Friday, January 17, 2014

Goose Island Gillian

I have quite a back log right now so I'm going to try and work through at least some of it. That means I actually drank this a while ago which was apparently December 6th according to the date on the picture. But, whatever, i'ts not like my notes go bad. Gillian is a sour saison brewed with strawberries and peppercorns (and possibly a few other things) and then aged in used wine barrels. Pretty complicated beast. One fun trivia fact is that the experimental name was Scully, which if you've ever watched the X-Files, Scully was played by Gillian Anderson. Get it? Scully -> Gillian? Okay, maybe only nerds will think that's neat but it totally is.
Spicy, peppery nose with some light fruit and a bunch of oak. Body was similar, starting off lightly peppery, almost bitter, followed by strawberry, oak, and a little white wine flavor. As I drank more, the bitterness faded like it usually does and the strawberry and wine notes really came to the front. Very tasty beer with the only real negative being the price. Not sure what the going rate for it is in Philly, but it easily could be $35 or $40 given the usual markups. Knocks it down a few pegs for me just because for that kind of money I could get other beers. Still, glad to have tried it at least once.

2 comments:

  1. I saw this going for, like, $40 somewhere and even I balked at that price (and you know I don't shy away from expensive beer). But it does sound great. If I find a cheaper bottle somewhere, I'll definitely grab one...

    ReplyDelete
  2. Exactly. Considering it was $30 in other regions of the US, I knew it would be disgustingly overpriced here in Philly. I got it for quite a bit cheaper but it's not something repeatable so I'll be happy with my one bottle.

    ReplyDelete