Refunds for 2015 Regular BCBS and 2015 Prop

When I opened my off-tasting BCBCS '15, as soon as the cap was off I smelled sour cherries.

But I definitely knew something was off when the beer did hit the glass: an absurd amount of foam head. It was obvious that something wasn't quite right with that coffee variant.

 

04/11/15 bottle (1356) purchased in Minneapolis, tasting absolutely phenomenal. First one I've cracked in a month or so and it's wayyy better than the last bottle I drank.

Edit: To add, it was cellared since black friday in a roughly 65 degree closet until yesterday to drink today.

 

22OCT15 1352
14.3%

Purchased in Illinois. This is definitely starting to take a turn for the worst. Was only able to make it through about 5 sips before needing to dump it.

 

21OCT15 0930 14.3%

Tasted great.

 

If you have another 22OCT15 bottle that you purchased at the same time and place, you should take it to GI and ask them to try it and teat it if they doubt the off flavors / infection

 

Except they still didnt say that was BCBBW that was infected. From the descriptions of infected barleywine I have seen in the forums the flavor of trash and metal seems to indicate a wild yeast, maybe a strain of brett. Lacto throws a distict citric sourness. I mean common sense says the infection and a lactobacillus inoculation are very different animals. Tart cherries sounds like a brett lambicus infection, i am sure that strain is used in one of the sisters.
@Highbrow i like your post about looking at this with some logic, but I think the time stamps still come in to play. Because the batch abvs are different, we can only assume that this beer is blended from varying barrels. It is possible that 2014 barrels harbored infecting organisms for the barleywine, and while those barrels fared ok for 2014 bcbs, any one of the hundreds or thousands could have been the culprit that infected the whole batch of barleywine once blended. Same logic stands for the 15 bcbs. All it takes is one barrel to harbor just a few bacteria or wild yeast, once that barrel gets blended into a batch and bottled all it takes is some long chain starches and a couple of bugs to start munching away in the bottles. It may be tied in to one barrel in one batch, so time stamps and abv may still give us an idea of whats to come. It stands to reason that the lower abv bottles do not have the same beer from the same barrels as the higher abv bottles, same thing with the older vs younger bottles.

 

Bottled 10/20/15 1751, 14.3% abv, Distro to Upstate NY

I do not pick up any signs of infection / off flavors.

I went into this thing pretty much assuming my bottle was infected being so close to the dreaded 10/21 date, and on the first few sips i swore something was off. I decided to take a break, step back, and let the thing warm to room temp. Came back after i was settled down and could tell nothing was wrong with the bottle. Point is....dont go into a tasting with preconceived notions like i did, if your tasting "off flavors", really make sure they are there before commenting. A lot of times when the mind is made up, it can make things seem real that arent.

Im not at all questioning the opinions of the people in FL with 10/21 bottle dates, at this point there are enough reports to make that claim pretty valid. Just want to make a general point about tasting.

 

I'm a Certified Cicerone and the few bottles that I have had up to this point are fine (29Sept and 06Oct: both 14.3%).

You don't need to be a BJCP judge or Certified Cicerone (or higher) to detect infection. Although having a credential certainly substantiates the claims one makes; those without it should not have their input discounted. We aren't arguing about the appropriate amount of DMS in a German Pils, it is an unintended infection in a world-class barrel aged stout.

Most of us have been around long enough to know what regular BCBS should taste like. Tart cherry should not be the dominate aroma and/or flavor characteristic with the description given by the brewer.

Barrel programs usually work great, amplifying normal beer to amazing beer; however when they don't work as intended, the results are usually as amplified to horrible beer.

I'm going to Home Depot for another fridge to store all of my remaining 21 bottles until more information gathered.

 

2/2 in the last week have been infected (11/4 dates). The first was horrific. Like testing a 9-volt battery with your tongue. The 2nd had less of the tart, off flavors so we infused it with raspberries for a few hours to mask the flavor. That worked pretty damn well.

Goose seems to be at least starting to listen, or coming around a bit. This was their reply to me:

"We take all claims of infection or off-taste very seriously. We appreciate your e-mail, and want you to know we are looking into the reports of infection in regular BCS. Our quality assurance and quality control processes are critical to the complex portfolio of beers we release each year and we hold them to a very high standard. No further refunds have been announced at this time."

 

I meant more for potential causes. I'm not discrediting anyone's claims. I'm a Cicerone as well and had bad bottles of Coffee and haven't had a bad Barleywine, yet.

 

This is complete Bullshit man. from the little research I've done on this thread and seen the infected bottles have an "OCT" Date. all my bottles (5) have an "OCT" date!! not only did I have infected coffee and barleywines now the Stout too? does GI have anything to say?

 

I know you weren't, sorry if it came across that way.

Some people may discredit them and that would be sort of like me telling you that preceiving latex paint aromas in place of green apple aromas is wrong when evaluating acetaldehyde.

 

For those of you who have one that's turning, pm me for a recipe to hide it

 

So we'd have to open the bottle, verify it's going bad, send you a message and wait for you to respond with the recipe before finishing or drainpouring the bottle? Why not just throw the recipe up here? This seems like the perfect thread for it. Share the love man!

 

mho. not much point to argue what's "possible". putting "possible" aside for what's probable & sensible, i still think it's safer to refrigerate & drink ASAP. screw dates, times & abvs. not saying don't report & record them, i am saying don't read them & walk away assured you're safe or unsafe.

it certainly could be 1 barrel, 1 hose, hell 1 empty bottle. let's go with 1 barrel screwed up a bunch of coffee. then remind ourselves coffee was limited because GI found a bunch they felt was compromised. my bet is they tried what you & others suggested (batch/time/abv issue). the reason there appears to be only 1 date on coffee is [logic] they likely dumped the other date(s) abv(s). your first solid clue & evidence batches probably aren't the firewall you can depend on. yay or nay?

so maybe 1 barrel screwed up coffee. maybe 1 more single barrel screwed up barleywine 1 more single barrel is now screwing up regular. and if reports are accurate 1 other single barrel possibly screwed up Prop. that's a lot of terrible, back to back luck there on a single season release. regardless where it started/what's responsible - do what's sensible. that's pretty much all i suggested 4 months back & am reiterating it 4 mos. later.

 

Had my first BCBS today... 10/20/15 bottle date.

Tasted fantastic. No sourness or other off flavors. Damn good BBA stout.

 

You win

2 oz raspberries, 2 oz fresh coffee beans, 1oz cocoa nibs, 1 oz unsweetened coconut flakes, 1 cinnamon stick. Did this in the french press for about 45 min- 1 hr with 10-11 oz of bcbs. Enjoy!

 

In comparison to the troublesome 10/21 14.3% bottle I mentioned above, this 13.7% 10/12 bottle tastes like the "normal" BCBS I expected.

 

Not infected

Label date: Oct 26
abv 14.3%

Bottle stamp: 222 15 01 23:59
(On the bottom)