While there are many holidays on the craft beer calendar, you would be hard pressed to find a bigger one than ‘Bourbon County Day.’ For the uninitiated, every year around Black Friday Goose Island Brewery releases this series of bourbon barrel aged beers. The Bourbon County series has been around for the last ten years and started with just a stout, but each year Goose Island adds a few new variants to the line-up. This year I was able to secure the ‘Brand Stout’, ‘Brand Special #4’, and “Brand Carmella Ale’. All of which have taken a prime place in my cellar. I am still on the lookout for (or ISO for those in the know) for the other variants so I will be keeping my fingers crossed that I will find them soon.
The Bourbon County beers are fantastic and highly recommended.
However, for you to unlock their full potential they should be cellared for at
least two years. Cellaring, for those who do not know, is when beer is aged for
a prolonged period of time. These beers respond extremely well to being
cellared and are a great introduction into the world of cellaring. For the last
few years, I try to buy two of each variant in order to cellar them for different
periods of time. I used to cellar them for a minimum of one year but now, after
trying some of my older beers I will be cellaring them for a minimum of three
years.
While I have been growing my beer cellar over the last four years, I am still very much a novice at this process and will be dedicating a post to this in the future.
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