Beer in the new era

got a case of regular bcbs this morning easy but variants haven't popped up yet.

I got regular, that's it. Didn't even want to try for the variants. All the places I can get to it is long gone.

Just saw this in the cooler of my corner liquor store by my train stop............

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3834/11123459803_94aa331fd5.jpg

Fuck this guy. He's being sitting on this KBS for 8 months and just pulls it out today to try and entice people that may have missed out on BCBS?

jesus christ

KBS is good but not that good!

Regular BCBS was sitting right beside it for $26.99, which is a bit much. I didn't even ask about the varients. I'm sure he's keeping them in the back until he can charge $75 a bottle in 6 months.

Didn't even bother with the BCBS this year. I'm sure like last year the regular stuff (which I don't really like) will be easy to get for a while, but the coffee stout (which I love) would have been a hassle. My Pappy Van Winkle hunt, however successful, robbed me of much initiative to do it again for beer.

uh, guys, i bought a lot of BCBS. had the day off and it was my mission from my gf. most stores were sold out of the variants immediately, but i found a couple that still had them and ended up with three bottles of coffee stout, two barleywines, and a rye bomber. and basically a case of the regular (which was $19.99 everywhere here). haven't had any yet.

How long are you going to have to work your second job in order to pay that off?

heh i know it's a little ridiculous but it'll last us the year, and if it was available year-round i'm sure we'd end up buying that much eventually.

also my only dependent is a cat.

ha as a dude that freaked and bought over a case of cuvee when i heard about the oncoming "shortage" i respect both the player and the game.

the whole new ownership thing and this being the second year i'm drinking bcbs has made my search a lot less pressing. that said, i would love to try a proprietors' (is that what it's called? the one only released in chicago w/ coconut?) but i doubt i'll ever see a bottle.

Neither will I.

Had a Sixpoint Bengali Tiger in a Wetherspoons recently (do you have a US version of these? Big chain pubs that sell beer that's nearly out of date at slashes prices + serve cheap, okish food, normally regarded as a bit grubby/grotty in general). BOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

xpost For what it's worth, even local releases are apparently staggered, at least to some extent. So locals and near-Chicagoans - don't give up hope. Rather, check in with your favorite beer place and ask if there's more on the way.

Bengali Tiger is good but I like other Sixpoint offerings better (although, as noted above, I don't love IPAs). I'm still sort of tickled by the idea of people quaffing beers brewed within a few miles of me in UK pubs.

i'm not a big pumpkin beer fan (pumking pretty much the only pumpkin brew i fuck w/) but alewerks pumpkin ale is really nice

I was out in the boonies with family for most of Friday, but lucked into a 4-pack of Barleywine and a bottle of the Backyard Rye at a shop in Lincolnwood. The standard BCBS is everywhere this year, picked up two 4-packs of that at the liquor store out in the middle of nowhere near my dad's house.

I'm not a big fan of coconut in general, so I'm not too disappointed to miss out on the Proprietor's. I loved last year's Coffee though, so I'm wishing I could have found some of that. Though a friend commented on Instagram that he heard a rumor that a big batch of Coffee was "infected" and "had to be dumped" by Goose Island. Anyone else heard anything about that?

Def. debates about degree of "infection" every year, says a google search. Certainly that would explain why coffee, which is usually not tooooo hard to find, was a no-show lots of places. My local Binnys, the gen manager was complaining to me about the lack of coffee. He had to show up early for the early birds to sell them the Goose Island, and they were all bummed that the good stuff was not in the shipment. I have a few friends who, like me, don't really care for the standard BCBS, but go gaga over the coffee.

Ha, I was able to get one single bottle of BCBCS. I had to choose between it and barleywine. I really want to try the barleywine, but I was drawn to fresh bourbon county coffee, which is one of the best things ever.

OMFG I could drink this forever. Until I pass out with bourbon county rings around my mouth.

my one friend around here who got coffee so far said they killed it this year.

i can enjoy some bourbon county, but can't imagine wanting to drink it year round, or even more than one or two bottles a year.
to each his own.

stouts i have been enjoying:
maine brewing co. 'mean old tom' (v nice stout aged over vanilla beans. yum. vanilla taste is very subtle and pleasant.)
darkhorse brewing co. 'one oatmeal stout'
sierra nevada narwhal.

i want to try evil twin's 'christmas eve in a new york city hotel room' (shitty name) but it's too expensive.

you're not missing anything imo

I kind of dig that name, much better than another pun about hops

I am drinking a BC barleywine, wondering what kind of bourbon barrels they use.

Heaven Hill, I believe.

If that's the case I hope this is Evan Williams Single Barrel barleywine.

Bengali Tiger is def one of my favorite everyday IPAs.

I prob could've picked up some BCBS on Friday, but I'm still not sure I care enough about it...

All this talk of barrel aging made me stop by Bevmo on the way home. Picked up a Boulevard Brewing Co (Kansas City, MO) and Sierra Nevada collab called Terra Incognita. It's an ale that's barrel aged for three months. Haven't opened it yet. Anyone have experience with Boulevard? They had a few other types from them.

I now got at least a bottle of BCBS 09, 10, 11, 12, and 13. Ready to do a vertical tasting.

Vertical tasting? Uh, I believe it's called a "beeramid."

boulevard is pretty hit or miss for me. the terra incognita didnt hit me in the rigth spot, but it certainly wasnt a bad beer - i think they overstated the sour aspect, its def more of the funky banyard vibe wrt wild ales

went home to the midwest for thanksgiving and my brother treated me to some wonderful beers:

bell's expedition stout
epic big bad baptist stout imperial stout
north coast barrel-aged old rasputin -- always one of my favorite stouts, the barrel-aged version was fucking incredible
columbus ipa

and my mom treated me a six of great lakes christmas ale. a little too sweet but it's kind of a tradition to have it this time of year when i go home to cleveland so i enjoyed it.

back in new england i've really been enjoying baxter brewing co. from maine. hayride autumn ale is awesome, full flavored, murky rye ale with lots of oak taste. it's such a good beer, i don't know why they would limit its marketing potential by calling it an autumn ale. baxter's stowaway ipa is really good too.

morning haul

http://i42.tinypic.com/hvz720.jpg

nice work

Not bad! Did it take effort, or were they relatively easy to come by? You're in Philly, right?

yeah I'm in Philly and it was very easy. My local bottle shop got them in and we r buddies so I just dropped by at opening

It seems impossible to really get anything by knowing shop owners here. I buy a ton of beer. But so do all the other beer nerds in this huge city that also know the shop owners. Maybe I'm just not sociable.

I also don't have one shop, I usually go to 5 or 6 different places, depending on where I am in the city. Maybe if I had one shop where I got everything it would be different.

Managed to get two four packs of Bourbon County Stout and one of the Barleywine. Hoping to get a hold of some of the coffee, but that doesn't appear to have hit the area. Yet, anyway.

i go to this particular shop 2-3 times a week and i'm friendly w/ a bunch of the employees. also it's outside the city in the suburbs so it doesn't have the same traffic as a philly bottle shop.

being cool with the owner definitely scored us some extra BCBS coffees.

what are ppl saying about aging these? i know coffee is supposed to be drunk right away, and the regular can be aged - how about the other variants?

The regular and barleywine both say on the pack they can be aged up to 5 years. Don't know what the ideal drinking time would be tho.

It seems impossible to really get anything by knowing shop owners here. I buy a ton of beer. But so do all the other beer nerds in this huge city that also know the shop owners. Maybe I'm just not sociable.

Yeah, I don't know how this actually works around here either. I know that it seems to work well for a friend of mine, but he is super secretive about which shop. All I know is, he is regulary posting pictures on Instagram of his haul before it's supposedly available (i.e. he had pictures of BCBS up on Thanksgiving morning) - which is a whole other thing I don't want to get into now, but it pisses me off how much of this stuff goes on and how little of available stock actually ends up being on sale when its supposed to. Anyway, digression done. This friend of mine makes really good money and I wouldn't be shocked if he regularly drops a couple hundred bucks a week at the shop he uses. I have a kid, so that's not in the cards for me, so I'll just have to rely on what I can scrounge up when I have time and money.

But super nice haul Mordy! I'm jealous that you found some coffee.

Maybe I'm just not sociable.

this is def most of my problem, but all the shops i hit regularly are in the city and ppl who work there aren't gonna be able to bro down with every beer nerd who'd be looking for a favor.

also some places (eg tired hands) are immune to being charmed, no matter how sparkling your personality