried BCBS for the first time 5 or 6 years ago, it pushed things to a new level. That said, the 2015 infection issue was bad, pretty pervasive, and well documented at this point. There are several bottling dates of regular that are okay and taste fantastic if you ever come across it. 2015 was also the last year BCBS was not flash pasteurized.

 

OMG I can't wait!!!! /Sarcasm. Actually nobody needs to wait because we can all go out and but bourbon county sitting on the shelf right now. Along with KBS and others.

 

And you've clearly not around for the tons of other high end brewieres who had infection issues as well. This isn't isolated to just GI. Surly, Weldworks, Cycle have had some and their BA programs are world class. GI has been doing BA stouts for 20+ years and to my knowledge have had one infection issue. Pretty good record.

Hate on GI if you want to, but find me a brewery putting out that quality of BA stouts at that quantity year after year. You can't. Imagine if GI just did 2000-3000 bottle runs like most of the high end brewieres do. I'd bet they would be right up there with best of the best especially if they started to do more popular adjuncts like the other brewieres do.

 

I agree with that. Considering the huge quantity of BCBS every year, GI’s BA program might be the world best.

 

Regarding the infected issue for 2015, I never had the chance to try any variants, only the regular. However I did a 2014 - 2018 vertical and 2015 was the best of the bunch. I even got to try 2015 on draft during SF beer week at city beer and it was just as amazing. Was able to pick up 2 bottles(non infected dates) of 2015 reg and can't wait to try it so there's that. I will be looking forward to this year's release as I felt 2018 regular was the best since 2015 hopefully I'm able to get the variants again as well.

 

Budweiser clearly has the best labs at their disposal. You're high if you think they should get a pass forinfection. Then the Budweiser owned distributors put recalled bottles from 15 into cases of 16 and redistributed them. I can let an infection go, but weldwerks surly and hundreds of other breweries didnt redistribute their shitty bottles.