Goose Island - Fulton Street

Tuesday afternoon class field trip...eat your heart out.

This class sponsored drinking event was a tour of the Goose Island production facility. Walking in we were treated like kings...free beer (that is really all I need to feel like a king, free beer). This was the first brewery tour of this magnitude that I have been on with such a behind the scenes look at how things are done. After we got our beers to start the tour, the first thing I realized was what signifies that your are a successful brewery...two floors. This would make more sense if I had taken some pictures, too bad I didn't bring my camera. I will illustrate with words. The brewing vessels are so big that there is an upstairs to monitor what is going on in the brewing vessels and a downstairs that has all the piping and stuff (less glamorous than upstairs). I am sure this is tiny in comparison to Miller and such, but it was big anyway. I mentioned they have a four vessel system and they actually use it the way it is suppose to be used, non-stop brewing.

The head brewer and an assistant brewer were the tour guides, but we really had free reign over the place. They took us around and talked about different aspects of the brewery and packaging answering questions and didn't mind if we needed to briefly leave the group to refill our beers. I am not going to go into too much detail about everything, but it was an awesome tour and great facility, something to aspire to (15 years or so).

For those that might actually see these beer in the future, we got to sample two of the beers in their new Heritage Series. The Juliet and Sophie, both barrel aged Belgian beers that should be great when they are released. Juliet actually had some flavor problems, but that flavor defect should go away with more aging (I'll spare you the technical brewer talk). Be on the look out for these in a few months if you are into Belgians.

I will eventually get a post up about Flossmoor Station, ideally Saturday before the Night of the Living Ales.