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Episode 124 - Might Meets Right 2023 & FOBAB 2023 image

Episode 124 - Might Meets Right 2023 & FOBAB 2023

The Malting Hour
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This week Brandon and Tony recap their visit to Temperance Brewing Co. for their Might Meets Right preview event and the 21st anniversary of The Festival of Wood & Barrel Aged Beers.

Theme music provided by Myke Kelli (@mykekelli)
Outro and break music provided by @FluidMinds
Check out all our episodes at www.themaltinghour.com

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Transcript

Introduction and Episode Theme

00:00:00
Speaker
That will be the last one that I I drink out of this floor pack I think I'm gonna save that for one of the holidays Or to drink with those other two guys that sometime come on the show would have been on the show in a long time Who knows maybe I will maybe I won't I don't know. I don't know dude. We'll see what happens. You share with Matthew. That's great
00:00:22
Speaker
This week we recap Temperance's Might Meets Right and PhoBab 2023. This is episode 124 of The Molting Hour. What's the haps on the hops? Guy, yeasts, that's peace. This the molten hour where we talk about our 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 you wish you had. Join us for a drink. Join us for a lab. Time is never wasted. When you're getting wasted, the molten hour here. People, people taking places. People, people taking places.

Hosts Greetings and Barrel-aged Beer Discussion

00:00:56
Speaker
Welcome to the Malting Hour. I am one of your hosts, Tony Gullick joined always with... Brandon Winningger. Hey, Brandon. Hey, bud. How you doing? Good. It's been a long couple of days. Yeah, it has. You're not even probably drinking anything tonight, are you? Incorrect. I'm interested in what you're drinking, to be honest. Well, you just cracked it.
00:01:24
Speaker
The anticipation is killing me. I'm so excited, nervous at the same time. Brandon and I have been drinking a lot of barrel-aged beers this week into the weekend. It was quite nice, but also it's taxing. That held up really well. Twat is it you're drinking, my good man?
00:01:50
Speaker
Lake Effect Brewing Company's Start Your Day. Hey, what is Start Your Day? It's a bourbon barrel aged Imperial breakfast out brewed with maple syrup and coffee. Oh, yeah, get yourself a little coffee and booze before you go to bed tonight. That's smart. I am. Well,

Tony's Bourbon Barrel-aged Stout Experience

00:02:10
Speaker
this will be a good. Well, why don't you talk about the beer first before I get into mine.
00:02:16
Speaker
Yep, tastes like barely fire. The I'm not I don't know if I'm getting the coffee so much. Sip on it. Yeah, a little bit. The maple is coming through really nicely, so it's getting it's like chocolatey, mapley, good carbonation. It's funny because the can felt a little short, like it wasn't a full fill, but the help, Clint.
00:02:46
Speaker
But I mean, I'm I think it was. I don't know. It was good, though. And it is good, though. I don't remember if I've had this in the past, but I do enjoy it. And I was I was leery about like doing maple, because even that like you're more at Phobab.
00:03:04
Speaker
I was kind of trying to avoid some of the maple stuff because I was just not in the mood for maple bombs. And this is nice, very subtle. And it complements the maltiness of the stout, the chocolate notes that are coming through. And I think that the coffee is just very, very subtle. And this has not been chilled. This is one I grabbed from the back room. So it's been cellared. Yes.
00:03:32
Speaker
Nice. And I didn't want to chill it at all because I was like, I want to drink it just the way it is right now.
00:03:37
Speaker
Yeah, good call. I don't know if I had that one. Maybe it's a possibility, but I don't recall

Quality Variations in Stouts and Ratings

00:03:43
Speaker
having that. And I'm with you on certain maple beers can end up being very sweet or also just have a very strong maple syrup flavor that kind of overshadows the rest of the beer. And I feel like that really takes away from what they were going for. I mean, there's certain adjuncts that I really enjoy, like vanilla,
00:04:05
Speaker
I love a good vanilla stout, especially if it's a vanilla bomb, to be honest. But yeah, maple, maple is not that for for me. Yeah, I'll agree on the vanilla thing, but I've had some like vanilla bombs that were not good. And it's just it maybe it's the quality of the vanilla that they used in the beer or whatever. But I've had somewhere it was just like, it's questionable. But this one, this one's great.
00:04:33
Speaker
There's an octopus on that can. And since we're not going to be rating many beers, we might as well rate these. How many octopus arms would you give this beer? I'm going to go, I think, 3.8. Fair enough. Yeah, 3.8, I think. Just from first couple of sips into this. Definitely drinkable, definitely enjoyable.
00:05:01
Speaker
I this is one I think I could easily just do the entire can and I'm going to. And yeah, I don't have anything really negative to say about it. I think that I would wish the coffee would be a little more prominent. But

Temperance's Might Meets Right Event Preview

00:05:16
Speaker
my estimation of this beer is it's about two years old. So it's appropriate level of coffee for a beer that old.
00:05:24
Speaker
Yeah, probably some of that coffee probably fell off or faded after. And it didn't go green. So that's. Which is good. Yeah. Always not like Kermit the Frog. That's good. I wish I could try it, but instead I am trying. Temperances might meets right 2023.
00:05:44
Speaker
Basil Hayden Toast, which is 13.7% in my new Nifty Temperance Thin Stemmed Drinking Glass.
00:05:59
Speaker
Here's a forwarded RIP to that glass. Which is why I'm stressing. It's going to break at some point. I don't do well with glasses like that and I rarely use them.
00:06:16
Speaker
I have a Jessup's Farm one like that that I think I used once and I just put it back up. I almost knocked it over earlier. Didn't you break one from Jessup's Farm? Yeah, but it wasn't the thin stem, which is the regular one that I like using, which knock on wood I still got. But yeah, so I'll use this to transition into our first topic of tonight's or today's episode, which is we got the chance to go to Temperance this past week.
00:06:45
Speaker
to get a preview of their Might Meets Right, 2023 Bear Leads Beer lineup out in Evanston. And man, that was a fun time. It was. It was not overly crowded. It was not like an event where you have to stand in line to get
00:07:03
Speaker
samples of the beer. I think it was it was very well done. And I like how they did did it. You know, they have their brewery set up with tables and everything like that just kind of like a perfect situation for going in and sampling some of their newest offerings.
00:07:18
Speaker
Yeah, it was cool. We did it last year too, and that was a lot of fun that we did a media event and it seemed like there was people who were also industry people as well. This was an actual ticketed event that for $60, you got the four pack of the variants, four tasters,
00:07:38
Speaker
What you could use on tasting the four variants and also have a poor of or have a poor of What was it big crasher and something else? bird song whether
00:07:52
Speaker
that, or maybe I could be wrong. It might have maybe been a logger. But we used our four tickets to sample the beers because that's why we're there. Basement party. Basement party. There we go. I was right. It was a logger. We used our tickets to try these samples. We got there a little early. We both had a beer, hung out for a little bit. And then we got in there, got our first pour right away.
00:08:14
Speaker
And we went down the list and I, if I'm not mistaken, this was the first one, which is, yeah. So it's basil, hayden toast, basil, hayden toast. It's a aged in basil, hayden toast, bourbon barrels, the rich dark malts mellow and take on notes of dried fruit, caramelized sugar and toasted oats. Yikes.

Event Experience and Beer Tasting

00:08:39
Speaker
I'm still filming this from yesterday.
00:08:44
Speaker
And it's 13.7% ABV, which I looks like all of them are that as well. So this is the first one we got to try and I let this one room up. Jesus. I let this one warm up to room temperature.
00:08:59
Speaker
Uh, or at least get close to it. I took it out about 45 minutes before we started recording. And then I took this glass and cleaned it, but then I just let it run under some hot water for a while. Kind of warm up the glass as well. So this is warmer than when we had it. Cause we had a pretty cold. They're pouring it fresh there and it's super fresh. But what I like about this one and you and I ranked them together, we can go through that at the end here. Uh, spoiler alert. We liked all four of them.
00:09:30
Speaker
This, I'm getting way more barrel and I didn't read that description before we started recording. I'm getting a lot of dried fruit. It's really good. And I thought it was really good and I'm wondering if now maybe I like this more today than I did the first time we had it. It's possible. Now you just gotta drink all four of them today.
00:09:57
Speaker
Great idea. Said, that one, that sounds awful. And not because the beers are bad, because I got work tomorrow and my liver wants to just chill out for a few days. Please, sir. Please, no more barrel aged beers. We normally love it. Not right now. You've done too much. There is a way to burn out on barrel aged beers and doing a lot of barrel aged beer events. We'll do that. Because I'll even say, like,
00:10:27
Speaker
not jumping the gun, but like FOBAB even. It was like, we both talked about it. It's like, do we really want to do this today? I mean, again, we were super excited to get invited to that event. I mean, we look forward to it. And we had so much fun and had really good beers. And the awards were cool. And we got to run in some friends and hang out with them. But we started at 12 and ended up leaving.
00:10:51
Speaker
a little after three. Yeah, like three thirty ish. No, like three fifteen ish, I think. Yeah, because I think I was home by four. Yeah. By Uber. Thank you. Our Uber driver who I spoke with both our drivers for great. But so, yeah, so the event.

Attendees and Event Highlights

00:11:09
Speaker
Like Brandon said, wasn't super crowded, but you could tell that everybody that was there was really into it, really interested in probably our regulars or had been, you know, going to Temperance for, for years. And, uh, everybody was super cool. It was great to sample through all these beers. The next one we ended up trying was the Russell's reserve six-year-old rye, which is might be the right step, aged in Russell's reserve six-year-old rye barrels.
00:11:36
Speaker
Rich dark malts mellow and take on notes of allspice, pepper, and almond. I did not get that. No. But. No. I don't know. Again, I'm playing back. I don't know if I got necessarily all of those exact flavors, but.
00:11:56
Speaker
When we had the first two, that one was my favorite. Yes, same here. That was this one is very barrel forward, almost like you're getting a fresh pull of the stout out of a wet barrel like you'd have been sitting in there and like, here you go. Just put in your glass because the carbonation is, you know, it's not highly carbonated. It's a barely stout. And the Russell's Reserve
00:12:25
Speaker
I felt like the barrel is there, but it wasn't as in my face. Like I got to actually taste the beer. Yeah. Oh, yeah. That was a lot of fun. I think you and I both agree that that was our favorite. Or first or second. Actually, that was not my favorite. That was my number two. Yes, but out of the two. Out of these two, yes. The barrel present ones, the Russell Reserve was definitely
00:12:55
Speaker
top for me. Absolutely. And also this, uh, this event did sell out. Did it? Yeah. I just looked at the, which is awesome because it wasn't, like I said, it wasn't super crowded. So yeah, it was just enough. And I mean, literally the deal was.
00:13:11
Speaker
I mean, so $60 you get to, you get six ounce pours of each variant, take home the mixed four pack. Uh, also get to keep the glass. I'm going to break eventually. And then you have to hang out with all the people and you know, for $60 that's if we didn't get invited, I would have gone. Yeah, it was definitely well done. Um, if you got there early enough or you were there a little bit ahead of time, um, they had a local place there doing tacos inside the brewery.
00:13:39
Speaker
Like in the brewing area, they had a little couple of tables set up and they were just banging out some what smelled like delicious tacos. Which we thought maybe we were going to get, but we didn't. Yeah, we were dumb. Were we though? Because we had delicious pizza afterward. Delicious in quotes. We had inexpensive. Well, we had
00:14:04
Speaker
We had very large slices of pizza. Let's just forget that. You know what? And I can't not get it, especially after we're doing some drinking. And yeah, that that that pizza definitely holds its place. And if you were me, you may have stopped and got french fries as well. In a six piece note. I was leaving that part out, man. It's embarrassing to admit that to everybody.

Shalanda's Journey and Chocolate Beer

00:14:26
Speaker
Around that time is when we ran into Shalanda, Afro beer chick.
00:14:30
Speaker
That was nice to see her. I remember the last time we saw her, man. Was it about a year? I mean, when we saw her now, it was a half a shalonda. So those of you- She'll appreciate that immensely.
00:14:46
Speaker
I told her that. For those that don't follow her or that do, you would know that she's been on a weight loss journey and has done incredible. She looked great. It was almost hard to recognize her, except for the fact that she was, you know, her head wrap and her shirt and everything else matched. I was like, yeah, there's only one person I know that would match that. I think her nails matched too, actually.
00:15:13
Speaker
And then when she called me, she called me a jerk or whatever and says she loves you more than she loves me. So that may have also been the other thing. She just likes to give me shit. I'll give it right back, Shalanda. I'll give it right back. Yeah, but shout out to Shalanda.
00:15:31
Speaker
her journey has been awesome and very proud of the work she's put in and how she's doing it. I know she's super proud of it, but it was great to see her. She was living her best life and super happy.
00:15:45
Speaker
Yeah, I love drinking beers with her. It's just funny, man. It's always fun. She's great. It's a lot of fun hanging out with her and looking forward to bringing her on to do cocktails and cookies. That's perfect. That's a perfect holiday episode right there. So I'm going to stick to that. I'm going to say it right here right now. I'm going to call it. I'm going to make it happen, Brandon. OK. All my all my false things that I say on the show. That's what I'm sticking by. This is going to happen. You hear it, Shalanda? You're coming back.
00:16:14
Speaker
cookies and cocktails. I can't wait for that. I'm so excited. Yeah. All right. So around that time, we ended up moving on to the chocolate, which is aged. This is great. I didn't know this about this. And maybe you knew this, but the chocolate one is aged in both the basil, Hayden, toast, bourbon and Russell's Reserve, six year old rye barrels. So they blend both of those and let it sit in cacao and abs to bring out the chocolate malt notes. I didn't know that was blended. I assumed it was blended.
00:16:44
Speaker
Well, good for you, Mr. Smart Guy, who knows more about beer than Tony. Well, because there was no barrel description on the other. It was like chocolate, vanilla. And I'm like, Well, I didn't think of that. Okay, I just blend them together. Well, maybe you should go work for a brewery. It's cool to write to write their descriptions. Oh, you've landed this. So let's just call it chocolate.
00:17:11
Speaker
What did you think of this one? I liked it. The chocolate was subtle, but it was very, very complimentary to the barrel. Barrels. Barrels, yes. And I think I liked the fact that there was a blend. Now knowing and confirming that it actually was a blend. I'm super excited to have it again and let that one warm up again because these were
00:17:38
Speaker
being poured fresh straight from their fucking chiller area where they keep the other beers on tap. I feel like a lot of these beers need to warm up a bit and to bring out some of those flavors to let them pop because if they're subtle like that, it kind of gets lost. Yeah, and that's kind of what I was saying too. The chocolate was subtle and I feel like if we would have had more time and let it warm up, it would have popped even more.
00:18:05
Speaker
Um, but as it was, it wasn't a chocolate bomb. It wasn't like, no, no, but as it was, it was, it was really good. I enjoyed it immensely. It was a nice like dark cocoa, uh, and I'm a big fan of dark chocolate. So this one ended up falling and this is not a knock at this beer. Uh, my number four, um, and Russell's reserve is number two for me.
00:18:31
Speaker
And then the basil hazel, Jesus, was number three for me, which only leaves one more, which is the same thing.

Temperance's 10th Anniversary Plans

00:18:42
Speaker
Now if you guys, this is also a blend, and then they let it sit on vanilla beans to bring out vanilla notes from aging in oak whiskey barrels, and we found out that these were Madagascar vanilla beans.
00:18:57
Speaker
If you guys didn't notice what Josh, the owner had mentioned to us when he gave a little speech about what's about this release and what's coming up for Temperance, which by the way, we are speaking with Josh tomorrow. And so next week, we have an interview with Temperance, they'll be on the show to discuss, I think it's Josh and Connor are joining us to speak about their 10 year anniversary. So we get to give the history of Temperance.
00:19:25
Speaker
and their 10 year journey leading up to their 10th anniversary and their exciting 10 year beer, which we'll talk about on that show. If you might already know, I don't know. Yeah, it was funny because I'm doing something and it was Connor I ran into and he's like,
00:19:42
Speaker
So yeah, it's not your shirt or your sweater. I was like, yeah, so we've never made it happen, huh? Like we just saw Josh, we're working on it. We're working on it. And then we did, man. We pulled the trigger. We do Katie over there. Temperance is also very cool and has been very great with helping patient, patient, patient. Yes, we were originally going to go do this back in like.
00:20:04
Speaker
August and I had to cancel for personal reasons and they've been super cool and they invited us to this event. So yeah, so what Josh was saying was that
00:20:14
Speaker
They wanted to go back to the basics of might meets right. Cause they've done some like a lot of fun barrel aged like adjunct versions of this. Like they did, I know they've done Mexican hot chocolate. I think they've done like a chocolate mint one before too. I'm only focusing on the chocolate, but they've done, I know they've done like a berry one as well, but they've, they've kind of been all over the place. Complex adjuncts have been in the mix.
00:20:42
Speaker
Yeah, so for it being 10 years of doing this, they wanted to just do simple, which I when I saw the announcement of it was super excited because two different barrels and then a chocolate and a vanilla and those are simple enough and delicious enough. I feel like if done correctly that, you know, you're not going to lose the barrel, you're not going to lose the stout and the adjunct should
00:21:06
Speaker
help enhance the beer and I think chocolate and vanilla do that. Vanilla just happens to be my favorite. I love vanilla styles. I love vanilla beers. I love vanilla in beers. This one is not a vanilla bomb, but the vanilla does come out strongly. Am I saying that a bit strong? No, it was fantastic actually. It was very well presented.
00:21:44
Speaker
typically served at or people enjoy them at, the fact that the vanilla was just so prominent and so clean and just so complimentary to everything else in the barrel and in the beer, that was the standout for me as well. I was blown away. I didn't think I was, you know, like I like vanilla beers too, you know, and just trying it I was just like, oh,
00:21:53
Speaker
Not strong in an off putting way.
00:22:08
Speaker
Okay, here we go. Yeah, I was super happy with it, and that will be the last one that I drink out of this floor pack. I think I'm gonna save that for one of the holidays, or to drink with those other two guys that sometime come on the show, but haven't been on the show in a long time. Who knows? Maybe I will. Maybe I will. I don't know, I don't know, dude. We'll see what happens. You share it with Matthew? That's great.
00:22:41
Speaker
And that's the beginning of the show. Yeah. I love when we're knee deep into an episode and I hear something and then I catch it. Oh God, do I love it? And then I write down the time. Yeah. Oh, this, this was my number one. So it was this, then the Russell's preserve, then the Basil Hayden, then the chocolate. So these were, those are, that's the way I, I ranked them. Yeah. I think it was, I think it was the same. So.
00:23:06
Speaker
Yeah. And again, all four were good. And we're pretty transparent when it comes to beers. Although it sounds like we do like every beer. I think we just picked good beers to try, unless it was that Shorts episode. That Shorts episode, we were going hard on them.
00:23:25
Speaker
Sorry shorts. Sorry shorts. It was not a good episode. It was not your day. But all these, all four beers are really good. And I definitely recommend the price point on it. You know, it's when you consider like some of these other barely aged beers, the fact that you're getting
00:23:39
Speaker
basically a mixed four pack. You can't buy just the Basil Hayden four pack. You can't buy just the Russell's Reserve, et cetera. It comes as a mixed four pack. And I think that's awesome. I think it's a really cool way to sell these beers. And I have always appreciated that about Temperance with the Might Meets Right series. So the price point, I think it's like, it was $32, $34, something like that.
00:24:05
Speaker
I think 34 DNA is what they said. Yeah. So I mean, that's 48 ounces of beer. It's almost 14%. You get to try the barrel separated and the barrels together blended with some really nice, simple adjuncts that really make the rest of those beers and the barrel aging kind of pop. My fear is when this hits store shelves,
00:24:32
Speaker
You know, there's always the people that just sneakily try to go in and crack the packs and then like put everything together and, you know, Oh, this is a four pack of vanilla. This is delicious. It's like.
00:24:43
Speaker
How do you know my move, man? That's what I'm

Pricing Strategy and Retail Challenges

00:24:48
Speaker
going to do. I mean, it's great. But it's just like there was a time when I was going to get some bricks. I was just going to say it reminds me of the brickstone story. And I couldn't find like it's like somebody just kept mixing and matching. And I was like, I don't want all the same one. So.
00:25:06
Speaker
Yes. I hope that doesn't happen. Don't be that person if you end up going out to get these beers. Buy the four pack. And if you like it, buy it again. Buy it again. Think about all the other barrel aged beers you buy.
00:25:17
Speaker
I will say the only place that that should be, or that is acceptable to do something like that would be like beer on the wall or bottles and cans where they do allow you to separate. So if they allow you to do that with those and you feel like doing it, you know, like they allow the cracking of the cases there. So I would say do that.
00:25:37
Speaker
Yeah, and I'm not sure that they actually do it. I don't think they carry the mite meats, right? They might not. Yeah. Maybe because of that. Maybe because it just makes sense to do. It might be more difficult to do that because then here's the four pack and then, you know, you're snagging. They get them and then they tape them. Like all the vanilla's are gone. You know what I mean? Or all the Russell's reserves are gone. That would suck. I think it ruins the experience. It's really nice experience to have these four different beers. I like it. I kind of wish some other breweries would do this as well or kind of, you know,
00:26:07
Speaker
Try something like this. I'm not saying the other breweries suck for not doing it, but it would be nice like to this is an example. I'm not saying that old Irving should do this, but it would be fun to get like a four pack of Krampus. You know what I mean? A four pack of the mixed ones. But, you know, that's another story. We're going to try those anyway, and I'm going to buy them. Yeah.
00:26:32
Speaker
That's kind of what we had said. We were talking to a friend of the show, Pat, at FOBAB, kind of talking to him about the event. Was it him? Maybe it was the whole group. But I remember we were talking about it. We kind of said like, you know, try all because he was, I think, mentioning them. And I was like, you should try all of them. They're all good.
00:26:55
Speaker
We have preferences, but that doesn't mean that anyone is not as good as the other. They're all on the same tier to me, but there's just one that I prefer to drink. I would never turn any one of them down. Well, I mean, it's funny because I went with the basil hidden toast, and that was my number three. I decided to start with that, and I think probably the next one I ended up going with is going to be the Russell's Reserve.
00:27:23
Speaker
I had thought, I was like, I wonder if Tony's gonna crack the vanilla tonight. Saving that one, baby, saving it for Matthew. Yeah, and chocolate, I think chocolate, I'm gonna let.
00:27:36
Speaker
really kind of warm up. Another thing I'd like to say about this beer before we take a quick break and move on to the second segment of this episode. I like that this beer is not heavy. It's not a thick stout. They really don't go big on this stout, other than alcohol, but it pours like a cola color in the glass, which in the tasters, it looked really dark. And it looks dark in my glass, but pouring into it,
00:28:06
Speaker
It's, it's a nice, I don't want to say it's a medium body, medium body beer. And I like that. I like that. It's a barely aged out. It's like that because I feel like it really gets a chance to
00:28:20
Speaker
present the barrels or adjuncts a little bit clearer. And I think it's maybe even harder to do that with a beer such as this one without totally drowning out the actual base beer. Which again, a beer like this, I would love to try the base beer. With much like all the other barrel age stouts we ever have, it's always like, let's try the base, I wanna try the base beer. Yeah, so that'll be something we could ask Josh.
00:28:50
Speaker
Give us the base beer. Josh, can we have the base beer, please? We've been good boys. Yeah, so shout out to Temperance. Thanks so much for inviting us and giving us these gifts as we left. It was very nice of you guys. We appreciate it. Super nice. Next year, even if we don't get invited for this, and they do this again, I would go. I would go on a heartbeat. I had a lot of fun. It was a good time with you, buddy. And I think I eat the tacos there, too.
00:29:18
Speaker
It might be something else next year. I'm just saying, I was using it as an example. Okay. Tacos. Tacos is the placekeeper for whatever food they might have. Nice. You know what? We'll be right back.
00:31:17
Speaker
And we're back. Welcome back, everybody. I'm texting my mom, sorry. I wasn't ready. I mean, I was. Welcome back, everybody, to our special big barrel-aged beer episode. I don't even know what the picture of this episode is going to look like. Big barrel-aged beer bonanza. Big barrel-aged blowout. It's wild because this week,
00:31:43
Speaker
Old Irving does their presale for their barrel aged beers, the Krampus Collection. We're talking with them about doing a quote unquote preview, but I don't know if our schedules are going to work out for it to be a preview. I think it's going to be post release, but whatever. Excited about all five of those. That was last year, so it's fine. The five beers this year, though, just sound fantastic, the variants. I'm super excited. We got to try.
00:32:13
Speaker
one of those variants at PhoBab because we got to go to PhoBab 21st. What would you call that? 21st? Annual. Annual? Yeah. 21st year. I just said year. Yeah. Our anniversary was an idiot. Yeah. That was super fun and not sure how many of you got to go, but if you did, I'm sure you had a great time as well.
00:32:37
Speaker
I heard Friday was a lot of fun, and Brandon and I got to go on Saturday, that was yesterday for us. And we got there about an hour early, and boy, we just hit the ground running as usual, man. Basically going against our own advice. Which is, you don't have to go and try everything. Now, with that being said, we did hit a point where it's like, we need to cut ourselves off, we're done.
00:33:03
Speaker
Yeah, but it's also we, I didn't say we went, I won't say we went and tried everything because there was things. We did not. We didn't try things that we were interested in and that we wanted to try. And I feel like, so for the way the setup is, if you want like barrel age stouts, like some good ones.
00:33:23
Speaker
Like that, when you get in the entrance and go around the outer rim of the auditorium, like that's the best way to do it. Like you're going to get those and then you get sucked down into the, onto the floor. Right. Which is fine.
00:33:38
Speaker
But for us, when the general public comes in, there's a crowd in that atrium at the top, and then the floor is crowded as well. But you still have some time down there to navigate and find some things while the general public is still kind of filtering in. Because I'm not saying that everyone does this, but the
00:34:02
Speaker
The average beer nerd goes in and goes hard and they will just run the lines of like trying everything as soon as they get in. We were there with the same time as the VIP people, which there's not a ton of people there for the VIP. It's actually very nice. I would highly recommend if you go to FOBAB, pay the extra money, get that extra hour in.
00:34:27
Speaker
especially if there are a bunch of beers that, you know, if you go to Saturday, did they show what beers were available on Friday? I think the list was supposed to be the same. No, I know. But I'm saying, was it actually listed? Because I don't remember when the beer list was actually listed. I thought we were looking for it on Thursday and didn't see it.
00:34:46
Speaker
No, but I know I saw it like, I think Saturday morning is when I saw it, but I think the post that I saw somebody posted from was from like Saturday night. So I don't know. Or Friday night, you mean? Yeah, sorry, Friday night. So maybe they announced a day of, but if there are certain beers that you want to go and try, definitely do the VIP. It's worth it. Go in there. Plus you're, you know, you're giving money to the Illinois Craft Beer Guild.
00:35:10
Speaker
And I will say, Ray, or Matthew, who's on the board of the guild, can call me out. But I do believe that if you are an imbibe member and you buy a FOBAB ticket, you automatically get that VIP entry. I think you're correct. It's nice because even with that, like you mentioned, there are the certain beer nerds who are going to go and run the gamut right away. There were small lines for certain beers. And when I say small lines, I mean, it literally was.
00:35:40
Speaker
you know, 10 to 15 people and those pores are quick. And by the time you get the one you can get back in line and grab another right behind if you really want to have it. But it was it was interesting to see there were a couple beers like that. So we kind of dipped in and the first beer I went and tried this is why I kept the list Brandon was from our friends over at dry hop. Let's throw chairs, which was an imperial stout. That was
00:36:09
Speaker
I believe in aged in bourbon barrels and then Malort barrels. Brandon, what are you drinking before we get going there? Is that totally naked from New Glares? It is. Is that when you got it like this year? Yeah. I'm jealous. I'm drinking Revolution's Antihero. We switched from barrel aged beers because we need a fucking break from barrel aged beers. I'll tell Sunday night.
00:36:36
Speaker
That too. But yeah, that was a good beer. I was really excited, Joe, who does all the marketing for Dry Hop, Corridor, and Crush by Giants. He's been on the show. You guys know Joe. Good guy. He told me about this beer. And so I wanted to try it because I don't like Malort. But I did like their Malort aged pale ale. And then this was also very good because it was a nice barrel aged stout. And then right in the back, right at the end,
00:37:05
Speaker
is that hint of Malort and it wasn't off-putting for me. It was actually very nice because it was like, here's sweet bourbon and then here's that little bit of bitterness that you got from Malort. I'm really mad that I never went back to try that. It was on my list. I thought you tried it, bummer. That should have been the one you grabbed on the way out when we were trying to grab a couple before we left. No, I know. I was looking on the wrong side of the aisle.
00:37:31
Speaker
Oh, yeah, that's right. We were also we didn't end up going all the way back to that exit. We went out in the main entrance. Yep. Dang it. After that, we did Maple Woods Cup of Select, which is now available if you got a chance to get it or went to the tap room, which I think they'll probably still have it on tap for a while. Cup of Select was real good. I forget what Cup of Select actually has has has going on with it, but their Cup of Series is always good.
00:37:57
Speaker
After that, we got a chance to sample old Irving's new Krampus in the Rye. Rye. So good. Yeah, that was really good. Then we worked our way through some other ones. Another one that stood out that I also know that you liked Brandon was drinking the brewery's Black Tuesday 2023.
00:38:21
Speaker
That was like 19% ABV, something like that. Yeah. And that's why the nice small, and you know what I liked about that guy who was pouring? He wasn't doing the big pours, man. He was doing.
00:38:32
Speaker
responsible like sips of beer which i'm sure some people were like what the fuck man guess what just get back in line and have some more but also i feel like somebody warned him um but i you know just kind of on the pouring top i will say that i feel like this year in regards to like years past it was pretty light on the pouring and i was okay with it yeah totally totally
00:38:57
Speaker
Unlike the great American beer fest, I wanted bigger pours because they weren't all barely its beers. I wanted a chance to take a sip or two of the beer and actually enjoy it. So there were a couple of beers where I was like, just got a little taste of it.
00:39:12
Speaker
Great American Beer Fest is a bit more crowded with longer lines, so I didn't really want to just go back and be like, can I get another pour now? Then we made our way out to the Goose Island train car, just right outside of the Credit One Center. Is that what it's called? Credit One? Credit One Arena. Arena. And the first beers they had pouring
00:39:38
Speaker
I don't remember the other one, but the other one I was most excited about was that they had 2019's Double Barrel, which was a cool move on Goose to do that for the people coming in early because each hour they swapped out two different beers that they were pouring on the train car. Oh, Kentucky Fog was the other one that they were doing, which Brandon, you should have tried. But Double Barrel was fantastic. I didn't really have
00:40:04
Speaker
any bad beers. Actually, I take that back. There were like three beers I really didn't like. I'm not going to call out the breweries because it's not necessary. Yeah, I think you, my first beer, I think I dumped. You did. It's a beer that I go to try every time I'm at Phobab. Again, I'm not going to call the brewery out because
00:40:31
Speaker
I think I mentioned it to Ray. I think it was Ray that I was talking to. Well, we saw Ray right away. I was talking to somebody and I was like, oh yes, it was probably Joe. And I told him, I dumped it. And he's like, yeah, he goes, they should not even have submitted that. What's the problem? And I said, to be fair, it may have been the bottom of the barrel.
00:40:55
Speaker
Yes, now I know what you're talking about. That's very much what it was reminiscent of. It was like the dregs and there was no barrel. It was bitter, tasted oxidized. I'm like, that could have been the barrel from yesterday. Yeah, it was not a good pour. It was not a good pour. We should have went back and actually tried that again because I'm sure it was pouring better and it was a better
00:41:18
Speaker
Yeah, it did not look good. One of the ones that I was saying that I was not excited about. Let me rephrase that. I was not excited about trying this one. Because in years past, I've not liked this from Goose Island. I don't like their berry bourbon counties. I think they're all just over the top.
00:41:40
Speaker
Clark has let some of them age for years and guess what? It's still just a big berry mess that just doesn't taste great. Would you say it's berry messy? I will now.
00:42:00
Speaker
What the? We got a chance to try Burbank County. Burbank County branched out Backyard 2023, which is there. What are the? Do you remember? Do you know what the berry mix is on that?
00:42:16
Speaker
That's a negative goose. Oh boy. I'm trying to see if I can pull it up real quick. Uh, here we go. The first thing it brings me is to food and wine. Thanks food and wine magazine for, I could have just went to, you know, goose islands website. Yeah, I got it. Why would I do that? Oh, damn it. I'm about to pull it up to I'm so close. It's right here. It's a reboot of 2013's backyard ride, which I will be honest backyard ride. I actually did like, uh, Mike and I took that to my brother-in-law and I took that camping one year and it was really, really good.
00:42:47
Speaker
It says, a reboot of 2013's Backyard Rye, which was Agent Rye barrels and made with mulberry. This bourbon barrel aged stout has notes of chocolate, vanilla, and berry fruit. Which berry fruit? After a year of aging, the beer was finished on mulberries, boysenberries, and marianberries. Boysenberries? I will say this. Say it. I was fucking shocked how much I really liked it.
00:43:10
Speaker
I thought this was going to be the variant I wasn't going to buy. I'm not saying I'll still buy it, but I'm not going to not buy it now because just based on of how my experience is in some of the past. You'll buy it. You'll buy it and you'll like it. I don't like how you're threatening me with this. It was really good. It was really good. And I enjoyed it. Did you enjoy it as well? I think you enjoyed it as well. I did. Yeah, it was super tasty. And I don't dislike previous backyards.
00:43:36
Speaker
but I thought it was really well done. And I think I like this one better than I have like previous ones. So that was pleasant. My comparison was to revolutions when they do
00:43:50
Speaker
I think it's pronounced, I know it's pronounced Deeth, but I can't say that, man. I can't say Deeth. It doesn't sound right. Deeth by cherries, death by cherries, death by currants, death by clums, death by whatever. When they do the fruited stouts at Rev, that's my favorite way of having a fruited stout. I feel like it's always subtle and very tasty. What I did pass, I'm sorry, were you gonna say something?
00:44:14
Speaker
Yeah, I was going to say, it's hard to call something Deeth, especially when that brewery has a beer called Deeth Star. Which is fine. Deeth Star makes sense. When you say Deeth by sharing. No. Any normal person who's a Star Wars fan or something will be like, oh, Death Star. Yeah, that's awesome. That's where your mind goes. That's where my mind went.
00:44:38
Speaker
that's where it's always at. Like Cafe Deeth, that's still, that's still fine. You know, but it's death just sounds better. I did skip over when we were down on the floor. A lot of that was either outside or up upstairs on the main concourse, went down on the floor, prairie artisan ales, they had two signs up for beers that they weren't pouring. Now whether they were
00:45:01
Speaker
out of it or this was just during the VIP session, I don't know, but Brandon, you went and tried, because you wanted to try something that they had. If I'm not mistaken, one of the one was, was it the birthday bomb? Was that the one? So I went to, no, there was birthday and then there was, no, yeah, it was birthday and something else. And then I wanted to try birthday, but they didn't have it. Oh, okay. So I had, they had their French toast bomb.
00:45:30
Speaker
which is the one that we both tried. And I was blown away by that. That was, you know, I forgot to mention that to Clark. Clark had asked me what my favorite ones were and I didn't mention that. But what I loved about that one was that it wasn't super sweet. The cinnamon wasn't overpowering, but it really tasted like cinnamon toast crunch. Yeah. It was awesome. And I want to have that again and again and again and again.
00:45:56
Speaker
I would say that my, the next one that I had, that was one of my favorites of the day was hot butchers, Lincoln anniversary, barely reached out. I just thought that was a very.
00:46:05
Speaker
Well done. It's kind of a sweeter, barely stout. And I'll say this for hot butcher. I'm not a fan of their stouts. There's something about their stouts. I don't really enjoy this one. Hit it in all the right places for me. Randy's really sophisticated, sophisticatedly drinking that totally. So which which how much was it? Lincoln and good. That was good. That was that was one of my favorites of the
00:46:34
Speaker
of the day. Ailsmiths, Burlage, Speedway, Mexican Hot Chocolate. You and I both had that. That was very, very tasty. This was around the time. Oh no, that's not true. Right after that, after this beer is when I said what I'm about to say. After that beer, we found Maple Woods, Burlage, Cup of Stuff. That, hands down, to me, was my favorite beer of the festival. Now granted, I
00:47:03
Speaker
There's other categories, but I mainly drank stouts. That's what I like. I like parallel stouts. I didn't. And then there's there's there's a metric shit ton of beers at that event. Absolutely. There's also like wild sours. Probably touched. Not even a third of them, like. I was going to say the same thing, like we I think.
00:47:28
Speaker
I'm impressed by people that literally can go to those events and stay the full time.
00:47:36
Speaker
and plow through it. And then people say, oh, when you were younger, you could probably do that. I'm like, what? When I was 22? Because when I was 22, I didn't like that. I would not. I don't know. And maybe my mind would have been blown, and I would have been like, let's get ripped and just drink a bunch of beers. But no, I feel like the flavor would have been off-putting to me then. I was pretty good at keeping track of what I had, and it looks like I had 17 samples total.
00:48:05
Speaker
That's probably incorrect, but...
00:48:07
Speaker
But for three and a half hours, it's actually probably pretty true. It was pretty good to keep my... Wow. Incorrect. And while I'm saying incorrect, you may be off... I'm not saying that you definitely have 17, but there may have been one or two that we had. Probably closer to a little over 20, probably. Because I feel like in the very early beginning, when you were doing it, you were doing it pretty well. And then even in the beginning, I think we both grabbed a couple of things, and then you didn't mark it down. And I was just like, oh, all right, we're not doing this anymore.
00:48:38
Speaker
Actually, you're right. There were a couple that I tried, and I'm like, I don't need to write this down. That being said, one of the ones that we had in the beginning was more brewing's Mendy. Oh, I forgot to mention that. Yes. Mendy and Mendy Special Reserve. And the Mendy, not the Special Reserve, but original Mendy, 2023, won runner up in Best of Show for the event. Yes. And you also had another winning beer. You had sketchbooks. Oh, God, a Belgian triple. Yeah. And they got bronze for that?
00:49:08
Speaker
No, no, we have bronze. Yeah. Yeah. They got bronze. Yeah. I've got the list right here, but yeah, I think it was bronze. Yeah. Congratulations to sketchbook. More brewing. Yeah. One for, for, for Mindy.
00:49:20
Speaker
We got to try Mendy and Mendy Special Reserve. And actually, I did like Mendy more than the Mendy Special Reserve. I'm mad that I didn't see it and grab it, because I think they did a version of it last year, but the Off Colors, Mezcal. Oh, yes. Beer for Tacos. Yeah, we tried it last year. It was very good. Yeah, I loved it last year. And it won the gold this year. Yeah, good for that, man. That's Beer for Tacos, as you guys know. If you've been listening to us for years, you know how much I love Beer for Tacos. It's such a great beer.
00:49:50
Speaker
And what kind of trips me out is... What's tripping you up, Brandon? Tell us. The fans want to know. Well, Haymarket, I don't know Haymarket for, like, fruited beers, but they won gold for a fruited beer. What beer was it? Icky Bob Thornton. And I think it's a pumpkin beer. What a great name. Yeah. Wow. I wish we would have tried it. But then I take away, like, you know, when I say fruited beers, I usually don't include pumpkin beers in that category. So maybe that is up there, Ali.
00:50:20
Speaker
Maybe we just gotta go to Haymarket and see if they got it on tap. Sounds good. Or Pete. Pete, send us some icky bob. Hey, you know what else? While we were there, we ran into Shalonda. Again? Twice in one week. How fun was that? It was a lot of fun hanging out with her. You know what? There is a beer I didn't put down. It was, I don't know, the brewery, Bananaversary. Wait, was that from
00:50:46
Speaker
Who's coming here in Chicago from? I think that was another half beer, Bananaversary. I could be wrong about that. If I'm wrong, I apologize. But Bananaversary was good, whoever that was, because it was a really nice stout that had a hint of banana. It wasn't like a big, like banana wasn't the main focus. It was a good stout and that was like, excuse me, the aftertaste of banana.
00:51:13
Speaker
I really liked it. Yeah, I had it too and I enjoyed it. Did you see Dan sent a message today about other half? Yes, yes. Super cool. We know Dan. Thank you.
00:51:25
Speaker
You'd know that too if you were on the show more. Sorry, Dan, we love you. The other thing we got to do was go up to the Logger Lounge with Joe. We met up with Joe from Kordor, as mentioned, Joe Stegerwald. We hung out with him for a bit, which was a lot of fun. And we went to Logger Lounge, where I had art history.
00:51:46
Speaker
their, their, their logger, which I really liked. I really liked it. It was really good. That was my Tim Robinson. Did you really like it? I did.
00:51:59
Speaker
So good. That was awesome. And then we also went up to the NA area, sponsored by Revolution, with their sparkling hot water. And we ran into our old friend Rachel Morrison, who has been out of the country for a long time. She's not that old. No, she's not that old. Just old friend to us, old as in like two years now, I think. It was good seeing her catch up with her and, you know,
00:52:23
Speaker
I told her, sorry, we didn't do the pumpkin bear with you. But when you're out of the country, we can't invite you to things. I didn't mean to yell up. I don't think that's what she said, but kind of. But yeah, overall, FOBAB was awesome as usual. We also, right before the awards, Brandon and I separated for a little bit. I went and had, well, I went and had Bourbon County Biscotti, also not on my list. I definitely had like 25 samples. I went up back to the car, the train car, and had Bourbon County Biscotti from last year, which was really good.
00:52:53
Speaker
grabbed another uh hop water watching Brandon drink on this bottle so there he is i don't know why he looks so tired too it's just such a long it's been a long week into the weekend um i uh i came back down and we went down to the man what was the name of the barbecue place uh fire water yeah oh my god we got to go down to the brewers lounge
00:53:19
Speaker
because we're cool. We got media passes, and I loaded my plate up with pulled pork, brisket, some sausage, got some beans, grabbed their sauce, and ate that pretty much with my hands. I was like, fuck a fork. I'm using my hands. We're sitting here in the stands.
00:53:36
Speaker
That literally hit the spot. And it's funny because a lot of times when I eat something, it's like, oh, this is the reset that I need to keep going. It was like, this was the reset that I need to tell me that you're getting pretty good. You don't need to do much more. Yeah, exactly. It was the reset that hit me that was like, you know what, dude? You can probably have one or two more, and then you should probably head home. I came home, and I sat around for a little bit. I'm like, you know what? I'm going to take a nap, and I'm going to go grocery shopping.
00:54:05
Speaker
Two hour nap got up and that's exactly what I did. Washed my face. I felt good. Drank some carbonated grapefruit seltzer from Juul. Thank you, Juul. Plugging Juul Osko for their signature select grapefruit carbonated water. 12 packs are about $4. Way cheaper than bubbly and tastes exactly the same.
00:54:24
Speaker
Yeah, then got some grocery shopping in. So it was nice. It was good. I did not do that. We came home. I forget what it was. I sat on the couch for about all the five minutes before a little man wanted to go do a Spidey car. So he went and did Spidey car. And mom went and sent something off to UPS.
00:54:43
Speaker
And then we put Spidey Cart back and I dragged Benjamin out front and we took all the Halloween decorations down. Nice. Um, well, 99% of them, we still got the pumpkins up there that are like decaying. So that's fine. The squirrels. Well, the good thing is that we both were smart about the day.
00:55:02
Speaker
It was a good time. We both had a good time. We did sneak in a couple like quick tasters on the way out, which I figured we were going to do. Um, but yeah, uh, thanks to Ray and everybody at the Illinois craft, uh, beer guild forward. I ran into Ray and I had a conversation with her. That was nice. Oh, Raya.
00:55:21
Speaker
Ray from her name is Ray. Oh, from Rabid. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. So it's like, yeah, I ran into Ray from Rabid Brewing, who is an organizer as well. Tobias was not there. He was running shop down there, but Toby.
00:55:40
Speaker
I ran into her in the Brewers Lounge and we chatted for a couple of minutes and then she's like, I gotta go work. I know somebody else by the name of Ray, I just put that together. Yes, you're right. She's been on the show side. I was talking about thanks to Ray Stout as well. No, I know. Okay, cool. Yeah, no, thanks everybody for...
00:55:58
Speaker
running another great event. It's so much fun. I hope you guys made a lot of money and for the Illinois craft beer guild. It was it was awesome. And we look forward to it every year. I'm looking forward to doing again. I'm looking forward to having Ray back on when he doesn't have to promote something like that and just drink some beers with us. Yeah, totally. That'd be a lot of fun. Agreed. If he wants to. Yeah. He might not want to. True. Might not want to. You know what? You guys aren't all that cool.
00:56:28
Speaker
I don't actually like you guys. I doubt that's the case, but as Brandon finishes his beard from New Glamis, I think it's a time for us to say so long, farewell. Auf Wiedersehen. Goodbye. Goodbye. That would have been a great way to end it, but I'm not going to end it that way. Thanks, everybody, for listening. Like, subscribe, share with friends. Go back and listen to old episodes. That helps us.
00:56:58
Speaker
Helps the algorithm. Yeah. And like our stuff, we are on TikTok. We're on Instagram. We're on Facebook. We're on X for my Twitter. We're on YouTube. Oh yeah, it's not on YouTube. I forget about that sometimes. But yeah, it was a good barely each week, man. I had a lot of fun with you. This was awesome. Yeah, good times. I'm looking forward to going to bed as soon as we're done here.
00:57:23
Speaker
Oh wait, I can't, I still gotta edit this. I don't have to edit shit, I just gotta put a couple things together and boom, it's done. I gotta figure out a picture I'm gonna use for this. I think it's just gonna be your face. That's the one, I should've screenshot that. But yeah, thanks everybody, thanks for listening and next week, listen to it, it's gonna be awesome. We finally get to talk with Temperance and their 10 year anniversary.
00:57:48
Speaker
and their 10 year beer, which I'm super excited for. Spoiler alert. It's their flagship beer, but it's different and better. I hope so. I hope we can try it tomorrow. Or beefier. Actually, I don't think it's ready. I don't know if we're going to try that tomorrow. Do you think the lettuce has some might meets right tomorrow? You never know. Are we going to drink more? Are we going to drink more barely each beer tomorrow? I can't go tomorrow. Got to go.
00:58:19
Speaker
All right, Brandon, love everybody. Love you too, man. See everybody next week. Thanks for listening. Bye.
00:58:27
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 individually on social media. Brandon can be found on Instagram as bmdub81, on Twitter, bdub81, and on Untapped as bdubdrinksbeer. Tony can be found on Instagram and Untapped under Ace of Hope Chicago. On Twitter, The Ace of Hope Chicago. Clark can be found as Clarkowski on all three.
00:58:55
Speaker
Dan can be found on Instagram as hip underscore underscore hops and hip hops on YouTube. 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.