We here down in the IBW underground bunker are very excited to announce that 2016 will be our first year participating in the Festival of Wood & Barrel Aged Beers in Chicago. The festival - the largest of it's kind - is this Friday and Saturday at the UIC Pavillion. All three sessions are sold out already, but, we'd venture to guess that most of you have tickets already.

Here are the beers that we will have at FOBAB this year:

SON OF TOUCAN SAM (collab w/ Haywood Tavern)

The Son of Toucan Sam is a Belgian Bock, for lack of a better style indicator. We used an all Munich grist, boiled for 4 hours to bring out a beatuiful ruby-red color and finished with Executive Chef Rodney Staton's "Fruity Loops" spice blend and the Rochefort yeast. The base beer was a complex and crushable thing of beauty which we then took and put into a red wine french oak barrel for 9 months to transform it into something truly magical. We're very excited about this beer. If you don't have a chance to try it this weekend at FOBAB there will be some opportunity to get it in 750ml bottles later this year. Stay tuned...

40 ROUNDS

40 Rounds is a Black Farmhouse beer made with black cardamom, black strap mollasses & black prinz malts resulting in a dry, slightly smoky farmhouse beer with hints of black cofee and bitter chocolate. We then took some of that 40 Rounds and aged it in a Buffalo Trace barrel for 9 months to create a whisky barrel aged beer that, in many ways, defies the style by creating a toffee, vanilla and whisky rich beer that is incredibly drinkable at only 5.7%.

ALL COLOR OF THE DARK

All Colors of the Dark takes our Black Maw black licorice stout and aged it for a year and a half in FEW rye barrels letting the Rodenbach blend of yeast and bugs work their magic. We then blend and balance that back with a farmhouse aged on the same bugs to create a rich tapestry of dark and sweet fruits balanced on an inky black base.

Next Wednesday, November 16th, will see the release of our most recent collaboration series with Parachute Restaurant. The 2016 version of Pareidolia is a buckwheat farmhouse aged on Asian pears with Amchur used to accentuate the fruit. The bottled version that will be released next week is naturally conditioned on a mix of brettanomyces lambicus and brettanomyces claussenii. This is a very limited release and you will need to move very quickly to snatch this up. We will release a list of stores carrying this beer next Wednesday.

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Last week saw the release of Brainwash, a 7% tart farmhouse. Brainwash glows a hazy, post-hypnotic yellow and smells of mellon, passionfruit, white pepper & grain. The taste is juicy and tart, very much like a wild ale, but it achieves it’s flavor profile simply with water, hops, grain and sachromyces (non-wild) yeast. At 7%, Brainwash is efficient at bending the mind, yet drinks like a beverage half it's weight in booze. You can get Brainwash at any of the stores that carry IBW. You can search locations at http://www.ibw-chicago.com/get-illuminated

Finally, please don't be an idiot, go out and vote tomorrow if you haven't already.