It Starts With One Barrel

We’re happy to have Taproom releases back. After one, two, or (for some barrels) three-plus years of planning and blending and aging, it’s always nice to have a cathartic release point for the time and effort of our brewery team. And along with the chance to celebrate and toast, we get to pour Taproom-only variants that offer new takes on some of our favorite barrels. Coconut? Sure. Vanilla? Why not. A rare spirit barrel or one-time blend? Absolutely. We can do almost anything at one-barrel scale.

But a party’s never just a party. The barrel team is watching like hawks. If OSHA let us perch them up there on the barrel stacks, rest assured they’d be there, taking notes. The Taproom release event is when the rubber meets the road on the next generation of Deep Wood beers. While the exclusivity of draft variants is certainly a selling point, they’re also the R&D proving ground for the next brews we’d like to elevate to the main lineup of cans.

V.S.O.J. started as a draft variant in January 2017, and the reaction that day is a big reason it stuck around to become the talisman of our barrel program. Likewise, we have something else Very Special coming in January that very quietly poured upstairs at a Brewpub event before roaring into the main lineup the following year.

You never know which variant is here today and gone tomorrow, and which one will be the next sought-after can. But that’s really up to all of you. Let’s explore three from the 2021-22 fall/winter lineup that came to life first as small-volume variants.

Blackberry Finn first joined us in 2019, pouring at the Great American Beer Festival before appearing at the Taproom. A fully double-barreled English Barleywine vivified with the electric addition of unfermented blackberries. The inky, earthy, tart blackberries grafted onto incredible depth of two separate barrels like creeping vines adding nuance and character to an aging but well-kept Victorian house.

There’s something to the flavor of fresh blackberries that suggests a sweet buffet of jammy purple. A lot of oak and a fair amount of dark berries come together to each heighten the experience of the other. There’s a swirling contrast of tannin, malt, and bright, aromatic fruit.

By the end, you might not know that this is among the two or three driest Deep Wood Series beers we’ve released. One sees purple and smells succulent fruit, one tends to think sugar. But dive into a can of Blackberry Finn and you’ll see it’s an appealing mirage on a tremendously nuanced, impeccably balanced beer.

Dark Mode, making its debut in the Deep Wood Series (or anywhere) is the spiritual successor to both Jamo-nilla and Lynott’s Stout. We took barrel and process lessons from both, and forged a new third way that serves as the long-overdue return of Milk Stout to the Deep Wood Series. This is a big, burly Imperial Milk Stout throwing sharp elbows of oak, whiskey, and scalded sugar. It’s not quite either of the predecessor beers, because it’s both. And more.

To put V.S.O. on a label, we’re saying that this is a singular creation built from our most carefully constructed and longest-tenured barrels. Brewed to exacting specifications, carefully shepherded over multiple years, and blended with an eye to art and a spreadsheet full of proprietary values until it’s a stunner in the eyes of everyone at the brewery.

The original V.S.O.R. snuck onto draft at the Brewpub on a frigid January night in 2019 during a Don’t Drink Beer show upstairs in the Brewers’ Lounge. The wind roared, the fireplace crackled, and uninsulated pipes throughout Chicagoland were in critical danger. Distractions, both outside and onstage, abounded. But steadily, and then quickly, the line to re-up pours from the first-ever keg of V.S.O.R. grew. A slightly sweeter blend of our signature Ryewine had grown deep, sweet, complex, and unforgettable with the extra age. Tooth-sticking toffee and spicy rye in perfect harmony with a pillowy head and mouthfeel like a cumulus cloud. That experience was the green light we needed to add it to the next fall/winter lineup.

Now it’s back after almost three years. And if there’s one thing we always say, it’s that the next batch will be even better. Suddenly Chicago in January isn’t looking so bad.

We hope you can join us at a Taproom release to enjoy the new additions to the lineup and get a look at what might be next. Check out our Deep Wood Series page for the full 2021-2022 lineup and the individual event pages for the specifics on each upcoming release:

• Nov 19th (Presale on the 16th): Straight Jacket, Vanilla Deth, and Blackberry Finn
• Dec 10th (Presale on the 7th): Ryeway to Heaven, Dark Mode, Maple Jacket
• Jan 28th (Presale on the 25th): Gravedigger Billy, V.S.O.R.

See you at the Taproom!