Back in December of 2005, Oskar Blues released two canned "seasonal" beers within the confines of their home state of Colorado. A total of 400 cases (9,600 cans) of each was hand-canned and hand-labeled. Oskar Blues founder, Dale Katechis, called them "a canned gift to our fans". One of them would become very well known and the other would never be seen again.

The well known one was a very hoppy, very big (9.3%) and very bold (85 IBUs) ale that defied all categories at the time. It was billed as "the world's hoppiest canned beer". It's name was Gordon.

The other beer conversely was a solid, unfiltered, malty American Brown Ale brewed with five different malts and four kinds of US and UK hops. It weighed in at an extremely sessionable 5.2% and was to be the answer to all the Oskar Blues lovers that yearned for something in a can that was a little lower in alcohol. It's name was Leroy. .....................photo:Oskar Blues

   9,600 cans of Leroy were hand-canned and hand-labeled  

An excerpt from the 2005 Press Release reads:

"Some people," (Dale of Dale's Pale Ale) Katechis says, "have told us our beers are too strong for them. We don't know what they mean by that, but Leroy is for them." 

Based on the online reviews we'll assume that "those people" enjoyed all 9,600 cans of Leroy. So whatever happened to this sessionable brown ale? We know what became of Gordon. I would have thought a sessionable brew from Oskar Blues would have been a bigger success. Leroy would certai nly go over well now as people are starting to return to session beers after spending the past few years destroying their palates and their livers (myself included) on hop bombs and massive Russian Imperial Stouts. 

UPDATE:

I needed answers so I wrote to the folks responsible for the "canned beer apocalypse" to find out more about Leroy's early fate and to see if we may one day see Leroy in cans again. Last night I got a call from Chad Melis, the Marketing Director at Oskar Blues, who shed some light on things. He told me the following:

Leroy was indeed only brewed once and part of the reason why it was not put into full production was because of the name. Quite a few other "Leroy Browns" are in existence and Oskar Blues is/was striveing to offer something more unique. They continued to brew Leroy at the brewpub in Lyons but they eventually stopped, tweaked the recipe, and began offering a different brown ale called One Nut Brown. So, Leroy is officially retired and will not be returning to cans. Such is the life of a special release beer!

Thanks Chad for filling us in. Cheers!