Feb 16, 2015
Season 2, Episode 7 - The time has come. The moment has arrived. This week is part one of our epic blind tasting of bourbon barrel-aged stouts from across the United States.
We’ve been hyping these episodes for a few weeks now, and they have finally arrived. Here’s the premise of these shows: Episode 7 (part 1) is going to be the introduction of the blind tasting, and why the beers were selected. We’re going to drink four of the nine beers, and rate them according to aroma, appearance, flavor, mouthfeel, and then a final overall rating. Episode 8 (part 2) will feature the final five beers and the results of the blind tasting will be revealed. But, let’s take a step back and briefly discuss how this came about.
We picked nine bourbon barrel-aged stouts. We tried to keep this tasting as pure as possible by eliminated any beers that have known adjuncts in them, such as vanilla, coffee, and cacao nibs. We wanted stout aged in bourbon barrels. That’s what BCBS is, and you can’t compare this beer fairly to others made with adjuncts. We also wanted fresh examples of each beer. As fresh as possible, anyway…
In no particular order, here are the beers we chose and were able to acquire:
· Firestone Walker Brewing Co. – Parabola, 2014
· Goose Island Beer Co. – Bourbon County
Brand Stout, 2014
· Hangar 24 Craft Brewery – Pugachev’s
Cobra, 2014
· The Bruery – Black
Tuesday, 2014
· Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. – Bourbon
Barrel-Aged Narwhal, 2014
· Dark Horse Brewing Company – Bourbon
Barrel-Aged Plead The 5th, 2014
· Bell’s Brewery – Black Note
Stout, 2014
· Bottle Logic Brewing – Darkstar
November, 2014
· Avery Brewing Company – Uncle Jacob’s
Stout, 2012
We have a special guest pouress for the next couple of shows, who is also a 4B Patron on Patreon, Ms. Dana Parker (@MissTurkeyBowl). Dana is the only one at this point who knows which beers are which. The beers were kept outside of our studio, and she brought them to us randomly.
We’re not going to list the tasting notes on the blog post, but you can view them on this week’s show outline. Next week in episode 8, we’ll drink the final five beers and announce the results of the blind tasting. So, until then…
BREW THE SHIT OUT OF IT.
Special shoutouts go to “Cougar” Steve Saavedra for hookup on the Michigan beers, and Scott McElhone for inspiring the titles of episodes 7 and 8.
Four Brewers Patrons get 50% off Firkfest tickets! Send an email to Nagel (greg@fourbrewers.com *note: there is no dash anywhere in this email address) to get your discounted tickets. These are limited to two (2) per individual Patron.
Links to things from this
week’s episode:
S2/E7 Show Outline
Pliny Fights
Cancer Charity Raffle
Firkfest 2015
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