Welcome back to FTW’s Beverage of the Week series. Here, we mostly chronicle and review beers, but happily expand that scope to any beverage (or food) that pairs well with sports. Yes, even cookie dough whiskey.
At some point in your life, you let down your guard. You embrace the mundane, because trends are exhausting. You find the truest, safest spot in a weary world; the Costco food court.
My salvation came, as it does for most of us, around the time my child arrived. A labyrinth of bright colors and free samples were enough to keep her occupied. Trips began with a hot dog and three to four Diet Pepsis and ended with soft serve and possibly a second hot dog. Judgment does not exist between the concrete floors and fluorescent lights of Costco; it is merely a place to exhale in between bouts of frustration with snack mongers setting a manatee’s pace between each sample station.
This quiet sense of security bred an appreciation of all things Kirkland Signature, Costco’s in-house brand. It began, as it does for many of us, with handles of booze that clocked in at $12 and tasted suspiciously like the more famous brands whose labels they aped. It expanded from there, reaching its pinnacle the moment I truly became a dad: when I purchased Kirkland brand sweatpants.
With my Costco alliances laid bare, it’s time to get to the meat of today’s review. There is a barrel-aged Kirkland Signature stout on shelves across our great nation. Unlike the spirits you have to sip before debating where they’d been distilled, this vintage ale offers no such mystery.
It’s a collaboration with Deschutes, the Oregon brewery responsible for trusted airport tap beers like the Fresh Squeezed IPA. More germane to this conversation, however, is their The Abyss imperial stout — a brew with tremendous reviews on Beer Advocate and a glowing sigil of hope that, once again, a Costco house brand might be secretly awesome.
Will the 2024 vintage live up to that lofty standard? Let’s dig in.
2024 Kirkland Bourbon Barrel-Aged Imperial Stout Vintage Ale: B
It pours the expected heavy black. From the depths bubbles a creamy, tan ring of foam that lingers long after the beer has settled. It smells pleasant, but a little light. There are a few signs this is a 12 percent ABV brew, but it’s not overpowering from the top of the pour itself. It looks more like a heavy, seven-to-eight percent stout.
The first sip itself isn’t especially complex. It’s a little smoky, a little heavy and very smooth. Like the scent bubbling off the pour, there’s little here to suggest it’s as boozy as it is. It also feels much lighter than it pours; the texture here is almost effervescent and easy to drink, which is not something you’d expect from a barrel-aged beer with this gravity.
Part of that is because you aren’t getting much of the bourbon influence in each sip. You get a little bit of that grain and the warmth that comes with it — there’s a sweet rye feel for sure — but it’s not as pronounced as some of the other beers in this genre. That leaves it to come off lighter than, say, Goose Island’s winter Bourbon County offerings.
That might be a bummer to some. It’s slightly generic, which doesn’t mean it’s bad, just that it’s gonna leave a few beer nerds hanging. You get some solid porter notes here — roasted chocolate and a little bit of coffee — but nothing overpowering. It’s more of a broad appeal beer than some of the other bourbon-barrel stouts out there. That makes sense, even if I wish it went a little harder.
Would I drink it instead of a Hamm’s?
This is a pass/fail mechanism where I compare whatever I’m drinking to my baseline cheap beer. That’s the standby from the land of sky-blue waters, Hamm’s. So the question to answer is: on a typical day, would I drink Kirkland’s barrel-aged imperial stout over a cold can of Hamm’s?
Yeah. It hits all the hallmarks of an aged stout even if it doesn’t go above and beyond what’s advertised on the label. It’s a Deschutes beer, so you know you’re getting quality here.
But if you’re a beer nerd, you may be better off waiting for this year’s run of Goose Island’s Bourbon County stouts for more complex flavors. I’ll have a rundown of those beers this time next week.
