Stone Brewing – Odd Changes for Old Guardian and RIS
Stone Brewing shakes things up with pending changes to Special Releases Stone Old Guardian Barley Wine and Stone Russian Imperial Stout for 2011.
This past week, we got word from a source at Stone that the upcoming release of Stone Old Guardian would be Stone Old Guardian BELGO Barleywine. For those not familiar with Old Guardian BELGO Barley Wine, it has been a tap only release, featuring a Belgian yeast strain within Old Guardian, rather than Stone’s house yeast strain. This ingredient change makes it a completely different beer, in our opinion.
Once we heard this, we talked to Greg Koch to solidify the rumor. Greg told us that for 2011, things would be changed up a bit.
We’ve dubbed it “Odd Beers for Odd Years.”
The premise is that while we love the Stone Old Guardian Barley Wine and the Stone Imperial Russian Stout, we also love being creative. Since those two beers are two of our most age-able, we thought we’d play around with the format a little.
The 2011 Stone Old Guardian Barley Wine will actually be the 2011 Stone Old Guardian Belgo Barley Wine.
The 2011 Stone Imperial Russian Stout, well, we haven’t decided fully yet exactly how we’re going to “odd it up”….
You might have noticed, Stone Russian Imperial Stout has had some blended batches floating around at Stone, on tap, as well as Stone’s Total Tap Tower Takeover 2010. On this 7 city tour, you might find Stone Russian Imperial Stout 10th Anniversary Blend, and you might find Stone Russian Imperial Stout GK’s Madman Mix. The first, is a blending of the past 10 years of Stone Russian Imperial Stout, while the GK’s (Greg Koch) Madman Mix is a blend of several vintages celebrating the 10th Anniversary of Stones Imperial Russian Stout with chipotle, sage, and a a selection of other Stone beers.
As of press time, as mentioned above, the temporary fate of Russian Imperial Stout has not been decided, however we’d like to speculate one of the two blends might be a viable option. Stay tuned as the story unfolds.
