Side Project Brewing (2024)

Was anyone else underwhelmed by MJK? So much so that it was my least favorite beer of the weekend.

 

There are grown adults who get Presidents Day off?

I'm all for the equal application and treatment of "holidays," but, I say, I never...

 

Not I.

 

It’s a federal holiday.

 

I work in education and it still blows my mind how many holidays I get off per year. I’m one who is off tomorrow for the holiday.

Everything was drank and off the board incredibly quickly and the place emptied out within maybe an hour. Seems like a lot of people got their pours then jetted home rather than hang around like Friday and Saturday.

 

You don't say!!

So is Juneteenth.

President's Day needs scrapped for the day after the Super Bowl.

 

It was as good as I hoped it would be. Better than this year's OWK, in one man's opinion.

My only true disappointment was the last keg of D9. It was a faded cinnamon toast crunch, nothing else going on.

 

I couldn’t finish my 2oz pour, but as I said, it could be a palate shift after many issues I had with repeat Covid and long Covid. But, I personally got no flavors that people normally describe with Amburana. I just got a lot of prune juice. So, I am certainly the exception, not the rule. I did enjoy B1 a lot, though.

 

Amburana seems to have made both MJK and Derivation Grand Cru rather polarizing if you read the Untappd reviews. Seems to be either loved or not, but that’s probably also affected by the significant hype for both beers.

 

I absolutely loved MJK, thought it was on par with B1 if not better, just perfection.

Grand Cru on the other hand....fell into the polarizing half of Amburana for me. Both the smell and at least the finish were very off-putting for me. I honestly thought maybe my glass was dirty or something but after smelling other people's and discussing it seems that's just what it is.

 

I think it’s awesome that we are seeing new barrel treatments like Amburana. I tried MJK, but not D Grand Cru. I think the issue is more the sky high expectations that follow any side project release with the Derivation moniker or named after the King boys. Same thing happened with D14 and D10 IMO.

MJK b1 and b2 are just so different I don’t personally get many similarities other than they are both barreled barleywine. Had these new releases been called For Cinnamon ****s I think expectations would be different.

Fingers crossed for For Sauternes ****s.

 

ISO LC 24-25 renewal email

 

Do most people get invited back? I was surprised I got the invite this year and super excited. With small kids and a non beer drinking wife, we don’t travel a lot or stop at breweries often.

I bought most of what was released to LC and then some others. I just wasn’t sure if being invited again would be based on spending because I’m sure I’m at the lower end just with my budget and not being able to drink in person.

 

Oh and I thought D18 was delicious

really interesting beer, lots of coconut/rum when cold and the coffee/bourbon came out as it warmed.

nice Friday surprise

 

The only people who have gotten booted were people blatantly reselling (even then this number is minimal) or people who didn’t buy anything

 

Agree. This was the barrier I had to truly enjoying my first glass. I was looking for MJK b1 and what it was was a completely different, delicious barleywine.

It me.

 

are these merely new amburana barrels that have not held bourbon / rye / some type of spirit? if so, that sounds terribly boring to me. i know cory mentioned having both "new-to-us" amburana barrels as well as used ones... are the used ones vessels that held whiskey?

 

Soon we’ll see an artifact whiskey finished in derivation grand cru amburana barrels

 

And then a BA stout or BIL aged those barrels.