It has been two thousand, eight hundred and twenty-two days since I last reviewed anything from Cedar Ridge Distillery in Iowa. At the time it was a single barrel of their bourbon. This time around, I found a Bottled-in-Bond version of their bourbon. I disliked that first bourbon so much, that this is honestly the first whiskey of theirs to pass my lips since that bottle was emptied. Here are my thoughts from the 2013 review:
I'm not a fan of this bourbon. It misses almost all the notes I look for in a bourbon. It has almost no vanilla or caramel and very little spice. It does showcase the corn very well. And maybe being from the middle of corn country, that's the point.
I know that I didn’t care for the barrel of bourbon that my previous bottle came from, but I had readers comment that they had mixed results with theirs. Some they loved and others they really did not like. This being a batched product gives me hope that the product is better than it was almost 7 years ago (well, 8 if you go by the purchase date of my previous bottle). Well that and they’ve had 7-8 more years to build their craft. And since they’ve only been around 16 years, a decent portion of the time they’ve been open has happened since they sold me that first bottle. All that is to say that I had a good feeling that I would like the bottle I purchased.
I mean, why would I have purchased it otherwise?
Cedar Ridge Bottled-in-Bond
Purchase Info: $48.99 for a 750 mL bottle at Atomic Liquors, Eagan, MN
Price per Drink (50mL): $3.27
Details: 50% ABV. DSP-IA-15001. Release 2.
Nose: Dried corn, raisin, cinnamon, vanilla, and mint.
Mouth: Sweet custard on entry tranistioning to a spicy cinnamon, dried fruit, corn, mint and black tea.
Finish: Warm and of medium length. Lingering notes of cinnamon, black tea, and dried fruits.
Thoughts: I like this, though it tastes kinda young, even at four years old. I will say it is a lot better than that bourbon I bought 8 years ago. I'm not a huge fan of the raisin/dried fruit notes in here. But luckily for me, that note is much more pronounced in a Glencairn than it is in my usual rocks glass. I’m not sure if I would buy this again. Not sure I like it at a $50 level, but it does make it more likely that I will be giving other whiskeys of theirs a look in the future. I’m raising the rating on Cedar Ridge Bourbon from a dislike to a like.
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