Bourbon County X: The People’s Choice Survey
Although Goose Island’s Bourbon County Brand Stout has been made since 1995 (or was it 1992?), the celebrated release has moved beyond just a big beer aged in bourbon barrels in a lot of ways. 2020 marks the 11th year that the brewery has released variants of their Bourbon County brand, which has added ingredients, changed barrel treatments, and even shifted styles over the years. So, we thought it was a good time to look back on the first ten years of variants on the Bourbon County brand.
We surveyed some of our good friends in the world of beer – professional writers, bloggers, fellow podcasters, specialty shop owners, and even Goose Island brewers – to find out their top variants of all time, and posted the results here. Reactions were…mixed. Ranging from mild surprise to righteous indignation, we certainly got the feeling that a few favorites were left off the list.
So now we turn to you, trusted beer consumer! We want your feedback. We want to know the people’s choice for the best Bourbon County variant from 2010 – 2019. If you scroll down below, there’s a Google Form survey to fill out.
To encourage participation, we are offering anyone that fills out the survey a chance to win a $20 gift card to a local small business, brewery, or bottle shop of their choosing. (You do not need to be local to Chicago to win it – we’ll figure out how to get it to you!) Survey entries must be completed by 5:00PM CST on Monday, November 30th to be included in the raffle.
Variant for purposes of this survey means part of the Bourbon County Brand line-up, initially released on or around Black Friday, and bottled and sold. Notable beers that were excluded from this list were Baudoinia and Templeton Rye (both never officially bottled and sold) and King Henry (not labeled as Bourbon County). Also, the 2015 infected variants have not been included as options here.
Yes, we know people have strong feelings about King Henry not being included, but it is the odd one out. It’s definitely in the Bourbon County extended family (a barleywine aged in 2010 Bourbon County Rare barrels), but it wasn’t released under the label of Bourbon County – unlike every other beer on the list.
Click on the following link to complete the survey. Aggregated results will be posted later next week!
10 Years of Bourbon County Variants – People’s Choice Survey
