About Us/Contact Us

Castle & Cairn is a personal blog first and foremost.

It is a reflecting place and online journal. Who am I?

I'm Josh. You can find me on X/twitter as @Joshdebiers. I live in Georgia, am a CPA, and have worked for consulting houses like Deloitte and PwC. During the day, I stay busy with projects ranging from management consulting to analytics development. Looking to get in touch? Send me a DM on X or submit the contact us form below! For group tastings and composite reviews, there will be a variety of visiting contributors.

Interests

Drink: Anything in a cup. From Bourbon to coffee and tea, I'm a big fan of liquid luxury on a budget. I have tasted and ranked more than 600 distinct beers and was a community ambassador for some Budweiser family brands. In terms of whiskey business, I am a certified Bourbon Steward.
Gaming: What could be better than having your friends at your fingertips every day? Video games have long been an important part of my friend group. From Call of Duty to Deep Rock Galactic to Sea of Thieves and many more, I view gaming as a way to bring people together. In terms of entertainment per dollar, video and board games provide huge value. I stream very occasionally and you can find me as "MuggleJosh" on Twitch. My favorite types of games are FPS and Open World RPGs.
Lifestyle: Balance in all things. I was taught to cultivate a "Renaissance" mindset and I strongly believe that anything can be interesting provided you know enough about it. Lifestyle is my catch-all category for the things that make life most enjoyable.

Product Reviews - If I find something I really like or don't like, I'll let you know.
Recipes - I love cooking and grilling. Most nights you can find me by the grill or stove.
Reflections on News - I'm naturally interested in technology and current events, particularly the overlap of the two with business. Find some hot and cold takes here.

A glass of whiskey sits on a stone wall overlooking a green field in the old country

Approach to AI Generated Content

I believe that human generated content is critical to the future of the internet and continued functioning of society. At work, I utilize traditional machine learning models as well as generative AI to accomplish a variety of tasks. After more than three years of working with these tools, I can tell you that they are fantastic for many use cases, but still significantly prone to error. While AI tools may be used to create some of the images on this site and language models may be used as research aids, all text on Castle & Cairn will be human generated.

Approach to Editorial Integrity

In the event a product is provided for free in exchange for a review, no preference will be given to the providing party or manufacturer (though we will be understandably over the moon about the opportunity). These circumstances will be disclosed in the relevant post. Opinions and analysis will be genuine and free from modification other than verifiable corrections of fact. I will wait a little while before reviewing it as I likely will be overly excited that someone has sent me something. For review articles, look for a verifiably authentic header photo of questionable composition (likely my living room) as a stamp that the bottle or item in question has indeed been sampled.

Behind the Name

Why Castle & Carin? Cairn is fairly straightforward as it is the back half of the now prolific Glencairn drinking glass popularized in the early 2000s for tasting and assessing whiskey. Castle comes from my natural disposition as a homebody. I do enjoy traveling but there's just something different about being at home. It's the environment most cultivated to your enjoyment. It's a place to host parties and be generous with friends. It's a hierarchy need and the single most worthwhile investment in yourself, a nice place to live. In 1644, English judge Sir Edward Coke was quoted as saying, "For a man's house is his castle". The overlap of the two concepts gives me a cozy overall vibe. I like to think of my ancestors in Ireland and Scotland home amidst solid walls on a drizzly cold day.

Contact Us

🍺 Costco's Kirkland Vintage Ale 2025 - Review & Tasting Notes

Fall is in the air, and that means we have yet another year of Kirkland's Vintage Ale! Brewed proudly by Deschutes (pronounced "Da-Shootz") in Bend, Oregon, this Bourbon Barrel-Aged Imperial Stout spends nine months in the wood, picking up what the whiskey left behind (mostly vanillin and tannins). Bottled over the summer, this particular beer is from Lot B. Neither Costco nor the packaging give us much additional detail beyond the ABV and style. I remember finding last year 's edition to be solid but nothing to write home about, fairly dry but a pleasant pour. The use of the work "vintage" to me implies that some changes may be made year-to-year but we'll have to see if our taste buds can help us validate. How does the 2025 vintage fair? 💅Style: Bourbon Barrel Imperial Stout 🛒Sourced: $7.99 Costco, GA for a 22oz bottle. $2 cheaper than the 2024 edition! 💥Hops: Not Mentioned sadly. Other ingredients include chocolate malt, milled oats and Dutc...

🍺🍷🥃 Beer, Wine, and Spirits Rebate Website Master List

If there is anything I love more than a good drink, it's saving money buying that good drink! The rules for providing discounts on alcohol differ substantially between states with some allowing outright discounts or coupons and others entirely disallowing any sort of purchase incentive. Thankfully though, in my native Georgia as well as most states, a simple reimbursement approach is permissible. Alcohol Rebate Site Master List The following sites are relatively stable for each manufacturer. New offers usually come out every few months. None of these are affiliate links and I provide no assurance as to the process. I have saved so much money using rebates and hope you have similar success. Best practices and general process advice will be presented at the bottom. New sites will be added as I uncover them. Beer Rebates Boston Beer Company Brands - Angry Orchard, Dogfish head, Hard Mountain Dew, Samuel Adams, Sun Crusher, Truly, and Twisted Tea. Some brands may not have active...

☕ All Java Monster Flavors Tasted & Ranked

As a habitual caffeine abuser, I have a soft spot for Monster, both for their expansive lineup of flavors as well as their support for Sports and E-sports. Coffee is my standard caffeination vector, so the Java Monster suite of products is the perfect mix of bean flavor and energy boost. In this post, I'll provide my personal rankings and rationale for what is a very strong lineup. Note that I have not been compensated in any way for this write-up... I just like them. Currently, Monster Energy 's Java Monster lineup has five available flavors: Mean Bean - Vanilla Irish Crème Loca Mocha - Chocolate Salted Caramel Café Latte There are two "triple shot" versions of the Vanilla and Mocha which contain 300mg of caffeine though their flavors are very similar to the base versions above. At this point, we should also take a moment of silence for the two cold brew flavors, sweet black and nitro latte. The nitro latte was a personal favorite and I quite liked the sweet black,...

🥃Review #20 Elijah Craig Barrel Proof - Private Barrel Distiller's Selection

📚 Background: Released in three batches per year, Elijah Craig Barrel Proof Straight Kentucky Bourbon Whiskey is almost always a hit with aficionados. Barrel proof means that, of course, the whiskey is not cut with water after being dumped from the barrel. The "Private Barrel" moniker further tells you that not the barrel was specially selected and not batched or blended. This can cut both ways as single barrel whiskies sometimes differ significantly from their batched counterparts which have the benefit of distiller curation to even out any off notes. If your local store owner's tastes align with yours, their barrel picks may be better than anything else you can find. On the other hand, a less conscientious selector may pick you a big loser of a barrel. This bottle comes from Costco which means that the private barrel is a "distiller's selection" and not picked by a Costco employee specifically. Typically for these big releases the manufacturer will try...

🥃Review #64: E.H. Taylor Small Batch Bottled-in-Bond Bourbon - 2025

Named for Colonel E.H. Taylor JR (Kentucky Colonel - not a military man), this entry level offering honor's Taylor's commitment to quality as an early promoter of the bottled-in-bond act and designation. Relatively new to Buffalo Trace's portfolio, the brand was launched in 2011. Born in Kentucky, Taylor initially worked in banking, financing distilleries before acquiring the Old Fire Copper (O.F.C.) Distillery in 1869, named for expansive copper piping which Taylor believed would assist in eliminating impurities (stills are made of copper because it removes sulfur compounds and is naturally antimicrobial, though the time spent in transition lines is usually pretty minimal). After facing financial ruin on a number of occasions, he eventually sold a fairly successful operation to George T. Stagg in 1879 which would go on to be known as the Buffalo Trace of today. The E.H. Taylor lineup features this Small Batch, Single Barrel, Barrel Proof, Straight Rye, Barrel Proof Rye, a...

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