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Episode 69 - Brickstone Brewing Dark Secret(s) feat. Tommy Vasilakis
114 Plays4 years ago
This week we're joined by Tommy of Brickstone Brewing again to discuss and sample some of their barrel aged imperial stout, Dark Secret.
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Transcript
Binny's Exclusive Deal Discussion
00:00:00
Speaker
Yeah. So it's going to be an exclusive, uh, binnies deal. Well, when we get, when we get ahold of some, we'll have to maybe have you come back on. Oh yeah. It was, we'll send you some.
00:00:14
Speaker
Yeah, I won't have any.
Episode 69 Introduction with Tommy from Brickstone
00:00:17
Speaker
This week, we're joined again by Tommy from Brickstone to discuss Dark Secret. This is episode 69 of The Molting Hour. What's the haps on the house? Guy, ease that speech. This the molten hour where we talk about a drink and tell you what we think every other week. And if we get drunk, well, we might slur our speech. Got the gift of ab, the friends who wish you had. Join us for a drink. Join us for a laugh. Time is never wasted. The way you're getting wasted. The molten hour here. People, people take your place.
00:00:52
Speaker
Welcome to the Malting Hour.
Meet Tony Golic and Brandon Wininger
00:00:54
Speaker
I am one of your hosts, Tony Golic, joined always with... Brandon Wininger. And that's it, again. It's just us. No, Clark. No, Clark. Sorry, Clark, you're still not here. That's okay. You're off doing your thing and we miss you and we look forward to
00:01:10
Speaker
Oh, seeing you soon. On an episode actually coming up. Being a dad. Yeah, good job. I hope hockey is treating you well. You know, from what he was telling us, you know, he gets to visit a lot of breweries on these hockey dad trips. So that's cool. So not only is hockey expensive, but breweries, it's that expensive too.
00:01:28
Speaker
Exactly. Well, this is going to be now two weeks in a row where we're following up on promises that we made that when we've had breweries or someone from a brewery on a show, we're like, oh, man, we can't wait to do this again, maybe sometime this year. And we did it again. This past week was with short fuse. And this week, Brandon, who do we got with us again?
Tommy's Return and Chicago's Barrel-Aged Celebrations
00:01:50
Speaker
We are welcoming back Tommy from Brickstone Brewery. Tommy, thanks for joining us. Yeah, thanks for having me, guys. Yeah, this is this is exciting. We had so much fun the last episode. And since then, not that I mean,
00:02:06
Speaker
Not that we didn't, we weren't all familiar with APA and everything else. Your beers have definitely made regular appearances in my fridge throughout this year. And it's not, I mean, just because, I mean, I will say because the beers are good, but also we got a chance to talk with you. So it was like, each time I drink these beers, it's like remembering how much fun we had on that episode.
00:02:26
Speaker
like I'm talking to you again. Yeah, exactly. So you know, it's it's creepy. It's great. Thanks. If Tommy's talking to you again, when you're drinking that beer, that means you've had too many of those beers. Especially if it's in my whisper voice. It's always saying
00:02:44
Speaker
Call for it tomorrow. That's right. Oh man. So this is actually kind of a special reason that we have Tommy on. We're coming up on what is becoming a kind of a holiday on its own in Chicago. You know, most people celebrate Black Friday just to go out and do random shopping and buy things that they don't need. Or recover from the day before.
00:03:08
Speaker
Yes, or their turkey recovery, but it has become a tradition now for several Chicago area breweries to do some barrel aged releases on that day. And I know we touched on it briefly. Last time we talked to Tommy, but they have some
00:03:26
Speaker
new barrel aged beers coming out. So it's part of their dark secret series. So I'm excited to hear kind of what the lineup is and what people can expect this year. And then if there's any surprises that like, you know, you're going to throw out there, you know, I would love to hear that too. Like you want to break any secrets? Like, yeah. Any dark secrets? Oh, yeah.
The Legacy of Dark Secret Beer
00:03:51
Speaker
Yeah. Thank you.
00:03:53
Speaker
Yeah, so kind of recapping, Tommy, why don't you kind of give us the history of Dark Secret and how that started out. And I know initially it wasn't a barrel-aged beer, right? And then it kind of morphed into that, and it now kind of continued that streak. Yeah, so, you know, Dark Secret been brewing at Brookstone since 2006, and Dark Secret began development probably in, you know, 2010, I would say. And it is actually the only
00:04:21
Speaker
Imperial Stout, I brewed at the time. And just until last year, I brewed my second Imperial Stout in my life. So Dark Secret's always been the first Imperial Stout I ever brewed. Never changed the recipe from day one. So we've been happy with it. And like you said, when we first release it, people said, hey, brew a stronger stout, you know, for the winter. So, okay, let's brew this stout and let's boil it for a while. So we did that and it wasn't barrel aged.
00:04:52
Speaker
It came to the point where we said, Hey, um, let's start having fun with some barrels. And, uh, we've been doing that every year since. And now we used to call it barely dark secret, but now it's kind of gone to everybody knows that dark secret is barrel aged. Um, so we never released the unbarreled version ever anymore. Um, you know, and we're pretty, pretty happy.
Brickstone's 15th Anniversary and Limited Releases
00:05:16
Speaker
This is a special year for us because it's our 15 year anniversary. Congratulations. Thank you.
00:05:22
Speaker
Plus, it is, we're gonna do our Black Friday event at the Brewpub again, where you'll be able to purchase it there only. Dark secret over the last few years, we've been lucky enough to sell a lot of it at the Brewpub during our events, and it really hasn't made it out to market. We're actually trying to get it out to market a little bit more starting next year. There is some few cases out there,
00:05:50
Speaker
uh, I'd say 95% of it is sold at the brew pub. Um, this year we brewed about 33% more than we did prior year. So we're hoping to get out to the market. Um, some barrels, I just got in, we got some less maple urban barrels from heaven Hill. We've got some Elijah frag, um, 20 year old barrels. Um, we got some rum barrels. So, you know, next year we're going to have a lot more variety of stuff. Uh, this year, black Friday, we're,
00:06:20
Speaker
um, release in our double Oak Woodford reserve. And then we also have double Oak Woodford reserve agent on vanilla. So those are two canned variances. Um, after that, you know, we'll have some stuff in draft, a bunch of different stuff. We're, you know, playing around and having fun with, uh, like we did, uh, last year with, uh, raspberry tiramisu Irish cream. Uh, but it, you know, like I said, it's a special year for us being our 15th anniversary and bringing it back to the brew pub.
00:06:50
Speaker
uh, you know, obviously COVID stopped that the prior year. So, um, a lot of our customers are excited to come and see people that haven't seen in a while. And we open up at 8 a.m. Uh, we have biscuits and gravy and beer. So, you know, you know, what else could you ask for on a Friday after Thanksgiving?
00:07:09
Speaker
Brandon, what are we doing Black Friday? We might have to go down there. I was just, as everything's going through my head, I'm like, well, my mom and stepdad are in town, you know, I could make the road trip. They could come with, they'd enjoy it. That would be a fun time. Maybe we should just- Honestly, you had me at Biscuits in Green. Not only does this year's dark secret, which by the way, I like,
00:07:34
Speaker
that it's, I like that it's just called dark secret and that it's, I don't know why, but when you were saying that and you're like, yeah, the barrel age is just out of it. It's just called, you know, dark secret now because everybody knows what it is. I kind of like that. I feel like it, you know, when you hear barrel age for certain beers, that's, that's great, but it really, it makes it seem like there's something else. Like there's another version of that beer. And like you said, it's just dark secret now and that's all it is. So that kind of just becomes,
00:07:58
Speaker
you know, a part of it. There's other barrel aged beers that do the same thing. But you know, I think that's great. But hearing what you guys did this year and what's available. Oh, man.
Flavor Insights: Vanilla and Raspberry Tiramisu Stouts
00:08:08
Speaker
I saw the post today on Instagram and saw the reveal of what dark secret is. And I got really excited, especially because I'm a huge fan of vanilla in big stouts. That's to me is just like,
00:08:22
Speaker
It's I think we talked to I think we talked to us on the short fuse episode about how vanilla is, you know, used in baking to bring out the other flavors, you know, and and and that works exceptionally well.
00:08:37
Speaker
and stouts, especially barrel aged stouts. I feel like when you've got the right amount of vanilla, I mean, I do also really enjoy like huge vanilla bombs where it's like, oh man, there's just a lot of vanilla and booze behind it. I'll drink it. I will drink vanilla extract if I need to. I love it that much.
00:08:54
Speaker
But I just said, I'm not really going to do it. I'm just I'm I'm excited, man. And I will say that there is a a place that Brandon and I live by that did have dark secret on the shelves. So I'm hoping that that place still has it. And I'm going to say it just now, because I did. They they did. It's I mean, well, the binnies bias, the binnies by I'm Portis Park at it.
00:09:19
Speaker
Oh, do they still have it? Not anymore. It's gone, baby. That was last year. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Some homing maybe that it might make its way over there. Yeah. So that was kind of how, after we did the last episode, I think, Tommy, you had hinted on kind of like the different variations that you had done. And I had remembered that I had just saw that there was a vinnies that had dark secrets still on the shelf. So I ran there, I grabbed that.
00:09:44
Speaker
drank it and it was awesome. And then when we were talking about doing this episode, I thought, well, I wonder if there's any minis that still has any dark secret from last year. And the one in Logan square actually had two four packs left. I bought one of them. I wasn't greedy. The guy's like, he's like, man, I'm surprised you knew we had this. He's like, I don't think it was on the shelf anymore. He's like, but we have it sitting in the back. I'm like, why don't you put it on the shelf? Somebody will buy it.
00:10:13
Speaker
um but I yeah I bought it so and I was excited too because um you know I think I got two of the the base just regular barrel-aged dark secrets and then there was one raspberry tiramisu and one irish cream that I did give to Tony that he's not drinking right now um but I am drinking the the raspberry tiramisu and I had this one earlier this year and this one is awesome um
00:10:39
Speaker
I'm a fan of tiramisu in general. I don't know if I've ever had raspberry tiramisu, but just the way the flavors kind of go so well together in this and like the vanilla, the chocolate, all of that kind of richness from the stout kind of definitely accentuates the raspberry, which is awesome. But I'm just kind of curious, like, what did you guys do to kind of get that, to build this flavor profile? So we used vanilla, we used pureed raspberries,
00:11:10
Speaker
Um, we used, uh, some, I believe we used cocoa chocolate, um, and in that variant, and we thought the raspberry was obviously going to be the dominant flavor in it. And the vanilla will help, uh, bring out some of that chocolate flavor, you know, give that sweetness to it. So we were happy. And I don't think we covered up too much of the barrel by putting way too much raspberry in it or, or vanilla. So, you know,
00:11:39
Speaker
you know upon smelling it you get some raspberry aromatics and then you know tasting it you get it right up there in front and towards the end you get some of that chocolate and vanilla flavor so we're pretty happy trying to we've never um you know really adjuncted dark secret and it was the first year and and it was pretty good success because people have had dark secret and they've had barrel ages they've had vanilla and then for us to come out and say hey let's just do some other flavors which
00:12:08
Speaker
Um, this year, I think we got like on black Friday, we have like 10 different variances on draft of dark secret. So you're saying I should get up early. Yeah.
00:12:23
Speaker
The one thing I did notice, I didn't mean to cut you off, but kind of to your point about like with the amount of raspberry in there, one thing I did find interesting when I do pour it, the light hit it just right. And the head on it had like a nice kind of red hue to it. And that was kind of neat. Yeah, definitely. I wish I knew what that was like right now.
00:12:45
Speaker
But so, so what Tony means by that, Tony's not drinking this, obviously Tony's drinking. He's actually doing it the 15th anniversary, 15th anniversary. But if I'm correct, if I'm correct that, Tommy, that is a very like, it's dark secret, correct? Yeah, so it's dark secret 15, we called it, you know, us being our 15 year anniversary, so let's, let's
00:13:11
Speaker
Um, do a special dark secret release. That's not on black Friday. So that's where they came from. We've never released dark secret, not on black Friday. Um, this was aged in Blanton barrels for 18 months. Uh, the double of Woodford reason, uh, Woodford been aged for 21 months. Uh, so it's very interesting to try the same batch of dark secret aged on different barrels for different times.
Barrel Effects on Beer Flavor
00:13:37
Speaker
So I'm actually drinking the, uh, weller.
00:13:40
Speaker
in the Blanton, so last year's Weller and then this year's 15 Blanton's. I'm letting them warm up a little bit, but I'm getting a couple of different flavors from them from the barrels, but it's interesting because they're the same batch of Dark Secret, but just a different kind of different barrels.
00:14:00
Speaker
it's it's it's fun how the barrels and for people when i when i explain to some people like co-workers or even family members uh barrel age beers why it's so exciting and what's so special about them is exactly what you just said there's
00:14:17
Speaker
you took the same batch of beer, aged them in different barrels, and it really does bring out different flavors and nuances that only come from those particular barrels and the way that the beer is aged in it because whiskies and bourbons are, you know, different recipes and depending on the barrel,
00:14:37
Speaker
And what happens at nighttime with the barrel, you know, what what all comes out of it ends up getting imparted into the beard in different ways. And, you know, there's there's a lot of science behind it. And it's really exciting when you get to try a new barrel aged beer or like you're saying the two, you know, one batch, two different barrels. That's exciting just to try in itself. To me, those are like variants right there. Yeah. And people don't understand, you know,
00:15:03
Speaker
They say, oh, it's just a whiskey barrel. It's the same thing. No, there's different flavors coming from red girl. You know, when we taste all the barrels around there's, there's a day. I think I had a picture last week where we, it was a shorter day of tasting bros. We taste like 12 or 14 different barrels and lined them all up. And you know, we go down the line with the team and everyone's getting different flavors on every single batch. And then we blend them together and you know, it really comes to, uh, you know, the beer we want it to become.
00:15:32
Speaker
You can get some more bourbon out of one, some more dark fruits out of the other, but it's pretty fun to try the different barrels. We've thought about doing a single barrel dark secret release one time. You know, it's a lot harder for us because our tanks are larger. So, you know, getting one barrel in cannon, it's a little harder for us, but we thought about trying to do that.
00:15:58
Speaker
Well, if you ever just want two random podcasts, guys from Chicago, there's a few of our podcasts just as extra tasters. You know, you know how to get a hold of Brandon. That sounds that's that's that is one of the things that I find so awesome when we talk to other people who work at breweries, the whole tasting process like
00:16:21
Speaker
Yes, it's, it's, it's your job, you know, and you're going through it and you're, you know, there's, there's some professional aspect to it. But at the end of the day, you're literally trying like such cool shit in one, like, like with all the people that you're around and work with, it's like, let's, what, what coolness did we, you know, what delicious goodness did we end up with? And, you know, you guys get a chance to try and then blend it all together. I mean, and, you know, to try and put out the,
00:16:51
Speaker
the best tasting thing possible. Not only is it, you know, that that probably is a little stressful, but that just sounds freaking fun, man. Yeah. You know, we've tasted these barrels from I would say six months on. That's awesome. Seen it from six every day. You know, it's fun because you see, OK, it's a six month mark. I'm not getting all the flavors I really like in dark secret. So then we let it go a little longer. And actually, we got to be your point. We're like, man, this is really tasting good.
00:17:20
Speaker
Let's see what it is longer. And I'm tasting it two side by side right now, and the one it takes longer, I'm getting a little different flavors out of it. And I'm like, wow, this is kind of nice. Same beer, like I said. But it's fun to track it through the whole process from six months all the way this year to 21 months.
00:17:44
Speaker
That's awesome. You know, if we could, I'd age a little longer. We've done some double barrels that have aged longer. Those were close to two years, but you know, this is long as single barrel aging we did. That's really cool. I went in for a couple sips of the 15 and
00:18:07
Speaker
It's the smell, the aroma on it, like it hit me right away. It's very, it's very much a barely aged beer. There's a roasty chocolatey vanilla deal going here. And then my first sip.
00:18:23
Speaker
I got like a bitter sweetness that I like. Like it's not overly sweet. I do like that. There are some barrel aged beers. I think are just too sweet that maybe you lose sight of, you know, just a solid sout. You know, if it's just, it's an imperial sweet stuff, that's one thing, but there is like, there's a sweetness to it, but it's not overly sweet. There's this nice like
00:18:43
Speaker
like a bitter coffee flavor. And then there was like the barrel. And then this last sip I got, which I don't normally get in, I wouldn't say normally, but I don't get in a lot of barrel aged
Exploring Beer Flavor Layers
00:18:56
Speaker
beers. I think this is a really nice flavor. It's like a dark fruit almost, just in the back.
00:19:02
Speaker
I get like a dark fruit raisin or prune it in the end. Yeah, exactly. That's nice. I like that there's different layers as I'm going through this beer of when it hits my tongue to when it hits my gullet, there's all these different flavors that I'm getting. I think, again, that's something that I wish people who don't
00:19:26
Speaker
Dabble and trying barely aged beers you know you miss out on it's it's like wine I compare it to like when you drink a good wine we could try a good wine you can taste all these different things or even or even just bourbon itself. There's all these different layers you can get from it and we can get that in a beer.
00:19:42
Speaker
I think that that just screams like well executed and that, you know, the brewery and the brewers and everybody took real care and thought and time and obviously six months of sampling every single barrel as tough as that was, you know, to really get the right tasting beer. And this to me is awesome. There's also like a dark, I get a nice dark cocoa too that I love. Yeah, we use a lot of dark chocolate malt in this and I'm tasting the Waller
00:20:12
Speaker
from last year and I get more chocolate than dark fruit. So it's kind of nice taste side by side. Brandon, do you have any more weller cans on hand? I don't. Son of a bitch. I got a few four packs left. So I'll send them over to you guys.
00:20:29
Speaker
Or if, you know, we stop on by on Black Friday, maybe we'll see. Okay, here you go, yeah. Me and my mom and my son. So here's a question that I have because there's obviously different methods that people, we talked about what you use to get, you know, your flavoring into the raspberry tiramisu. At what stage do you add the flavors? Everything's closer to the end of fermentation in the barrel. So read them in the barrels.
00:21:00
Speaker
If I remember, we're probably doing prides a few weeks beforehand, and then we're letting them sit. So it does spend some time in the barrel. Yeah, yeah, we do. We let us spend time in the barrel. That's awesome.
00:21:17
Speaker
Yeah, because the reason I asked too, there was another brewery that I will not name that I saw, they were moving their barrel aged stuff out and then putting it into bright tanks and then just letting the adjuncts sit on it for like three days. And then they were canning it. And I'm like, that doesn't seem like a lot of time. And then I also thought like that could either be really good or really bad because you may get way too much of that flavoring or you may get not enough of that flavoring.
00:21:47
Speaker
You know, this year I was thinking, I said, I wonder if I put some in way earlier in the process to see what's going to happen. And I'm like, you know, we have extra barrels this year, so this might be the year that we're starting to experiment with different stuff. But I think we'll lose some of the flavors, you know, as it ages. Yeah, I mean, speaking for this raspberry tiramisu, you know, a year old now, and the flavor is still amazing.
00:22:15
Speaker
That's what's, that's what's nice. I'd like it held up really well. Thanks. Yeah. Feel free to pour some of that like a solo cup for me and I'll come grab it tomorrow. Just pour a little of the side of the little shot glass and I'll just leave you a splash. Thanks. That'd be great. Yeah. It's, uh, the whole idea of.
00:22:34
Speaker
uh, adjuncting barely stouts is always intrigued me because you already have. Something as I was saying, like is very well thought out when it came to doing any variance, like the variance you guys have this year. And then obviously the ones we were just talking about the Irish cream, uh, the raspberry tiramisu. Um, when you guys are, does it come like,
00:23:01
Speaker
after the fact, like when you know you've got the beer maybe where you want it and then you're like, well, let's try this because I really liked the way that, you know, this beer tastes, I think this would work well with it. Or do you already kind of have something in mind? So last year we were lucky enough to be able to release a weller. We released a vanilla espresso, Irish cream, raspberry cream soup. We had more barrels this year coming to this Black Friday release.
00:23:31
Speaker
we're pretty limited so sure we want it we want people to be able to enjoy the the the work that's been put into this beer of just the barrel aged so and then we decided i love vanilla and imperial stocks barrel aged so you know i didn't want to add anything else and just because we were very limited this year coming up uh at this black friday release i said let's just take the two one vanilla one regular barrel aged um because
00:24:00
Speaker
we wouldn't have the extra beer to try something else different. So I think last year we're lucky enough to have a little bit more ready. So we're able, let's just, you know, I think it was a couple of months beforehand. We sat, we sit, we have a table upstairs in our office that we all kind of sit around. It's our round square table that we sit at, but we kind of just start thinking of different flavors. And then we start,
00:24:29
Speaker
playing with them, we use different beers to flavor and taste and see how they're gonna come to life. And I think this is something that the team said, hey, let's try this, let's try that. And we said, okay, let's for the first time, let's adjunct dark secret was something else, pastry-esque. And it was pretty fun to do. But again, if it was releasing one dark secret, I love people to be able to taste the barrel and taste the different flavors you get from the barrel.
00:24:59
Speaker
And like I said, a lot of people think all the barrels are the same and I'm tasting two different barrels here and I'm almost like I'm drinking two different beers, but I'm not because they're the same batch. So it's pretty fun. And honestly, this is the first time I'm tasting these two side by side. I tasted, you know, off of the barrels, I taste them, but this is the first time I'm tasting them side by side.
00:25:21
Speaker
Oh, well, thanks for sharing that experience with us. I feel like this is a, that's kind of a big deal. So if I remember correctly, is one of the variations of dark secret, not variations, but one of the barrels that are coming out, was that like a binnies pick? So those are coming. So we're actually canning that tomorrow. So I will probably,
00:25:51
Speaker
Let me see if I could send you a photo. I have this whole voice screaming in my head. Every time you say you're doing something that wants to say on my way to stop that. Um, so yeah, so this will be the second binnies collaboration, binnies pick barrels we're doing. Um, we have, uh, while Turkey Russell's reserve, um, barrels. And again, you know, I taste them and it's, it's different than.
00:26:19
Speaker
you know, some other barrels. So I'm really happy with them. We're excited that that's the beer that's going to get out to market. You know, the beer we have released by Friday might get out a little bit, but that's the beer that we have enough of to get to their benny stores. And this is another project we've been working on for, you know, 20 months. So we're finally bringing this to life. And it's been fun along the way with getting different barrels from them and
00:26:49
Speaker
and working with them on the label and being able to get a different variance out there that no one else is gonna have, you know, not even us at the group, but we're not even gonna sell it there. That's awesome. Yeah, so it's gonna be an exclusive Binny's deal. Well, when we get a hold of something, we'll have to maybe have you come back on. Oh, yeah. It was- We'll send you some. Yeah, we'll have any.
00:27:18
Speaker
Yeah. It's funny to be, you know, just thinking about that, you know, how many people, you know, may just not realize how explosive of a beer that actually is. Like if you see it at Binney's and just like, Oh, it's just another barely dark secret. No, no, that's a specific and special barely start secret. And I'm super excited. And I definitely, you know, do you know, so do you know roughly when it's going to hit Binney's stores? Um,
00:27:47
Speaker
We wanted them to release it after a Black Friday. So there's no confusion. So I would say probably December is what we're looking for. So it's right around the corner. We want our Black Friday release to go finish up and then we get the labels in next week. We're gonna label up the beer and ship it off to them. So I'm thinking logistically first two weeks in December.
00:28:16
Speaker
We just didn't wanna confuse people of releasing our dark secret out to the market and then also having our Black Friday event. And again, you're two different beers. So it's gonna be fun to try them all side by side.
00:28:32
Speaker
Yeah, I'm thinking that that will be a nice maybe Christmas Eve beer for me this year. I like to save whatever one or two barrel age offerings from the Chicagoland area that I save specifically. Like I'm saving this. I know that this is going to be for Christmas Eve.
00:28:55
Speaker
because what I like to do on Christmas Eve, that's when I wrap gifts. I don't wrap gifts at all. Like we go out and we normally like we'll go to a family member's house or have it here or whatever and home by like nine or 10, I'm not driving and I've had a few already and then it's like now it's time to wrap gifts and that's when I crack open.
00:29:15
Speaker
one or two special beers. So that, for all you other people out there who do the same thing that I do, maybe this beer is what you hold on to for your Christmas Eve wrapping. And you and I can wrap gifts together and enjoy the special Denny's dark secret. There was the commercial right there, printing. There we go. Yeah, I mean, a lot too is like, you know, a nice Christmas, you know, us thinking too, it's like, you know, we have our Black Friday, we have our Thanksgiving there. And, you know, a lot of people,
00:29:46
Speaker
can't hold on to the beer. If they get a four pack, they don't hold on to it till Christmas, you know? So, you know, we thought, Hey, let's wish I had anything and do it after. Um, that's my problem. Yeah, I probably was I don't hold or I do hold on to things. And it's like, great. Now until I come by. Yeah, we thought Christmas would be a good kind of release. You know, people get, you know, around, you know, before the holidays.
00:30:15
Speaker
for another dark secret.
00:30:18
Speaker
We're pretty excited to get that one out. Yeah, it would be nice if breweries, if like all the Chicagoland breweries could get together, this would never work because like, you know, someone's gonna be like, we're the first because everyone wants to spend their money on us or whatever. But I mean, there's just, there's so many available that if it was spread out wider, I mean, how awesome each week, you know, you'd find something. Although that is kind of the way it has become,
00:30:46
Speaker
in our area with barrel-aged releasing. I mean, with Dark Secret coming out Black Friday, and as everybody knows who listens to this, there's another brewery that does a big Black Friday release as well with their barrel
Chicago's Barrel-Aged Beer Scene
00:30:59
Speaker
-aged beers, Busan, and Short Fuse is doing, or has done theirs by the time this comes out, has already done theirs.
00:31:06
Speaker
Maplewood has done. There's Revolution has theirs coming out, you know, every other, every three weeks or something, their whole series. Half Acre has it, Beguile has it. I mean, we're just, I know I'm leaving some out, Cruz Blanca. You know, there's just, there's so many barrel aged beers, and I feel like we're so lucky to live in this area.
00:31:29
Speaker
uh this part of the country it's it's barely age country this time of year and it's oh yeah it's so awesome so i'm really excited that you guys have the binnies exclusive that i will be coming out in december because you know a lot of the stuff is is coming out in november a couple things maybe in december but to know that you know you guys have the big dark secret release uh and then there's another dark secret coming out that's just going to be at binnies so that's a bonus man that's awesome yeah yeah pretty much because you know we don't we
00:31:58
Speaker
This year, especially, you know, we had different variances throughout the year. So usually it's just, you know, Black Friday and that's it. And, you know, and then you gotta wait till next year. So this year is pretty fun to, you know, release a couple different through the year.
00:32:10
Speaker
I feel like it would have been, I mean, this definitely probably wasn't planned, or maybe it is. It's called Dark Secret, but doing this special release at Benny's and just kind of floating some like social media posts, like specific stores that it's at, and you got to solve some kind of puzzle to find out where the secret, the dark secret is. That'd be awesome. Like I would do that. I remember, and just like not- If you want, I can hide some beers throughout the city in our neighborhood and just make that our own-
00:32:40
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, I'll do it, yeah. You know what, Tommy and I will get together and put together a map of a dark secret, a hunt for you. Or you can do...
00:32:48
Speaker
Maybe that's a good Easter idea. You want to do like an Easter dark secret. There you go. It's funny because that kind of popped into my head because back years, years ago when half acre first started, they used to do these random social media posts and like hide tokens somewhere and like people would go and you'd find the token and they'd give you a bunch of like beer and swag. I was like,
00:33:12
Speaker
Yeah, I could never figure it out. Like I literally watch it all the time. I was like, I have no idea where that is. I'm like, and I'm not even gonna try. But it was just kind of cool to see stuff like that. So, you know, dark secret is you got the perfect name for like, you know, unless you want to start randomly hiding cans around the city and then a miner finds it and then you're really in trouble. Yeah, don't do that. Mom, look what I found. I feel funny. Um,
00:33:42
Speaker
So, wait, what are we drinking this game? I was gonna say, let's see. I think we're in Easter right now, Easter. Yeah, I keep going back and I'm like, well, Tony's not drinking the- Is it November right now or April? Yeah, it's April. Before you know it, spring's right around the corner. I don't know, I'm just shocked that Thanksgiving's coming up, so.
00:34:05
Speaker
I do love this time of year for multiple reasons. I am someone who embraces the holidays. I explained this to my wife. She's not huge on holidays. She likes them, but I embrace them. I love the holidays because I felt like growing up, no matter what was going on and not that I had a terribly hard life, this is going to sound like the biggest sob story or something.
00:34:25
Speaker
But no matter what was going on in my life or, you know, people went around me at least like we had those like holidays where it was like, no matter what's going on, you know, things could really suck. It's a great time to spend time with family and friends. And whether it's huge or you see one person or one, you know, one family member,
00:34:49
Speaker
one friend or whatever, it's always like, I always look forward to this time of year. And the bonus of it is barrel aged beard. Yeah, that's it. It's funny, because that's how our Black Friday feels. We go Thanksgiving at our family's house and everybody that's there works at the group up with us. You know, my mom, my sister, my cousins, we're all at the brewery. And
00:35:11
Speaker
I'm not taking your work home with you. We're like, what are we going to do now? We're like, well, we got to get up at five in the morning and go set up for dark secret day. It's a long day. I'm going to go sleep at the brewery. I'll see you guys later. Yeah. So, you know, uh, we've been open 15 years and I'm 41 now. So, you know, we opened when I was starting to open the brew and I was 25. And, uh, those days were a little rough to get up for, uh, you know, to open up it.
00:35:40
Speaker
you know, six in the morning. Cause you know, I'd be out the night before now I'm in bed by nine o'clock. So it's like, you know, I'm the first one there probably. Yeah. It's funny how that changes. I never thought that that would change for me of being like, my wife still goes to bed before me, but you know, late for me now has become 10 30. Like, whoa, this is really staying up late. I got to get to bed. Yeah. There's a reason I don't work retail anymore. Yeah.
00:36:08
Speaker
Especially like, I used to work at Sears and then I think they'd open at like five. I think first couple of years was six o'clock and then it was five o'clock. Then I stopped working there. And then I remember like the last couple of years they were open in the city. They were like, they're going to open at four. I'm like, why? Who goes to Sears at four in the morning? Just go straight to straight to work from the night before that. Yeah.
00:36:32
Speaker
But then I have like, and this is when I was in my twenties and I had friends that like, they'd have Thanksgiving dinner. Like, come on, let's go out. And we would go out and I'd come home. It's three in the morning. I'd literally lay down for 10 minutes, get up shower and like walk to work still drunk. Like stop at Dunkin Donuts and get a, you know, a box of coffee and like a dozen donuts. And then I'd like hide in the office until the doors open. You know, that's why it's closed down. Yeah. Yeah.
00:37:02
Speaker
You're the guy. Brandon, are you still drinking the tiramisu, right? Okay. I didn't know if you ended up going into the 15. I was going to ask you what you thought about it. Sorry. No, but I don't necessarily remember because it was a while ago, but I did have the 15 before and it was
00:37:22
Speaker
Stellar. I didn't let it warm up. I drank it out of the can because Tommy threw one at me when I was at the brewery and I wasn't going to say no. I threw it at you. Wow. What a welcome. And then I can actually say I did help brew the coming batch of Dark Secret because I helped pour in the candy.
00:37:42
Speaker
You were there that day? Yeah, I remember. I forget the guy's name that I was up there with, but we were dumping in the sugar. Yeah, we were sitting there just dumping in the buckets of sugar. Holy shit, look at you, man. Yeah, we have a ton of dark Belgian candy sugar in this. I know, dude, and I got some on my hand and I tried it and I was like, this stuff's great. I know why this is in beer.
00:38:07
Speaker
I know I invited you that day because I hate lifting up those buckets for cattle. Yeah, come by this day. It'll be fun. You know, you can take a look in the brewery. Maybe you could help out brew this beer. It was kind of funny, though. Ironically, so that our company does like every once a quarter, we get like a Wednesday off and that kind of worked out for me to go down there. And I took a couple of pictures when I was there.
00:38:32
Speaker
And then in our group, our employee communication channel, we have a specific communication of what you did on this special day off. And I was like, I went to a brewery and I took some pictures. And some person that I work with that I've never met before was like, is that Brickstone? And I was like, yeah.
00:38:52
Speaker
She goes, yeah, I live all the way up in Elgin, but I could see that from a mile away. I was like, there was nothing in the picture that said Brickstone, and it was of the production facility. And she was like, that's Brickstone. I was like, holy shit. That's awesome. And she was like, yeah, I drink a lot of beer. I was like, OK, fair enough. You are getting a promotion. Yeah, right?
00:39:12
Speaker
She's behind your show next. Yeah, exactly. And that's how it works. That's how it works. That's how we find our guests. If you like drinking beer, you're allowed on the show.
00:39:25
Speaker
So I have a bad tendency of plowing through beers and I realize this, I just like, so two things.
Carbonation Addiction and Flavor Development
00:39:34
Speaker
One, I love carbonated things. So I have an addiction to carbonated water now, which is a good thing, I guess. I don't know how that carbonic acid does to my teeth and my guts or whatever, but
00:39:44
Speaker
I enjoy drinking carbonated water a lot. And I realized that when I come home from work, that's what I'm craving in general, something carbonated, not soda or anything. So I am now in place of beer. I now just, you know, just slam bubblies left and right. But with the same thing goes oddly enough with like barrel aged stouts. I love the taste of barrel aged beer so much.
00:40:07
Speaker
that like I have to stop myself and slow myself down to like, hey, dude, this is, you know, enjoy this, savor the flavor. And so I've been really good because I think I opened this beer
00:40:19
Speaker
I don't know, 10 minutes into us talking and I still have this much left, which is very impressive. And I feel like I've taken a bunch of sips, Brandon, there you go. That's how much I got there. And as it's, I let it warm up a little bit before we started recording until I found out I had, you know, the wrong link to join you guys here. In the wrong chat room. Yeah, I was. I was like, says it starts at eight. I don't know what's going on. I'm normally the first in. But it really is like,
00:40:49
Speaker
whole idea of you know let let you know certain beers kind of warm up uh I my my my beer fridge is pretty cold because I've got all sorts of beers in there so you know if I have to pull a stout out I let it sit for a while like I plan ahead like oh I'm gonna drink this so let it sit for a bit to kind of warm up and the more that this is sat here the more
00:41:13
Speaker
not like it becomes better it really does like it's just it keeps getting better and better and of course you know as you drink stuff you know sometimes feel a little better as well so that might have something to do with it but it really is like i'm get it's i'm i'm almost getting less of that dark cocoa as much as i'm getting more
00:41:32
Speaker
chocolate now. And I know that has a lot that plays in with the whole idea of like, you know, when you get those vanilla essence from, you know, bourbon barrels and bourbon itself, I feel like that's kind of playing a role into it a little bit more. So it is, it is getting, it's getting better. It's getting better to me. It's so tasty, man. It's really good. And I have, I have a habit of telling, reminding people that I'm not blowing smoke up your ass. We have had beers on this show where I have just,
00:42:01
Speaker
kind of plainly said what I thought about it without being a jerk about it. But anytime that I am really enjoying a beer, I do genuinely mean it. If I didn't like this, I'm like, yeah, this is nice. And I probably would have left it at that.
00:42:17
Speaker
You can find the episode where I've done that, I'll give you. I'm going to watch the last episode of ours. They call that the Guy Fieri method. If you ever watch Diners Drive Into Dive, they say if he ever goes into just describing what's in the dish, he doesn't really like it.
00:42:34
Speaker
But if he talks about the flavors, you know, then he does. But it's like, oh, this this chicken, oh, you did really good with the chicken and then the the milk and the cream to make that sauce. Good. And then it's like he hated it. You know, that's a good point, because I good raspberries. I set my dark secret out at like 720 on my desk because I like it to warm up. And I always tell people, I'm like, honestly, let it warm up. You get different flavors.
00:43:04
Speaker
I do drink it, you know, colder and then I like to sip on it throughout and I start getting different layers and different flavors. And a lot of people, you know, when they drink barely beers, they just, they might only be drinking three, four ounces at a time and they'll finish it within the first five minutes. But, you know, and they're missing some flavors.
00:43:24
Speaker
Yeah, I feel like as this is this warmed up, you know, and it's getting more, you know, used to my palate tasting it. And this isn't a negative thing. I've lost a little bit of the dark fruit, but it's been replaced now, like I said, with more of a chocolate overtone. Yeah, yeah, it's and it's, that's awesome. I love the way that that's trans that it's transforming as I'm as I'm drinking it. Yeah, I got the same palette as you because I
00:43:54
Speaker
Same thing I was tasting dark fruit in the beginning and I'm tasting just more chocolate and bourbon sweetness. Yeah. So kind of funny that you both mentioned that. So I took this raspberry tiramisu out cold, cracked it and started sipping on it. And the reason I do that most of the time is because
00:44:14
Speaker
It is a different beer when it's cold and I do kind of enjoy stouts when they're cold, but I do like to see how they progress. When I first had it, you know, I talked about, you get the raspberry and the vanilla, like that would have been something, you know, pouring over ice cream or something like that would have just been like a really nice compliment. What's completely different about this now is it almost tastes like a chocolate covered raspberry, the raspberry tiramisu, like dark chocolate covered raspberry, cause it's,
00:44:43
Speaker
deep, deep cocoa and bright raspberry still coming through. And that's like, I like this more now. And I was like, I wish I had more because another one sit out and warm up because this is awesome. Yeah, I get more of the chocolate as it warms up and kind of fun to try it, you know, in different stages. We did, we did another barrel aged, like I said, this is the only barrel or this is the only imperial stout
00:45:12
Speaker
I brewed in my lifetime. Besides one, I, I brewed a small batch at the brew pub last year and it's aging in barrels right now. And, uh, it's going to be fun to try that one because I, I, I took some flavors from dark secret that I love. And I, I tried to push more of those into that, that imperial style we did. I still don't have a name for it. So, you know, I have to figure that out, but, uh, it'll be interesting to see. I use some more of that. I like a lot of that.
00:45:41
Speaker
dark chocolate and, you know, flavors and coffee. So I used a little bit more of those in this batch that I brewed. That would be my second imperial start I brewed in my, you know. So this is your career. Your dark, dark secrets. Yeah.
00:46:00
Speaker
I was going to say, just don't call it into the void. That's our beer name, Tommy. We've made that beer. Man, I trademarked it already. Shit. I should bring my attorney. Hey, that'd be a first so that I feel like we made like, you know, we made a podcast history there for an attorney who's out to us and says, hey, don't do that.
00:46:23
Speaker
I've only had that happen to me once in my life and it was Howard Stern's attorney and I will never let that happen again. I think you've talked about that on the podcast before. I might have when I used to. I was printing stuff when he went over to Sirius. I made a bunch of shirts and designs and stuff like that.
00:46:41
Speaker
I made a crap ton of money just selling them on this website. And then I got a cease and desist from Don Buckwald, Howard Stern's attorney. At least it was just a cease and desist instead of like, hey, you owe us money now. Yeah. Oh man.
00:46:58
Speaker
I mean, you got to have him on the show now. There we go. That's also how it works. Someone mentioned something and like, yeah, that's a good idea. We'll do that. And then we normally do. Well, I don't know. It's more the sound effects we don't add into the show. Speak of into the void. Brandon, you and I need to we need to brew that again. We do. We need to revisit that. When it was November 14th was a year ago. It was a year ago. Yeah. So that's what we gave to Tommy. And Tommy was like, it's a little thin.
00:47:26
Speaker
Hey man. It was, it was. Yeah. That is constructive criticism. And I appreciate that. There's, there's, you know, it's like, we got to, you got to take it. And I, I, I agree with it. It's a bit thin. I just love, I love the flavor of it. I mean, it's not the end all be all recipe. What Tommy has consistently said like twice when he was talking about dark secret is just boil it longer, boil it longer. And then it's who he said, same thing said us is like boil it a little longer.
00:47:54
Speaker
I'm okay with that. Someone that we've brewed with in the past, who I will not mention. Excuse me. There we go. That's all that carbonated water now fighting with the dark secret inside of me. Who we've brewed with in the past had said, I don't care what the volume is.
00:48:15
Speaker
right as much as what the you know projected original gravity was supposed to be and what the the body is supposed to to be and if you design a recipe you know when you design a recipe and you're designing it you know how you in your mind you know when you when you put it into whatever you're doing or writing it down you know you have this type of air profile in mind like how you want it to taste the mouth feel hops all that
00:48:42
Speaker
this enjoy. We do like thicker stouts. We like I don't miss a super chewy, but I'm not opposed to it. And really, if it came down to us just a little bit longer, then that's all we got to do. We got to that's why you got to keep that grass and the boil doesn't matter how long we've boiled it. Yeah, I told people don't worry about a lot of people don't want to boil longer because they're going to lose the volume. They say, well, I might have less beer, less beer, but
00:49:11
Speaker
you're going to have the beer you want. So, you know, we boil off a ton and actually, you know, we have three jackets. We have our internal calandria, bottom jacket, side jacket. We have an oversized boiler and all of our beers, except dark secret, we only use the calandria and the bottom jacket. We don't use the side jacket. It just boils too hard. And for dark secret, we boil all three jackets. And I think this year we boiled
00:49:42
Speaker
to 135 minutes of two hours and 15 minutes. That's awesome. Well, I mean, it's tough because it's a long brew day and you say, oh, I'm almost there. I just got to boil up. And then you're like, oh, it's a two hour and 15 minute boil as opposed to our regular, you know, 75 minute one. And it says, you know, we have to do two mashes to fill our kettle.
Brewing Process of Dark Secret
00:50:07
Speaker
So for us to brew dark cigarette, we do a 30 barrel. We have a 50 barrel brew hospital.
00:50:12
Speaker
The mask mixer could only do 30 barrels of dark secret because there's so much grain. So we pump 30 barrels over to the brew kettle. We hold it in there. Then we do another 30 barrel batch. And we pump that 30 barrels into the kettle so that we have 60 barrels. So we're boiling 60 barrels. And then we, so that's one day. And then the next day we do the same thing. So it's, you know, it's a long brew. It's definitely two back to back long brew days.
00:50:41
Speaker
for us, but you know, in the end, I tell the guys, I'm like, look, we do this once a year, you know, and, and honestly, the whole team, you know, it's such a long brew day. It's a fun beer to brew. They all want to be there that long. Sure. Hey, do you want me to get there and get started? No, everyone wants to be there, started and finished. So it's fun, you know. Yeah. I, I, I think that that's a good tip just for home brewers, excuse me, as well as just, you know, if a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a
00:51:11
Speaker
general at home can be long unless a simple beer where you can cut corners on mash times or, you know, you're adjusting, you know, volumes and stuff like that. I just did that with brown ale that I brewed recently.
00:51:27
Speaker
adjusted my, which I did the still, I still did a full hour mash, but I adjusted the volume of how much I was using for my sparge water because I was like, you know what, I'll be here. I don't want to be out all night. It was this past super cold outside. And I thought we were getting snow, but as in my garage, I was like, I want to cut down on time. So I ended up doing a half hour boil and adjusted my hops and everything.
00:51:55
Speaker
i ended up with my five and a half gallons because i figured you know anywhere from a half to a full gallon and i hit my numbers and i hit my numbers so if you plan ahead you know if you if you if you plan ahead and in the other sense look i got nothing going on today if i need to stand here and let this boil
00:52:14
Speaker
Yeah, maybe you have yourself another Pilsner at the end of the day, you know, while you're brewing. Don't have anything huge during your brew day unless you really don't care how that beer is going to turn out. I've had that mistake before. Oh, yeah.
00:52:27
Speaker
I mean, I did have a revolution death tower towards the end of my mash because I had one, I had a brown ale beforehand and then I had a death tower towards the end of my mash. Cause I said, this is going to be it. This is what I'm going to do. And I'm going to sip this until I'm done. And that's how it worked out. But yeah, if you invest that, if you plan ahead and, and, and invest that time and just letting it boil off a little bit longer, you'll end up with a beer that you want. Yeah. We, we don't even, uh, we don't sparch. So we send it all over and, you know, to keep our gravity high.
00:52:57
Speaker
we don't do any spark. So it's, it's a, it's a quick, you know, it's in the water. We boil off a little bit and then we're just going straight. And it's so weird not to sparge on a beer. We're like, wait, is this going to turn out okay? You know, the first time I'm like, you know, over the years, you're like, fuck, you know, I want the gravity higher, you know, so either boil longer, but I'm like, you know, let's not sparge and see what happens. So over the last, I guess, probably four or five years, we've never sparked dark secret. And, uh,
00:53:25
Speaker
you know, we were able to hit our numbers. I think I've had that idea in the past of if I did a brain, I think maybe I've talked to you about this or Mike, where if we did something like our Imperial Stout and you and I used our mash tons, did the full grain bill as if we were doing a five gallon batch, but we just did those first runnings and then boil that instead of sparging, then we have this big, like, like,
00:53:53
Speaker
Tommy saying, you know, you're not sparging, you just have this all those like pure sugars, just the first running. It's that's all sugar. It's all sugar. That's the best part. And you wrote that name that it's a little more expensive. But yeah, you then end up with you know what you want. And then the other thing is that you can do a second running of a smaller beer. Right. Same. And that same mash ton. Well, yeah, our last running is a dark secrets 18 Plato.
00:54:20
Speaker
So we could do a second running beer, but we have our vessels all tied up our match mixer, because we got to do two matches. So we got them all tied up. So we're always like, the team's like, man, how are we going to get a second running beer? I'm like, unless you want to be here about 35 hours, we could do them. But I said, I just feel like we'll save so much more money. I said, I know, but you know, it's a lot of
00:54:42
Speaker
A lot of hours. So, you know. That's when you call in two guys from Chicago who run a little podcast and we call that beer Little Secrets.
Little Secrets and Mystery Beer Concepts
00:54:53
Speaker
Ooh, there you go. Cool runnings. I had to throw that next time. Can't tree mark, probably. Probably. Probably can't do that. Sorry, I'm zipping my hoodie up, guys. I'll edit that right out.
00:55:09
Speaker
So actually, I switched up to the, is this the double haze juice? Is it the label? Yeah, the black. It's black label. That means it's important. Yeah, exactly. It's a mystery beer. You know, it's, it's funny, because we've done a mystery beer episode. And I was like, this would have been a perfect thing for a mystery beer episode, because there's no label. Yeah, throw it in.
00:55:35
Speaker
the mystery beer is. So I do have a random question, getting off all of, it's not that random, getting off of the barrel age stuff. We, I don't know if we told you this when, when did we, wait, what am I, I'm confusing something else. Disregard, I will edit this part out. Yeah, it was very random. No, maybe, maybe.
00:56:04
Speaker
Was it the milkshake beer? Was it the milkshake IPA? That's what we had. Yeah. Was that when we were texting back and forth in the episode like, oh my God, this is amazing. Did you have the latest one, the strawberry one we gave you? No, no.
00:56:22
Speaker
No, I have not had the strawberry one. We had... God damn it. What was it? What was it that we had? Now I don't have to check it out. A little very pomegranate maybe? Yes, that's what it was. Where me, Brandon... Was Clark on that episode? Yeah, that's right. So me, Brandon and Clark were texting back and forth. That's why I was getting confused. I was like, wait a minute. I know that Clark was on that episode.
00:56:45
Speaker
was on the episode with the milkshake IPA was that the brickstone. I remember going to binnies a couple times and and I kept looking for the next iteration of it because I was so excited to try another one. But the milkshake IPAs that you guys did or do
00:57:04
Speaker
We're not milkshake IPA guys, by any means. Brandon's barely a hazy IPA guy. And that was just so phenomenal that we were texting during the interview. How awesome. We don't really don't text during interviews. We're not texting each other separately if it's a Zoom interview. We were just losing our minds over it. I was gonna ask, you just said, what is the one that is available now? Strawberry? So we had a strawberry rhubarb.
00:57:35
Speaker
available. Yeah. And now the next one, I believe we're doing, uh, let me look this up. I think we have cranberry orange. Oh my God. That's like, that's a, that's like a Thanksgiving Christmas. Yeah. We were trying to push it out before that. And we were like, Oh man, we're ready. And we, we ran out of tank space and now we're in all these, uh, bourbon barrels. So
00:58:05
Speaker
I mean, I mean, people still drink it, but I, you know, the barrel aged beers kind of take precedence, but yeah, orange. Oh man, that'll, that'll still be good. Even in just cold weather. That's, that's going to be a nice milkshake IPA. But yeah, that's, that's kind of what I was that whole long drown out thing about me not remembering anything that I ever do on this show. Thanks for bearing with me.
00:58:27
Speaker
So the one question I was gonna ask is, you said there's gonna be 10 different variations roughly on draft for your Black Friday. So this episode is gonna be released this coming Monday before Black Friday. So is there any kind of hints you can give? It's the Monday before Thanksgiving is how I should have started the episode. Yeah, so any hints you can give us on what might be there? So let me pull.
00:58:56
Speaker
So we have a double dark chocolate. I mean, you know, I love chocolates. We did a double dark chocolate. We're working on a bananas foster. What? So if that turns out like, you know, what we anticipate we'll release that. Wait a minute. So hold up. Before you go further, how are you going to get the banana into the beer? We're going to curate and put it in the cake. So the way you work. Oh, fine.
00:59:25
Speaker
The way we do it, so we end up pureeing. Well, we put in a keg. Obviously we're not gonna, we can't package this beer. We'll put in a keg and then we'll put in an empty keg all the puree and flavorings we're gonna use in it. And then we'll push the dark secret on top of that so it mixes up. The only reason I asked about the banana was because Tony and I literally like the last couple of weeks have been talking about
00:59:54
Speaker
that same stout that we had brewed doing a banana version.
00:59:58
Speaker
And he had, listen, I think you heard it on a podcast about dehydrating the bananas. And I was like, yeah. And I had just, I had literally just for my kid dehydrated a bunch of bananas. And I was like surprised at how much of a banana flavor got like punched in the face. And it was like, we should do this for a beer. I'm like, that is a great idea. So, but then right after that, I heard somebody else doing a banana beer and they're pureeing. And I'm like, that works too. Like,
01:00:28
Speaker
Well, I hope that one turns out because I'm a huge fan of Bananas Foster. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I might. My neighbor, real quick for you, I would keep jumping off this. My neighbor next door, Jeff, who's been on the show many times, he I was familiar with Bananas Foster. I think maybe I had it once in my life. And one time we went over to his house.
01:00:47
Speaker
uh my wife and daughter and I uh just for like a you know neighborly holiday dinner and uh I had just spent the day at revolution drinking a bunch of like Death Star variants because it was like the release that year and uh he's like let's uh we're gonna we're gonna do bananas foster and we're gonna throw the bananas in here with booze and they sit it in and lit it on fire it was hilarious and
01:01:11
Speaker
Uh, terrifying at the same time, but I have this huge love for bananas done well and especially in a stout because I mean, who doesn't love a chocolate covered banana. Yeah. Yeah. That's what we thought right away. Chocolate and banana, but you can't go around. All right. What else you got?
Bananas Foster and Mint Beer Innovations
01:01:32
Speaker
Uh, what else we got here? Uh, I said we got a double dark chocolate we're doing. Um,
01:01:41
Speaker
So we have some of our 2020 weller. We have our, we have a raspberry dark secret from this year we're doing.
01:01:54
Speaker
We were mint chocolate chip. Then we had. Yeah, we had we did that for anniversary party and we saw that. You know what? I saw that checked in on untapped and that was I was like, what? How did I not know about this? I love mint. And we don't have to get into this now, Tommy. I might ask you about this when we're done, because I don't want to spend too much time on the whole like homebrewing aspect, even though that is part of the show.
01:02:20
Speaker
But I definitely want to try and figure out how to get mint into a beer. So please continue with any other variants that you want to talk about. And then we took a batch and we just did tons of vanilla on it. So we're double vanilla. Yes. It kind of went overboard on it. So we'll see. People that love vanilla will probably love it.
01:02:41
Speaker
Absolutely. I'm not joking when I'm saying I'm now really considering seeing what if my my my mom, I don't know if my stepdad would be down for it. Maybe you're taking over breakfast and fine. Yeah. Well, actually, you know what? That man does love biscuits and gravy.
01:02:59
Speaker
Oh, there you go. And so I think if I make like, I always want to try and take them out somewhere as far as like a breeze concern. And my stepdad does enjoy different types of beer. He gets on different kicks, like for a long this time, Alagash white he thought was the beast fucking knees and he's not wrong. Alagash white is good. But he was like, Oh man, that is the best beer ever. And then I forgot what he found. Oh, then he discovered he said, Hey, do you ever hear of this beer angry orchard?
01:03:30
Speaker
I was like, Tony, that's it. That's a hard cider is his name's Tony as well. Sorry. So, yeah, so he gets on these different kicks and he'll buy cases of beers and they live in Florida and he'll leave it in the garage. So, you know, he doesn't drink that much. You're doing man, you're killing me. Don't tell me that shit. Just tell me what you're drinking this month after his trunk. Yeah, exactly. So I think I can sell I think I can sell them on the biscuits and gravy. And then my mom, who is
01:03:58
Speaker
not a big beer fan, but anytime I like, mom, try this beer. It's supposed to taste like this and this and that, especially with fun, barely aged beers. She'll take a sip sometimes and be like, nope, that's not for me. I forgot what I gave her recently, but it was like, yeah, this is what it's supposed to taste like. And she took a sip and she's like, oh yeah, I can taste that. And then she started having a conversation with my wife and kept taking sips to the final, I interrupted the conversation. I was like, okay, that's, I just wanted you to try it. Thank you.
01:04:27
Speaker
So maybe I can sell them on that. And that would be a great way to, you know, get the weekend started Friday morning, head down to to Brickstone. And then I've got. Oh, there's Black Friday deals out there. You got to get this big TV. Oh, yeah. Good idea. You know what? I mean, I'm missing the TV in my guest room right now because I had to give it to my daughter when she went away for college. So watch out every time to do it. 100 inch TV for 200 bucks. Tell them.
01:04:51
Speaker
Done. Merry Christmas to all of us. It's just a gift for the house. Yeah, because Tommy's going to be selling TVs out of the back of his trunk. Yeah, wait a minute. Tommy, are you trying to sell me a TV? Look what I found on the side of the road. I got a side job here. This dark secret's not going to pay for itself. I just told you, we don't sparge.
01:05:13
Speaker
Uh, that being said, uh, I do kind of, you know, not to end this conversation because this is great, but I do kind of want to like close it out and remind people of this release that's coming up and where people need to go to be able to get this release. So basically let us know when, where. Yeah. So, uh, black Friday, we're bringing it back to the brew pub. Uh, you know, like it wasn't prior years doors open at 8 a.m. Uh, we'll price start. It's all a first comper served.
01:05:41
Speaker
We'll probably have a limit. We wouldn't know that until we finished packaging this week to see our yields. But yeah, it's always a fun time. Biscuits and gravy and beer and be buzzed by 8.30 in the morning. So for those that may be new to listening, where exactly is the brew pub located? Bourbon 8, so 557 Latham Drive and Bourbon 8, right off I-57.
01:06:12
Speaker
about five minutes right off the highway. And our production facility's not too far from there. It's a little bit like, a little less than a mile away, roughly. Yeah, you can see it from there. You walk there on a nice day, but we're still hosting it at the group pub where it all began and should be pretty fun.
01:06:30
Speaker
That's
Brickstone's Black Friday Event Details
01:06:31
Speaker
awesome. Yeah, Tommy, thanks again, man, for for joining us again and and throwing some drinking with us. Yeah. Drink it with us. You know, you're you you are always welcome on this show and I have I think that you will. We'll just keep we'll just keep talking. If you ever have anything you want to talk about, let us know. We're we're free. Yeah. We'll make ourselves available. We got to open. It might take a month for you guys.
01:06:57
Speaker
That would be awesome. Oh, that'd be awesome. Then you can tell us. Don't put me to work like I put you to work, Brandon. No, no, you just just show up. Just show up with a six pack of whatever the milkshake beer is at that time. All right. And we'll share and we'll share the binnies exclusive dark season with you. Yeah, thank you.
01:07:16
Speaker
You just point and tell us what to do. Yeah. You got to be the guy who says, just keep letting it boil. Don't stop the boil yet. All right. What the fuck you doing there? Well, all right, Tommy, thanks again, man. And thank you guys. Thank you so much. And then everybody go out there if, you know, in the surrounding area or even if, you know, you have a chance to just come up this way into Illinois.
01:07:44
Speaker
Stop by Brickstone on Black Friday. It's going to be awesome. You might just see me and or Brandon and my mom and stepmom there. Your mom and stepmom? My mom and stepmom. By the way, Tony, I'm not going to go there. My mom and stepmom. My mom and stepmom. I don't want to get canceled tonight. All right, Brandon, I love you, man. Love you too, man. Thanks for having me, guys. If I don't see you, happy holidays. Thanks, man. Same to you, Tommy. Cheers.
01:08:13
Speaker
This has been The Malting Hour. Be sure to follow us on all social media by searching The Malting Hour and at themaltinghour.com. You can also follow us on social media platforms individually. Branded can be found on Instagram as bmdub81. On Twitter, bdub81.
01:08:28
Speaker
An untapped, B-Dub drinks beer. Tony can be found on Instagram and untapped under Asafelp Chicago. On Twitter, TheAsafelpChicago. Clark can be found as Clarkhouseky on all three. Be sure to subscribe, like, and rate the show on your preferred podcast listening platform. Until next time, cheers from all of us at The Malting Hour.