Book Review: Kentucky Bourbon Whiskey—An American Heritage by Michael R. Veach

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If there is one job that I wish I could have, it is Bourbon Historian. I love history. I love bourbon. What could be better? But, if I can't be a Bourbon Historian, the next best thing  is to have a book written by one. Kentucky Bourbon Whiskey—An American Heritage is written by Michael Veach who happens to be a real, honest-to-goodness bourbon historian. Veach is associate curator of Special Collections at the Filson Historical Society and worked the archives of United Distillers for many years.

​Kentucky Bourbon Whiskey is a bourbon history book. There are no tasting notes. There are no myths being presented as facts. There is history. And a damn fine story. The book follows the bourbon story from before the Whiskey Rebellion all the way up until today. Along the way it dispels many of the myths that bourbon marketing people have wormed into the legends of bourbon.

This is ​a fantastic book. It includes many historical photos, labels, illustrations and documents. Weighing in at 141 pages (including the index), it is a quick read. But it is a book that every bourbon lover should own. I really enjoyed this one.

Review: Woodford Reserve Double Oaked

​There are a lot of bourbon drinkers out there that do not like Woodford Reserve. Not sure what it is about it. The taste? The price? I don't know. But the fact remains that I know very few bourbon drinkers that will lay claim to liking Woodford Reserve. I've yet to hear someone say it was their go-to bourbon. Of course, some like it but, don't like the price.

I'm going to tell you a story. It's a story about a man on a mission. You see this man's wife was a fan of Woodford Reserve. And she had just heard that they were putting out a second permanent bourbon under the Woodford name.

And she wanted it. 

So the man went on a multi-store search for the mysterious Double Oaked. ​It was an elusive prey. Not just there for the taking, Double Oaked had to be earned. And earn it the man did. He went to the liquor store near where he works.

Nothing. ​

He went to the store across the road from that one. Nothing. ​He stopped at his favorite. No go. He stopped at his second favorite. They had a place on the shelf, but had sold out. Finally he stopped at the one closest to his house. In desperation. This was his last chance to capture the prey that would make his lady oh so very happy. 

They had it. At first it didn't register. The copper colored embossed label. He looked right past it. But then there he came to his senses. He reached out his hand and grabbed it. It was his. ​His wife was happy. It was a good Friday.

Notes:
​Nose: brown sugar and apples
​​Taste: Baked apples with all the spices. Moves toward bitter tannins.
​Finish: This has a lingering bitterness that is lightly tinged with a carmel sweetness.​

So that story above? Pretty good, huh? Yeah, none of it is true. Well my wife did send me out after Double Oaked, but I found it at the first store. Probably because I had wisely chosen the biggest store in the richest suburb I drove through on my way home from work. And boy did you need a deep pocket to buy this one. I don't know what it goes for now, but when I bought the bottle shortly after it came out, I paid almost $60 for it. Which wouldn't be much, but it is pretty average bourbon. Good, I like it. But like the folks I mention above, I also do not like the price.

UPDATE: I revisited this bourbon after five and a half years. My opinions have changed in the intervening time. Check it out!​

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Review: Whiskey—A Global History by Kevin R. Kosar

Whiskey—A Global History by Kevin R. Kosar

This book starts out asking if the world really needs one more book on whiskey. Its very obvious answer is: yes, of course. And it's this one. 

Whiskey: A Global History by Kevin R. Kosar attempts to give a very short overview of the entire history of whiskey in 144 pages. For the most part it does a decent job of it. The author touches on the the history of distilled spirits as a whole and then each of the major whiskey producing regions individually. Toss in the obligatory forecast of the future and recipes at the end and you've got it. Succinct but packed with information.

So does the world really need another book on whiskey? Yes...and no. 

If you are a whiskey enthusiast, this is not the book for you. There are entire books dedicated to the topics covered by each chapter. In fact there are good books dedicated to the subtopics covered by each portion of each chapter. The enthusiast will find things that have been oversimplified to the point of almost being wrong. In short, the whiskey enthusiast will want to avoid this book.

This is a book for those who don't know much about whiskey and don't actually want to know a lot. If you subscribe to the theory that most people (feel they) are too busy to actually spend the time to learn anything, then this is the perfect book. It gives just the barest of information on each subject and never succumbs to the temptation to really delve deep on a topic. It doesn't even give in to the normal conceit of including tasting notes. The audience of this book is neither advanced enough nor would they probably care. I applaud that. Knowing your audience is hard. And this book knows its audience. So, for the busy person, or for someone who is just starting their whiskey journey, I highly recommend this.

This book was read in digital form on an iPad.

A Four Roses Head-to-Head-to-Head Tasting: Small Batch, Mariage Collection 2009 & Limited Edition Small Batch 2012

So I was reading my Google Reader subscriptions yesterday when I ran across a fairly alarming blog post on David Driscoll's K&L Spirits Blog. It seems that the Award-Winning Four Roses Limited Edition Small Batch 2012 Release has been reported to be oxidizing quicker than expected. (And what that means kids is this: drink your whiskey. Having it sit open on the shelf too long doesn't necessarily prolong enjoyment. Sometimes it actually lessens it.)

Well, after reading that post, I sent my wife an email. "Honey," I said "we need to take a sip of that there whiskey tonight and see what's what." 

hmm...it seems that in my memories, I talk an old prospector...

She had an even better idea. She said that after we tasted a little bit of it, if it was still ok, maybe we should sit down and do that second head-to-head-to-head tasting that we were thinking of doing. I married a smart woman. The plan had been to compare our 2009 Mariage with the 2012 Limited Edition Small Batch. But as I was setting up the two glasses, I drew a third circle on the papers and poured the regular Small Batch as well. My thought was: this is the baseline standard. A control in the experiment as it were. Plus it's my favorite every day whiskey and I don't pass up a chance to have some.

All three whiskies poured and awaiting tasting

The set up was the same as before. It was a double blind tasting which means that I poured them into glasses on a sheet of paper labeled A, B and C and then I left the room. My wife then came into the room and moved each glass onto the numbered sheet that you see above. This way I knew which bourbon was which letter and she knew which letter was which number, but neither of us knew which bourbon corresponded to which number. Fairly simple way of removing label bias.

So what were the results? Did I find that all the releases were over rated and I loved the regular release Small Batch the best after all? First: all bourbons were tasted neat. After we had our initial notes, my wife added a tiny bit of water to her glasses. Also, all of these bourbon have been open for a while. The LESB was opened in September. I didn't notice much oxidation, if any, but it was still 2/3 full. The Mariage was opened at the end of July at the celebration of a very big milestone. Same thing here. Stayed relatively full and I didn't notice much difference. The regular release Small Batch was a gift from my daughter's boyfriend at Christmas and helped me through that.

Bourbon 1:

Nose: Initially all I get is vanilla extract. But I take my time with it, figuring that it probably had a little something more to give. After a while I get an unidentified fruity odor. To me this always smells like JuicyFruit gum (my favorite gum when I was a child: five sticks, just a quarter). I get that a lot with Four Roses, so finding it here wasn't a giant surprise. With a little water it seemed to transform into an almost earthy honey smell. Reminded me of the buckwheat honey I had for a while.

Mouth: This dries the mouth, but doesn't burn. Strange. Big caramel. It has a sweet, floral taste, but not delicate. If I didn't know better, I'd think Four Roses had swapped a straight rye whiskey with a high percentage corn into my glass.

Finish: Almost no burn here. Finish brings that JuicyFruit flavor back again

Overall: Wow. This might very well be the best Four Roses, I've ever had. My wife normally puts a small piece of ice in every bourbon. She asked me to remind her that this one she wants neat from now on.  

Bourbon 2:

Nose: I'll admit, I was confused by this one. So confused that I went out to the spice cupboard and started smelling things to see what it was that it reminded me of. I settled on a mix of allspice and oregano with a little molasses thrown in. After a little water it get's mintier. (And after I move back up the line from three before tasting: wow! Big hit of alcohol. Guessing this is one of the higher proof releases).

Mouth: My first thought: "ooh, that's a Four Roses..." and I just closed my eyes and enjoyed that first sip. After I opened them again and took another sip, I got spice, and some of that JuicyFruit flavor. Sweet. Spicy. Fruity. Yum.

Finish: Short burn on this one. Sweet and spicy fading into a sharpness. It leaves a tingle on the tongue for a little while. My wife: "the finish makes me want more"

Overall: This one was confusing. It was very rich and full flavored, but I had a hard time picking out what those flavors were beyond their basic "Four-Roses-ness" Once my wife added a little ice, to replicate how she would normally drink a bourbon, this was her favorite of the three.

Bourbon 3:

Nose: After the other two, this is like a sweet floral perfume. It's very delicate. After a little water, not much different.

Mouth: This has a surprising sharpness along the sides of the tongue. More alcohol flavor than I expected. But after revisiting it a little later. It's much more sweet.

Finish: Short burn with a lingering sweetness.

Overall: While this was our least favorite of the three, it is still a very good bourbon. I could drink the heck out of this one at a bar with friends, watching tv or with a good book. It's a great everyday bourbon.

So which was which? Well, the rankings my wife gave them were as follows. Neat: 1, 2, 3. With a tiny piece of ice: 2, 1, 3. I'd rank them similarly even though I only had mine neat. It's a toss up between 1 and 2 for me. Both amazing, but different enough that I'd stand there for a moment trying to decide and then choose one at random. Number three was good, but not great. So that said, it isn't too surprising that Bourbon 3 was the regular release Small Batch. Number 1 is the 2012 Limited Edition Small Batch and Bourbon 2 is the Mariage Collection 2009 Release.

2012 LE SB

2009 Mariage

Small Batch

Last time I did this, I told you "If I could only buy one going forward..." Well, it seems that is probably going to be the case in this instance. I had a hard time picking up a second bottle of the 2012. It is in the bunker. I'm working my way through my second (and last) bottle of 2009. It looks like I'll be out of luck regarding that one too. But that's ok. There will be more wonderful bourbons to taste and I've had the good fortune to pick up two of each of the rare ones. That said, if I had the opportunity to buy the last bottle of any of these and could only pick one. It would be hard. My 15th Wedding Anniversary was celebrated at the 2012 LESB Release Party. The 2009 bottle was cracked open to celebrate my wife showing no further evidence of cancer after her chemo. Both have a bit of nostalgia there. But ultimately, and after a lot of soul searching, I'd choose the 2012. I stand by my initial reaction that it might be the best Four Roses I've ever had.

This might have been the most fun I've had at a tasting with just my wife. We knew going in that we were going to really like all of these. If asked independently we'd both say that Four Roses is our favorite bourbon producer and we knew that for us, the bar started at Very Good before we sat down to analyze them. Then it just became a matter of analyzing and exploring. It was a lot of fun.

I emptied my favorite cooking bourbon: Knob Creek Single Barrel

Tonight I'm talking about my favorite cooking bourbon. Some people might think that's an insult. That it means it is a bourbon so bad that all it is good for is hiding amongst other flavors. Nothing could be further from the truth. If I want to enjoy what I eat I had better use quality ingredients.

My go-to cooking bourbon will have to meet certain factors and the most important one of them will be that I like how it tastes.

The second factor is proof. When I bake, I pull out some water and substitute a little bourbon. You might have noticed that bourbon is much more expensive than water. Hence I want to use as little as possible while still giving me the flavor I want. As you probably know, higher proof bourbons tend to have less water added. As a result, there is also a tendency toward more flavor.

Cost and availablilty are the final factors. My go-to cooking bourbon won't be a Four Roses Limited Edition no matter how high the proof or how tasty the bourbon. 

So that makes Knob Creek Single Barrel probably the perfect cooking bourbon. It is 120 proof. It's tasty. It's readily available and it won't break the bank. That isn't to say that I haven't given it the once over in the Glencairn Glass though. Here are my findings:

Nose: Earthy, lots of oak. There is some sweet underneath. Honestly, I'm finding that this smells just like the warehouse on the tour at the American Stillhouse. 

Mouth: This is a sweet one! Tasted neat, I find this to be mostly caramel and heat.

Finsh: Sharp and spicy with a cool mintiness. It leaves a tingle on the tongue that lasts forever.

Overall: I like this bourbon, but not for drinking. I really don't like to drink super high proof bourbons. They fry my taste buds way too quick. And if I'm going to water it down anyway, I might as well go with the 100 proof Knob Creek and save myself some money. But as my go-to cooking bourbon, I love it. I've used this in my Bourbon Banana Bread and my Bourbon Doughnuts with great results.

So this is a tasty bourbon that is interesting in the glass. But for me, the really high proof makes it a meh for drinking. But that same proof makes it a love for cooking. Average that out and you get a like. And I really do like this. I just had to find a way to let it's flavor shine while holding back the proof. And for me that's in food.

A Head-to-Head-to-Head Tasting: Very Special Old Fitzgerald 12 Year, Larceny, & Old Fitzgerald Bottled in Bond

Has it finally happened? Has my nose unclogged? Have my senses of smell and taste returned to me? Am I ever going to stop asking questions and get on with this?

Yes. To all of them. My wife and I have finally come close enough to kicking the cold/flu that felled us in the late December/Early January that we can breathe again. We can laugh without coughing again. And most importantly, our tastebuds and our sniffers work again.

Last year, round about September, I hit on the idea that to really know the minute differences of different bourbons, I needed to compare them to one another. Have them side by side. Smell one, smell the other, smell my hand*, and start over again. So while I was in Kentucky, the land of bourbon, I decided to start picking up a few things with an eye toward head to head tastings. Some of them were planned. Some of the stuff I lucked into. I was checking out when I'd notice a small bottle of something. Maybe it was a different proof than what already had. Maybe it was a mini of another release of something I had at home. I collected things all autumn long, buying bourbon in at least 6 different states along the way. It was fun. 

But by the time I was about to get started on the tasting fun. BLAM! Laid out by tiny little viruses. So unfair. And now we're back to the present. About to dig into a trio of wheaters from Heaven Hill. so how did I decide on these? Well, a little bit of luck and a tiny bit of planning. I've had the Very Special Old Fitzgerald 12 Year Old since a visit to Des Moines, Iowa this summer. I picked it up because it was something I knew I couldn't get here in Minnesota. Or at least I had never seen it. The Larceny was released right about the time I was going to Kentucky. I got a $10 rebate on the bottle and it was also on sale for roughly $22. Buying that was a no brainer. At that point it seemed I had a pretty nice head to head going. It wasn't a planned one, but hey, I'm not one to sneer at dumb luck. One problem, those two wheaters were both MSRP'd like premium bourbons. One of the things I had read about Old Fitzgerald was that it was a good value bourbon. So with the head to head in mind, I went ahead and picked up a bottle of Old Fitzgerald Bottled in Bond for ~$18 for a liter. And just like that it became a head-to-head-to-head. Three times the fun!

Here's how the wife and I did the tastings. With her out of the room, I poured each into identical Glencairn glasses. One set for me, one set for my wife. I had them on a piece of paper and in front of each I wrote a number 1-3. Then I left the room. My wife came in and moved each glass onto another prepared sheet that was labeled A, B, C. So I knew which bourbons were 1, 2 and 3 and she knew which letter corresponded to which number and neither of us knew which bourbon was in which place in front of us. A perfect double blind tasting.

So what did we think? Well, we both agreed that there were a lot more similarities between the bourbons than there were differences. In the glass all three were the same color. Though in the bottle the VSOF was a bit darker. None of these were overly complicated bourbons. All of them were sweet with a hint of spice in the mouth. So knowing that, let's dig in.

Bourbon A:

Nose: Sweet with a hint of something smoky. Once I was hit with something  sharp, almost acidic, but it was gone as soon as it appeared and never came back. I found the same thing at another time in my wife's but it was still gone so fast I couldn't place it.

Mouth: Sweet, but not overly sweet. Brown sugar with a little spice. This one was a bit thin when compared to the other two. 

Finish: Short and sweet. Not hot. Dried the mouth.

Overall: This one confused me. I smelled things that I couldn't catch before they were gone and couldn't pick out anything beyond a very gently spicy brown sugar sweetness. This is a bourbon that I could drink the heck out of though. I like it and I'd enjoy having it at my side while watching a movie or talking with friends. This was probably our favorite of the three.

Bourbon B:

Nose: Tangy and sweet play a game of cat and mouse with each other while nosing this one. One time it's a hard maple bomb, the next it's tangy, then they swap back again.

Mouth: This is a sweet one. Not as sweet as the nose, but there is a slight maple or brown sugar there amongst the alcohol. I found this one to be a bit on the thick side. Not oily, but syrupy. I guess that goes with the maple in there.

Finish: Finish was the best part of this one. There is that tang in the back of the throat that the nose promised, sweet spice on the sides of the tongue, and a hint of smokiness all around.  

Overall: My wife found this to be the harshest one out of the three we tasted. Said she only tasted alcohol. I agree it was the harshest one, but not overwhelmingly so. I like this one as well. Though good, this was probably our least favorite of the three. 

Bourbon C:

Nose: Right away I was hit with sweet baked apples. After a bit I got a lot of brown sugar sweetness.

Mouth: Sweetness at first on this one getting spicier as it moves back. I get a lot of corn in this one as well. 

Finish: I found this to have the most burn in the finish out of the three. Really drying the back of the throat.

Overall: This is a good bourbon. It won't blow you away analyzing it, though I found those backed apples on the nose to be interesting. But I drink a whiskey more often than I taste it and this is another one I'd enjoy drinking over conversation with friends or along side a movie or good book.

So which was which? Bourbon A was the Very Special Old Fitzgerald 12 Year Old. No Surprise here, my wife loves older Heaven hill bourbons. Bourbon B was Old Fitzgerald Bottled in Bond, which explains the harshness comment by my wife. And Bourbon C was Larceny.

I like all of these in their own way. Like I said, our favorite was the Very Special Old Fitzgerald, but I wouldn't turn down any of them. And in fact, before I did the tasting, I enjoyed each and every one on numerous occasions. The BiB was great in cocktails or on it's own. The VSOF made a wicked good manhattan. And Larceny is just plain tasty.

If I could only buy one moving forward, I'd pick the BiB because it is so much cheaper and almost as good. My wife, the accountant, though disagrees with me and would choose the Larceny. She like the VSOF the best, but initially had a hard time finding differences between them. So since it is a little cheaper, she'd go that route. If you're buying though? Give either of us the VSOF.

*By the way, that hand smelling thing isn't a joke, it seems to reset the ol' sniffer for some reason.

Kentucky Bourbon Trail: Jim Beam American Stillhouse & Distillery tour

Jim Beam had the distinct honor of being both my first and last distillery tour when I went to Kentucky in September. The first time was right away Monday morning. We visited the American Stillhouse visitor center, took a self-guided tour and wandered around. We knew that the new stuff wasn't officially open yet, so we didn't expect much more than this. It wasn't until Friday night when we were talking to other bourbon enthusiasts at a KBF event that we heard that if you were lucky they were offering guided tours in order to work the kinks out. Well ok, I guess we knew what we going to do the next morning. And that one was our last distillery tour. 

Keep in mind we toured as guinea pigs and did so free of charge. Your tour may vary some.

Jim Beam building near the beginning of the visitor's driveway. It's really this pretty.We got to Beam a little after 9 am. The ladies behind the counter remembered us when we walked in. (I noticed this seemed to be a common thing in Kentucky, so friendly.) We were the last two spots on the first tour. When 9:30 rolled around we boarded a bus and rolled down to the production area. First thing they showed us was the water pump. Every tour talks about the water, this is the first time we were shown an actual water pump.

This is the Jim Beam American Stillhouse, it houses the gift shop and you get your tickets for the tour and tasting hereAfter the water pump, we go through a door into a very clean area where there is a mash cooker coming out of the floor. The lid is open and there is a gentleman waiting to show us how they add the grains to it. I got to help add the ground corn. That's right, I've now helped make a Jim Beam product. Then it's around a corner to three of the smallest fermentation tanks I've ever seen. These are very obviously for audience visualization purposes, though I'd guess they use the product inside in any case. Turn around and there is a small still about the size of some of the craft distillers I've been to. And then out a door and onto a porch.

I'm adding ground corn to the cooker. Yeah, I help make Jim Beam now.

This is Kyle, our tour guide, next to the tiny fermentation tanks. Kyle was a knowledgable, informative, and fun tour guide.

Shortly after the tiny fermentation tanks was giant still. This is a big damn still.Our next stop is the actual fermentation tank room. I will never get over how much each of these tanks hold and just how many of them there are at some of these big plants. After we walk through that room, we get to see the big still. This one produces somewhere in the neighborhood of 200 gallons every minute. Then it's off to the Knob Creek barrel dumping area. This is where we realize we really are guinea pigs. They grab the drill to take out the bung and nothing happens. Three guys come over and play with levers and another tries an old fashioned way of removing the bung with a mallet before they finally apologize and move us along to the bottling line. It seems this runs on the same air pressure system because there is very little bourbon entering the bottles as they go past.

A sheepish and apologetic non-demonstration of a barrel dumping.On our way back to the bus we are shown a collection of old decanters and the room that holds whiskey from each batch for the last two years (quality control samples). Then we jump back into the bus and ride back up the hill to the aging warehouse they have set up for us to wander through. It's well lit with display lighting to help show off what they've got in there. And all those wonderful smells are there too. If it wasn't for the fact that the tasting was next, I might have wanted to stay longer. 

Dramatically lit barrels of probably tasty bourbon.But the tasting was next so off we hurried. Beam has an unusually high tech tasting area. You get a small gift card looking thing that is loaded with 2 credits. You put the card in a machine, hold your glass under a spigot and press a button. A very small amount of bourbon or rye are then dispensed to you. You pull your card out, taste your sample and repeat. Then you give your card back and go spend money in the gift shop or wander around the grounds a bit. Maybe even sit in a rocker in the early morning sun. You could totally do that. I did.

This is a very pretty tasting bar. Push a button, get bourbon. I need one of these for the house.Last year I mentioned how even though the Beam tour could have been just a self guided tour, it was really fun due to the guide we had. This year was just as fun. There is something to be said for an operation that is just that damn big. And when the people you interact with obviously love what they do and who they work for/with it just makes for a nice time. I really liked this tour. The only knock on it was the tasting machine. Every other distillery has someone there to interact with you, pour your whiskies and tell you a bit about them. You got a card here. It lost a little of the personal touch. On the up side, everyone in your party could choose something different and whatever they wanted. Sot that's nice. 

If you are in the Louisville area, take the time to make a trip to Jim Beam. It really is a cool place and a nice tour.

At the end of it all, sometimes it's just nice to sit in a rocker in the sun by Booker.

Kentucky Bourbon Trail: Woodford Reserve Corn-To-Cork tour

It was Thursday, September 13th. I know because it was my 15th wedding anniversary. My wife and I felt that there was no better place to start this very special anniversary than one of the prettiest distilleries in Kentucky. I'm going to say right off the bat that I like this tour. But I knew that going in. You see, I've been on this one before. In fact, this tour is the one that made my wife decide to give whiskey a chance. There were some differences this time. The price increased from $10 per person to $25. We actually got to see the bottling area. And we wandered around the back of some of the buildings and saw the old water cisterns and the stream out back. Our tour guide was different as well. His name was Earl, and he gave a very good tour. 

 Horses watching from behind a fence along the drive to Woodford Reserve

Looking back from the entrance of the Woodford Reserve Visitor Center. I kinda wish I had these flagstones outside my door.

As you walk up to the fermentation and still building, they are always sure to point out the grind stone that was found on the property and set above the entry. It's cool, but very worn.

Recently filled barrels on a track going to the aging warehouse. Shot out the door to the fermentation room.

Mash fermenting in very large wooden vats. We were told that these were made from boards cut from logs that had been preserved in a swamp for a hundred plus years

The picture everyone takes at Woodford. The beer still, the whiskey safe, and the name on the wall.

A more interesting detail of one of the other stills which was open so you could look into it.

This is the stream that runs out behind the distillery. There is a small footbridge across it which leads to the old farm where the fathers of American Bourbon once lived.

Looking back at the distillery building while standing in front of an aging warehouse.

A close up of the rough hewn limestone aging warehouse. A lot of the buildings on the grounds are made of this material. Only the aging warehouses have bars on the windows though.

You can almost smell the angel's share through the screen can't you. Well, I can.

This is a barrel about to be dumped. We didn't get to see that, the workers were on break. But Earl did thieve some out of the barrel and let us smell it.

Like I said at the beginning. I liked this tour. Earl was a good tour guide. What I really liked about this tour, was that it was apparent that each tour guide was able to customize the tour to their strengths. Last time I was there I had a former science teacher giving the tour and he told us about molecules and fossils. This time, Earl gave us a bit more of the history and details about the grounds. Both were very good, just different.