Goose Island Cooper Project

That's the price of Bourbon County which spends longer in barrels and comes in bigger bottles. If GI did that, it would get a pretty harsh reception. I'm expecting to see a four pack of this at $15-$17.

 

I expect it to be closer to the Black Note/BA exposition range. $22-25

 

That's a different brewery, though. Why not close to the Boulevard BA Quad at $17?

I guess we'll see in time!

 

Goose could do better. This copper project has me at excitement level zero,.

 

I tried Peat's Dragon for the first time this past weekend, and I just can't get into it. The Islay Whiskey is just too damn peaty for me, despite the low ratio. I will say, I could handle it way better than the Stone Bigger, Longer, Uncut bomber I got two sips into before drain pouring.

Aside from that, I agree, Triptych is a killer brewery. I think me and a few friends might go there this weekend. I REALLY want to try the rum barrel aged quad and the sour cherry quad they have right now.

 

I was just by Triptych for the first time yesterday. Picked up some of the Rum BA Quad. It's good, not amazing. I do love their stuff though. On the Quad (Batch300/Dead Mans Chest), they said they've sold about 1/2 of what they canned. I think it should make it to the weekend, but hard to say. I'm guessing they'll at least have it on tap still. You can call ahead to make sure!

 

Cool. But wouldn't that be the SCBS instead of the BCBS?

 

Interesting.

I'm fairly versed in Scotch, less so in Scottish beer. I actually keep a bottle of Lag 16 (can you believe they add artificial coloring to it; bleh!!). However, I think that for Scotch barrel aging a more appropriate approach would probably be to use a sherried whisky rather than a peated whisky. If you're going to go for smoke, even something like the Uigeadail, with its much better balance, would be preferable to a straight peat bomb.

 

The whole reason GI was one the first to use bourbon barrels is because of Chicago's proximity to KY. Bourbon is the only spirit required by law to be 100% first use barrels, and as such brokers ~generally~ treat KY/IN/TN as "origin" (jack daniels is the single biggest origin of to-be-scotch barrels). The "destinations" would be Scotland, the Caribbean for rum, "American Whiskey", Canadian whiskey, maple syrups, beer etc etc.

It's not totally inconceivable that a barrel originating in IN, filled with bourbon in KY, dumped, shipped to Scotland, dumped (possibly multiple fills), then shipped back to Chicago to be used for beer. It's just that would be not be a typical or "logical" step during a barrels life, and likely would require considerably more coordination with a barrel broker, and likely more expense in the end, upon delivery at GI.

Also Scotch whisky has numerous forms and characteristics, as others have mentioned. The characteristics of a second fill bourbon from Islay is going to be much different than a former Caribbean cask from Speyside, and all permutations there within. I would think for a beer like this, uniformity is a virtue, and while I would never say "all bourbon is the same", the ingredient and barrel requirements mean that barrels from different distilleries are still all ~relatively~ similar.

 

I'm with @Jason1221 . Was super excited about Deadman's. I actually liked the pour I had better than the can I had. Pour held a better head. Good beer, I just had big expectations for it. Didn't try the sour. You'll want to try Dank Meme if you haven't had that yet too.

I see what you did there . I suppose it might.

Back to GI Cooper, I'm looking forward to giving this beer a shot, and am glad it's BB aged and not Scotch!

 

Don't confuse the dictionary definition of adjunct with the use of the term in the brewing industry. Even though you'll see cases of the term being used differently (e.g. in regards to sugar), brewing adjuncts meant fermentable material before BeerAdvocate existed. There might be some truth to your perspective, but the idea that snobby beer geeks made the definition artificially restrictive strikes me as totally illogical. Besides the timeline being backwards, beer geeks have surprisingly embraced the term. I do think that there is a little bit of a double standard in the existence of the "American adjunct lager" label, but I get why some people decided to go with it. It's strange that the vilification of the term eventually turned into beer geeks embracing but misusing the term. I don't know when this happened. There was such a short time between Beer Wars being released in 2009 and Goose Island selling in 2011. I'll admit that I'm assuming a lot here, but I feel like the muddying landscape resulted in a change in attitude.

 

That's it. I'm in. I'd rather see it aged in Scotch barrels, though.

 

I tried the beer last week, and wasn't the biggest fan. I will say my sense of smell was a little messed up from a cold, but the beer is a little light to be put in a barrel, tends to give off a bitter/boozy taste. I might be completely wrong since I was sick, but just my thoughts so far.

 

I didn't realize it's a BA/non BA blend... that kinda bums me out. Give me all the booze!

 

Release date @ Fulton taproom on 3/26. Hoping to make the release but really hoping this will be like BCBS this year in Chicago. Cases sitting on the floor for a week.

Heres to hopin!

 

Released yesterday at the taproom for $16/4-pack!

 

Hoping someone can report back on how this is tasting now that it's out. Curious to hear how much barrel presence there is and how it stacks up against others in the category.

 

Brian in a Chicago Facebook group had this to say:

 

I stopped at the brewery yesterday around 2:30 and it was already sold out. The bartender told me they only had around 10 cases for sale. A pretty small amount considering the buzz Goose was creating around this product. I had one on draft and thought it was a good beer, but nothing to lose sleep over if you miss it. It's a slightly amped up Scottish Ale with very little barrel presence. It's on the sweet caramel side with a little hint of coconut, wood and vanilla. Glad I tried it, even happier I saved $16. I'll personally take the bourbon forward Backwoods for the same price.