Knob Creek Twice Barreled Rye

Did I miss the memo letting everyone know that the new hotness was putting your rye whiskey into a second new barrel for finishing? Sure, I ran across one this fall, but it was a distillery-only release. It came in half bottles that sold for $50 each. That was a company playing around and stumbling upon something good. Cool, right?

But then, I started seeing reports that Beam was doing something extremely similar as a limited release in the Knob Creek line. Two data points isn’t a trend, but it could be the beginning of a trend. I mean, finishing your whiskey in a second barrel is nothing new. People have been doing that for years. But finishing it in a second, new barrel? Well, that’s new. At least to my limited memory. I mean, barrels are expensive. And sure, the big guys can resell them for somewhere around the price they bought them for, but still that seems like a serious outlay of cash.

So what are they getting for that extra expense? Well, think of it this way. A new charred oak barrel is like a basket full of freshly ground coffee beans. They smell good, they are full of flavor and they impart that flavor to the liquid that is interacting with them. But once you use them? Well most of that flavor is gone. Ever been so tired that you accidentally made today’s coffee with yesterday’s grounds? Yeah. Barrels are kinda like that too. Only in this case, they are running that metaphorical coffee through a new set of grounds imparting even more of that flavor to the resulting liquid.

Hmmm…I wonder if that would work? I love coffee, it might be the one thing I love more than whiskey.

Anyway, the result for both of the double-barreled whiskeys from this week was to impart a richness that was lacking in the standard releases. After tasting each of them side-by-side with their respective standard release rye, I’d say that running these particular whiskeys though the barrel again definitely had an effect. But did in Knob Creek’s case, did it make it better?

Knob Creek Twice Barreled Rye

Purchase Info: $49.99 for a 750 mL bottle at Ace Spirits, Hopkins, MN

Details: 50% ABV

Nose: Black pepper, dried fruit, and cloves

Mouth: Spicy and sweet with black pepper, clove, cinnamon, apricot, maple, caramel, honey, and oak.

Finish: Spicy and warm. Medium length. Lingering cinnamon and clove along with a fruity sweetness.

Thoughts: This is good. I like it much better than the standard release Knob Creek Rye. Of course, since I am finding my self falling further and further out of love with the Knob Creek Rye, is that really saying anything? In this case, yeah, it is. Lately I’m finding standard Knob Creek Rye to be very grain forward and since there is a hefty portion of corn in there, unfortunately, one of the grains that is coming through the most is corn. That kinda defeats the purpose of a rye to me. If I want a high rye bourbon, I’ll buy one. When I want a rye, I’d rather have one that tastes more of rye than bourbon.

And in a way, this is also very bourbony. There is a lot of the bourbon-like sweetness coming through. Luckily, in this case it is in the form of maple, caramel and honey, not grain flavors. And that really does make a difference as I think the sweetness helps complement the typical “rye” flavors that you would expect in a rye whiskey. There is also a richness that is severely lacking in standard Knob Creek Rye. All in all, I’m a fan. At the price, I’m not sure I’ll be buying a second bottle. But I don’t regret buying the first.

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Woodford Reserve Distillery Series: Barrel Finished Rye

I’ve loved good food for as long as I can remember. I’ve loved cooking for most of my adult life. I wasn’t always very good at it, at least not at first, but I was extremely enthusiastic. So much so that I spent almost 20 years improving and perfecting a recipe for homemade pizza sauce, starting with the recipe, then growing tomatoes, then growing multiple breeds of tomatoes. There were false starts and restarts, but once I had something that was as good as I could get it…I moved onto the crust. I learned so much, from the biology of keeping a sourdough starter alive (7 years and counting now) to how various baking temperatures affect crust texture and density.

You might have guessed this already, but I’m a bit obsessive about subjects that fascinate me.

So yeah, I like to cook and I love the science behind it. The book Cooking for Geeks was written just for people like me. One thing that I always wanted to try was sous vide cooking. If you are unaware, this is cooking that uses a circulating hot water bath to cook your food to a precise temperature and keep it there long enough to kill the harmful bacteria that might be in undercooked food, especially if you are like me and like your meat a bit on the rare side (in a complete oversimplification: killing the little nasties is a function of both temperature and time, the lower the temperature, the longer you will need to hold it at that temperature to kill off the buggers).

To that end, I recently bought myself a gadget that I have fallen in love with. I bought the Anova Precision Cooker. This thing allows me to seal some meat in a bag, drop it in the water and come back in a few hours to finish off the meat in a skillet (can’t miss out on the crispy crunch goodness of a Maillard reaction). In fact, once I am done here, I’ll be doing just that with the pork chops I started a few hours ago.

Now you might be thinking to yourself, what if anything does this have to do with whiskey? And I’ll be honest, I really just wanted to recommend that product to people because it has upped the quality of the steaks and chops served in my house by leaps and bounds. But I do have a reason it popped into my mind tonight, other than hunger. One of the reasons I love cooking is that it is a weird blend of both science and art. Which is the exact reason I love whiskey. You can know the science, but that doesn’t mean that you don’t need to experiment to figure out how to apply it. And experimentation leads to trying new things and learning new things.

Which leads me into what is in my glass tonight. For the last couple of years, Woodford Reserve has been putting out distillery-only experimental whiskeys. These aren’t always ground-breaking. They are releasing a Bottled-in-Bond bourbon soon. Bottled-in-Bond is about as old fashioned as you can get, yet it is a departure for the brand. By definition it has to be distilled at one distillery, and Woodford is usually a product of juice distilled in both the Woodford Reserve Pot Stills and the Old Forester Column Still. It will be an interesting product when it comes out.

But tonight I’m sipping on a Rye that made its way home with me on my last trip to Kentucky. Woodford Reserve Distillery Series: Barrel Finished Rye. This is a Rye whiskey that started life just like any other Woodford Rye. It was aged in a new charred oak barrel. For the whiskey that ended up in these bottles though, there was a second heavily toasted new barrel used to age it a second time. Think Double Oaked without the light charring on the second barrel.

Woodford Reserve Distillery Series: Barrel Finished Rye

Purchase Info: $49.99 for a 375 mL bottle at the distillery gift shop.

Details: 45.2% ABV. Rye whiskey finished in new heavily toasted barrels

Nose: Mint, candied apple, maple, floral rye bread, and leathery oak notes

Mouth: Fairly gentle for a rye. Floral mint dominates at first with baking spices and dried fruit showing up after a bit.

Finish: Spicy and warm. Floral rye bread notes linger along with a nice sweetness.

Thoughts: This is a pretty good rye. I like it more than the standard Woodford Rye. It is sweeter and has a nicer mouthfeel. If this were a regular release that was priced similarly to Double Oaked, I’d certainly be picking it up now and then.

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A comparison of Peychaud's Aromatic Cocktail Bitters: Barrel-Aged versus Standard

Last year, I took a cruise over the holidays. As someone who makes a significant fraction of his income as a dog sitter, my timing could not have been worse. You can only imagine how many people I had to turn away. But while I on the cruise I spent a lot of time down in the cocktail bar. This was a high end place that specialized in craft cocktails.

It will surprise no one who knows me to find out that the Sazerac is my favorite cocktail. If I am trying a new rye whiskey in cocktails for a review, it’ll always be in a Sazerac. If I’m traveling, I will usually order one if it is on the menu. Now I’ve had some really bad Sazerac’s at bars throughout the country. One bar in Bardstown, KY did almost everything wrong to theirs. They used bourbon instead of rye, orange instead of lemon, and they left out the absinthe. It was basically a Bourbon Old Fashioned with Peychaud’s. It was terrible. I’ve also had some very good ones as I’ve traveled. Which brings me back to the cruise mentioned above.

I was sad, though not terribly surprised that there wasn’t a Sazerac on the menu, it was a Caribbean cruise after all. But after chatting with the bartender for a few days, I asked him if he had the stuff to make one. He was super excited to do so. I’m guessing making the same 10 cocktails night after night gets a little repetitive. When he gathered the ingredients, I was surprised to see him pull out a bottle of the Barrel-Aged version of Peychaud’s Bitters. It was something I’d always wanted to try, but never felt justified in spending two and a half times as much on it.

That was a really good Sazerac. But, I kind of thought that surroundings might have had more than a little to do with that so I still didn’t buy any of the Barrel-Aged upon returning home. Well, at least until last week. I had planned the “best rye ever…this week” post and one of the tests was, naturally, a Sazerac test. Unfortunately I was out of Peychaud’s and when I asked my wife to stop off at Total Wine to pick some up, Total Wine was out of the standard so she picked up the Barrel-Aged version since she’d rather spend $10 extra than make an extra stop at another liquor store on the day before Thanksgiving. And so I found myself with the opportunity to see if there was anything to it that would justify spending that kind of money on it.

I compared the two Peychaud’s three different ways. First, I weighed out exactly 4 grams of each one and added 225 grams of soda water to each (bitters and soda water is my go to non-alcoholic drink). After that, I made one Sazerac (minus bitters) and split it into two, being sure to weigh each one out so as to remove relative strength as a variable. I then added 1 gram of each bitters and continued to finish each as normal. Finally, I just tasted each of them. I’m glad I did this step last, I still taste the darn things and it has been over two hours since I took a sip of each. Here is what I found, starting with tasting each on it’s own.

Nose:
Standard release Peychaud’s Bitters: Anise and celery notes.
Barrel-Aged Peychaud’s Bitters: Very similar with the addition of mint notes.

Taste:
Standard release Peychaud’s Bitters: Follows the nose, but has more of a celery emphasis.
Barrel-Aged Peychaud’s Bitters: Sweeter then the standard with less of a celery emphasis (though it is still there), also has the anise and mint notes from the nose.

In Soda Water:
The Barrel-aged is smoother and richer and with added mint flavor. Not a huge difference between the two with this much dilution, but still noticeable.

In a Sazerac:
The one made with the Barrel-Aged bitters is definitely sweeter, rounder and has more of the Peychaud’s influence than the standard release. Barrel-aged made a better Sazerac.

Thoughts:
I was surprised by a few things here. One, I honestly didn’t expect to find the celery notes in these when I tasted them on their own. Once I noticed it there, I was shocked that I didn’t notice it anywhere else. Not even in the soda water where there was no other flavor competition. I was also shocked at how much of a difference there really was between these two. I expected it to be subtle, but when tasted side-by-side it was anything but. Is there a reason to spend two and a half times on the Barrel-aged? Maybe. I’d guess that it depends on how often you buy Peychaud’s. If you only buy it every year or more, it really is better. If you buy it for use in bitters and soda water like I do and go through a bottle every couple months, it might be best to keep both on hand. One for soda and one for cocktails.

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Calumet Farm 10 Year Old, Single Barrel Selection by Total Wine Kentucky

Last week, I mentioned that upon entering a Louisville total Wine, I had been surprised by an expanded line of Calumet Farm bourbons. And that after much deliberation I had gotten the Private Selection over the batched versions. It was a good choice because, as it turned out, I wasn’t able to get the Private Selection at home, but ended up having the rest of the line available for purchase.

I also teased that the only reason I picked up the 10 year old Single Rack Black was because I had this one in the closet and wanted to see how they compared. This is the second part of the Calumet Farm “series” and the review that I teased last week.

Calumet Farm 10 Year Old, Single Barrel Selection by Total Wine Kentucky

Purchase Info: $68.99 for a 750 mL bottle at Total Wine-Paddock Shops, Louisville, KY.

Details: 10 year age statement. 46% ABV. Barrel 225. Barreled on date: March 2006.

Nose: Wintergreen, artificial cherry flavor, and tobacco.

Mouth: Warm and tingly with mint, baking spice, fruit and a touch of tobacco.

Finish: Gentle at first with a blossom of heat after. Lingering baking spice and tobacco.

Thoughts: This is obviously from the same source as the batched version as it has a very similar flavor profile. Fruit, spice, mint, and oak flavors dominate. In this version oak shows as tobacco instead of wood. In the Single Rack Black the fruits were less generic in flavor and the oak on the finish is more tannic.

I like them both. And I’d probably pick this up over the Single Rack Black if they were evenly priced. But since this is priced more than $15 higher at the same store, I probably wouldn’t go out of my way to pick it up again. The difference isn’t that big (unless you are super sensitive to tannins). And, in my experience of Total Wine private selections, that is pretty much par for the course. They are seldom much, if any better, then the original.

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Calumet Farm 10-year-old Single Rack Black Bourbon

I try to keep my nose to the happenings in the whiskey front. I read and listen to whiskey news, blogs, and reviews. I used to be on twitter to follow such things (not so much anymore, Twitter can be a vile place). But sometimes, things slip through the cracks, and I get surprised at the liquor store. I mean, if the company doesn’t send me the press release, it’s not like I’m out searching for them. I’m a storyteller, not a journalist.

Take tonight’s whiskey. Apparently, this was introduced earlier this year. In researching it, I found a press release for its 12-year-old brother dated April of 2018. Looking at the archive.org snapshots of the Calumet Bourbon website show that images for this bourbon showed up on their site around the same time. But when I walked into a Total Wine in Louisville back in September, I knew none of this. I saw that they had a Private Selection of a 10-year-old Calumet and picked it up. It wasn’t until I got back home that I realized that there were bottles of 10- and 12-year-old Calumet bourbons on local shelves.

Knowing that I thought the standard “small batch” Calumet was fine, but that I felt it was overpriced, I wasn’t in a real big hurry to grab another bottle from the line. But, of course, I did have that Private Selection in the closet, and I was a fan of the Bird Dog 10-year-old released from the same company. So, yeah, I pulled the trigger and picked this up.

What does “Single Rack” mean? Apparently, that is a descriptor that the company is using because each batch of bourbon is created using the barrels from a single rack (19 barrels) in the rickhouse.

Calumet Farm 10-year-old Single Rack Black Bourbon

Purchase Info: $52.99 for a 750 mL bottle at Total Wine, Burnsville, MN

Details: 46% ABV. 10 year age stated. Rack C0505.10. 19 barrel batch.

Nose: Bubblegum, mixed berries, a hint of soap, cinnamon, and light oak.

Mouth: Nice spice, with cinnamon, ripe fruits, mint, and oak.

Finish: Warm and of decent length. Lingering baking spice, ripe fruits, mint, and oak.

Thoughts: This tastes like it has more than its fair share of Heaven Hill juice in the batch. But, it also reminds me a bit of something from Jefferson’s. This ain’t half bad. It’s a nice “change-of-pace” bourbon as it sits solidly between the typical bourbon flavor profile and the fruity fringes of the bourbon flavor profile. I’m going to say this one will not be for everyone, but I like it. And I like it more after I’ve spent some time with it than I did when it was first opened.

You might be asking that since I felt that the “regular” small batch release was overpriced for what it was, what about this one? I’d like to say that a $50+ price point for a 10-year-old bourbon is high, but we all know that is no longer the case. So in light of that, I’m going to say that the price is on the higher side of acceptable for me but still within tolerances.

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Yellowstone Limited Edition 2018

I’ve reviewed the yearly release of Yellowstone Limited Edition for the last couple years now. I’ve always liked them enough to recommend them at retail purchase prices. But this year, we took the bold step of paying above retail prices for it.

No, we didn’t start playing the secondary market. At least, not really. Instead we picked this up at the yearly Master Distiller’s Auction to benefit the Oscar Getz Museum of Whiskey History in Bardstown, KY. The auction is held during the Kentucky Bourbon Festival each September and we’ve been attending every year since a friend of mine suggested I check it out. We have a good system. My frugal wife holds the number and does the bidding while I, the competitive one, tell her (before the auction) what I’d be willing to pay for the things I’m interested in.

The auction is the main source of revenue for the Oscar Getz museum and since we enjoy visiting (especially now that they have started to update the exhibits) we like to try to buy something in order to support them. While I will probably never have the budget to go after some of the high ticket items like a bottle of Willett Family Estate Single Barrel whiskey ($700), an antique bourbon from 1941 ($1,100), Pappy 15 year old ($2,000), a private tour and tasting at Willett with Drew Kulsveen ($2,000) or a bottle of Pappy 23 year old ($3,600), I do try to save at least a little of my Kentucky budget for the auction.

This year the auction raised $29,930 for the museum. Of which I, and my bottle of Yellowstone, contributed $150. Was it worth it? The way I see it, I gave a $150 to a museum I enjoy and got a bottle of nice whiskey tossed in. So, yeah. It was worth it. But how does it stand up for people who are happening upon it at retail?

Yellowstone Limited Edition 2018

Purchase Info: $150 for a signed 750 mL bottle at the Kentucky Bourbon Festival Master Distiller’s Auction to benefit the Oscar Getz Museum of Whiskey History.

Details: 50.5% ABV. The press release states this is a blend of bourbons that range from 4 to 12 years old, including some Limestone Branch distilled bourbon. Regarding the barrels used for finishing, the release quotes Steve Beam: “In 2016, we finished our Limited Edition bourbon in specially selected new wine barrels, which lent their special flavor to that year’s celebrated bourbon, but their journey had barely begun. Later that year, after the bourbon was dumped and bottled, the same 28 barrels were lightly charred and we filled them with our 2017 Limited Edition bourbon. This year, we took the very same barrels – now rich with complexity – and deeply charred them before filling them with our 2018 Limited Edition.”

Nose: Brown sugar, tobacco, tart cherry.

Mouth: Baking spices, brown sugar, salty leather (think about chewing on the laces of your baseball glove when you were a kid).

Finish: Warm, long and very flavorful. Cinnamon, nutmeg, clove and tart cherries linger.

Thoughts: Yum. This is delicious. I would certainly buy this again and since this is their last barrel finishing experiment in this line, I’m looking forward to what they try next.

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Jim Beam Repeal Batch

Last year, on a particularly cold negative twenty degree (Fahrenheit) night, I put a glass of 80° proof whiskey out on the deck to see how it would react to the extreme cold of a Minnesota winter and if it would start to freeze. Mostly, it did nothing. It got a little syrupy but it’s not like it started to crystalize or anything. I was a little disappointed but only a little. I started my college education, way back in the pre-commercial internet days, studying science so I am well versed in the idea that a hypothesis (especially one that is backed by scant actual info) often doesn’t stand up to experimental trials.

Why would I leave a glass of whiskey outside overnight? Well, mostly because I was curious. I wanted to know what happens as alcohol reaches it’s freezing point (roughly -17°F at 80 proof). Especially if that alcohol is bourbon. And since negative twenty doesn’t happen too often I thought that was my chance to find out. Maybe it didn’t get that cold, or maybe alcohol starts to gel before freezing. No idea. But it was interesting to observe. If this winter gets that cold, I’ll probably try again. It would be interesting to try frozen whiskey.

It is that same curiosity that led me to a certain thought when I first saw that Jim Beam was coming out with a non-chill filtered. We’ve all learned that bourbons are chill-filtered because at a lower proof there is the possibility of a cloudiness occurring if it gets too cold. This is deemed to be a turn-off to customers (I’d guess rightly so). And so the producers pre-chill the bourbon to filter that cloudiness out. But, the follow-up thought also says that chill-filtered bourbon also removes some of the flavor. And so it is fitting that, with a limited edition bourbon, a company would skip that step and give geeks what they are clamoring for, even if it is at a lower proof.

Of course, the first thing I thought of was if I could make that cloudiness happen. I’ve never seen it and I would like to. Why? Curiosity, I guess. But then I went and finished the bottle before thinking about it. Maybe I’ll have to get get another one.

Jim Beam Repeal Batch

Purchase Info: $17.99 for a 750 ml bottle, Liquor Barn Jefferson Commons, Louisville, KY. Available locally starting at $18.99 for a one liter bottle.

Details: 43% ABV. Non-Chill filtered.

Nose: Peanut Brittle, dried leaves

Mouth: Peanut, baking spice and a hint of mint.

Finish: Gentle with a long lasting unsalted peanut note.

Thoughts: This is a limited edition whiskey. Is it worth grabbing instead of other Beam products? To find out, I picked up a little Beam White label and Beam Black label. It found that this has a nose that is more similar to Beam Black than it is to Beam White, though not as woody as Black Label. The mouth is a sweeter and smoother version of Beam White. It doesn’t show the sharp wood flavors that Beam White often does. I’d say that if you were to view the difference between Beam White and Beam Black on a spectrum, that this would fall somewhere on the one quarter mark (on the Beam White side).

Should you buy it? If you are a Beam fan, yes. Even if it is just for curiosity’s sake. In a vacuum, it is pretty meh. But it is a better version of Beam White and due to the price, I might pick up a liter for use in cocktails. Or for experimentation’s sake.

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Little Book 2018: Chapter 2 "Noe Simple Task"

Tonight I am drinking a true FrankenWhiskey. And, not to spoil the results for you, but I love it. Released by Beam Suntory, Little Book is a label that celebrates unique whiskey blends. It's, to quote the label, "crafted by Freddie Noe," son of Jim Beam Master Distiller Fred Noe. I've never met the younger Mr. Noe, but I have to say I like what he's doing with Little Book.

Last year's Little Book was a blend of bourbon, corn, rye and malt whiskeys ranging from 4 to 13 years old. I...never tried it. For some reason, it just didn't interest me. Maybe it was the malt whiskey. Adding malt whiskey to something is usually a sign that I won't care for it. In any case, I passed on it. I sort of regret that now...

This year's, however, was a different animal altogether. It blends 8-year-old Kentucky Straight Rye whiskey with two different Canadian Whiskies. A 13-year-old Canadian Rye with a 40-year-old Canadian whiskey made from corn. I have been house blending US and Canadian Ryes at home for quite a while and was really looking forward to seeing what a company with access to nearly unlimited stocks could come up with. And when I saw it at Total Wine for less than $75, I pounced on it.

Little Book 2018: Chapter 2 "Noe Simple Task"

Purchase Info: $73.99 for a 750 mL at Total Wine, Burnsville, MN

Details: 59.40% ABV. Blend of 8-year-old Kentucky Straight Rye whiskey, 13-year-old Canadian Rye, and 40-year-old Canadian whiskey.

Nose: Cinnamon, nutmeg, candle wax, non-specific wood.

Mouth: Nice and spicy with good heat. Cinnamon carries over to the mouth with a honey sweetness and dried fruit notes backing it up.

Finish: Spicy and long with cinnamon, rye spices, mint, honey and dried fruit.

Thoughts: I saw some people in online comments bashing this for using Canadian whisky. As far as I’m concerned, those people are very wrong as the Canadian whiskies are the ones that are providing most of the flavor. This is a well crafted whiskey that has a lot of the Canadian rye flavors with the spicy brashness of a US-style rye. It’s fantastic. Spicy and bold with a great mouthfeel. I think I’m in love.

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