Tag Archives: Bourbon County Stout

The 6 Most Expensive American-Brewed Beers

“Oh, that seems a fair price for such a delicious…*chugs entire bottle* *runs the fuck out*”

~AFFotD staffer when presented with one of America’s most expensive beers

 fancy beer

The 21st century is a great time to like beer.  While America spent the 1970s thinking that managing to score a case of Coors was something to actually be excited about, and we had to blindly choose between “Bud” or “Miller” at most bars before deciding, “Fuck that, I’ll just chug some Listerine instead, it’ll get more drunk and tastes a little better” we now live in a nation where there are enough distinct and delicious varieties of beer that even people who swear they “hate beer” can find a style they love.

Now, much like there are still people who believe that the Earth if flat, or that Little Fockers is the best movie Ben Stiller has ever made, some drinkers hopelessly cling to Budweiser and Miller as “what a real beer tastes like!”  If you dare to point out that Budweiser tastes like someone put a handful of straw in a wet sock that they poured a bottle of tonic water in, they’ll ball up their fists and shout, “I like this beer ‘cause it’s cheap!  It’s refreshing when you make it cold enough that you can’t taste it that well!  Something negative about IPAs!”

While we might be being harsh in saying that these people are troglodytes, we do know that they just Googled the word “troglodyte” and said, “Hey, fuck you too assholes!” to their screen as if we can hear them (we cannot).

budweiser commercial

We love it when beer commercials make our point for us.

However, the main point that people who defend inferior beer (“mer mer that’s elitist I like my beer cold and my mer mer mer”) make is that Budweiser, Miller, and Coors are all, well, very cheap.  Granted, there are cheaper beers out there that taste better, but that’s not saying much—you can have a very basic, cheap lager that will do the job to get you drunk, and people can rightfully point out that a twelve pack of cheap shitty beer costs about the same as a six pack of okay craft beer.  We don’t dispute this, but we should point out that the shitty beer tends to be about 4% alcohol per volume, while you can get that okay craft beer at around 8% or 9%, meaning you’ll get drunker faster on better beer, so why the hell are you so desperately clinging to your macrobrew?

That being said, the boon of microbrewing and homebrewing in America means that now, more than ever before, we’ve had an almost infinite options of great beer at our disposal.  Unfortunately, with that boon in popularity comes gimmicks, and one of those gimmicks involves limited release beers that cost you more than you can really justify spending on a beer.  These are beers that cost $50 or more, and even at that price, require you wait in line and fight off hundreds of other craft beer nerds, desperate to taste a forbidden fruit that really probably tastes about as good as a $10 beer of comparable quality.

So we’re going to throw a bone to those of you reading this shouting (again, we can’t hear you) “Fancy beers are for sissies!  They cost too much!  I like Coors Light and being punched in the dick, you know, manly drinks!” by addressing the one negative side effect of the craft beer boon.  Obnoxiously expensive beers.  And so, we present to you…

The 6 Most Expensive American-Brewed Beers

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15 Bourbon Barrel-Aged Products of America

“This is madness.  Delicious, bourbon-y madness.”

~Bourbon Enthusiasts

 barrels

When an American distillery makes a bourbon, they’re left with two things—many bottles of delicious drunk juice, and a barrel that set them back $120 that can’t be reused but is still saturated with delicious bourbon flavor.  As in, legally, you cannot reuse a bourbon barrel to make another bourbon.  It’s a one-and-done proposition.  So, for decades, bourbon barrels were either discarded or sold to college students,

Then, in 1992, an at-the-time-relatively-unknown Chicago brewery called Goose Island released a beer called the Bourbon County Stout, and this happened.  Before eventually being bought out by Budweiser in an acquisition that was lamented on this very page, the concept of re-using bourbon barrels on products besides other whiskeys began to grow with Bourbon County Stout’s increasing popularity, and in the past several years we’ve not only seen dozens of beers that spend time aging in used bourbon barrels appear on the market, we’ve seen dozens of completely non-beer-related products that spend time in bourbon barrels got up for sale.  Literally dozens.

The wisest and most magnanimous among us know that adding bourbon to anything makes it delicious and American, and we can literally think of nothing that isn’t improved by the introduction of bourbon.  Have an empty glass and the distinct feeling you’ve wasted the last 15 years of your life?  Boom, put some bourbon in there and watch your worries melt away.  It’s 3AM and the last woman left at the bar looks like a goblin who manages a Wal-Mart?  Bam, bourbon yourself up, next thing you know you’ll swear you’re taking home 1998-era Cindy Crawford.  Your new baby from the aforementioned ill-advised union won’t shut up and you’ve got a hangover?  Boo-ya, drunk babies don’t cry, that’s fucking science.  So with that in mind, we’re going to list of fifteen products that, on their own are good, but when aged in bourbon, are incredible.  (Except for a few gross ones).

Fifteen Bourbon Barrel-Aged Products of America

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The Future of Goose Island (As Owned by Anheuser-Busch)

“What?  No…Nooo….NOOOOOOOOOOO.”

~People who like beer


One of the most common misconceptions in America can be found in the beers we consider to be “American.”  Many assume that the Bud Lights of the world are the ultimate American beer, because they’re cheap, low quality, and people still buy the shit out of them.  Except that most of the shitty beer, like Bud and Natty Ice, is from Anheuser-Busch InBev, based in…Belgium.  The shit is that?  Sure, Budweiser got its start in St. Louis, a city with a rich American history based around…uh…arches?  But any attempt to forgive the low quality of Budweiser because, “Well, it’s an American beer,” flew right out the window.

“But there’s still Miller Lite, right?  It’s Miller Time!”

Nope, that shit’s based out of England.  Get your head out of your ass, American beer consumer.

Fortunately, the great bastion of American liquor resides in craft beers.  While it has been established that going to a party with Milwaukee’s Best will likely result in you getting shot, if you go to a party with an American craft beer from a microbrewery, 90% of the people attending that party will get laid.  True story.  Craft brews, though more expensive, are delicious enough that you can find one that will be even be palatable for the girl at the party who keeps going on about how, “I don’t like beer,” as everyone else glares at her and silently judges the person who invited her.  Plus, they tend to have two or even four times the alcohol content of your Budweisers and Millers out there.  Better taste and more alcohol?  How is that not more American?

The microbrew culture in America has gone from laughably poor to universally respected in a fairly short period.  Sam Adams, Sierra Nevada, and Anchor Brewing helped reinvent the American brew, and since then many notable breweries have formed in America, making delicious, highly intoxicating beverages for Americans to get drunk on without nearly as bad of a hangover as you’d get from Icehouse.

While the beer industry has decreased by one percent this past year (we don’t know why this would be, we can only blame French immigrants) craft brews were up 11%, proving that more Americans appreciate the American notion of American made artisanal beers.

And we at AFFotD are sad to report that one of our classic American brewing institutions again has been assaulted by foreign powers.  And while we are strangely powerless to stop it, at the very least we at AFFotD can take a moment to reflect in the passing of an old friend.

That’s right.  Chicago microbrewery staple, Goose Island, has been purchased by Anheuser-Busch.

We’re all clearly very upset.

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