A new event in town: Whiskey on Ice

Sunday I attended Whiskey on Ice, the first whiskey festival to call the state of Minnesota home. The goal of the festival is admirable. Minnesota is seen as a small market for many whiskey companies. We don’t get what a lot of other states do. The premise was that if we had our very own whiskey festival, maybe companies outside of Canada would think about distributing their products to us. Now, I have no idea if it will help us get larger allocations of hard to find whiskeys, but I figure it can’t hurt. So now that my body has stopped punishing me for attending, let me tell you a little about my experience there. 

Whiskey on Ice was held in the Depot in downtown Minneapolis. The Depot is a combination hotel and ice rink/event center that is housed in a historic train depot. It is a beautiful space with high ceilings, ample underground parking and easy access to that all-important lifeblood of the economy: coffee. For this event, the fact that there are two hotels attached to it was a serious safety bonus.

The event featured five master classes and “the grand tasting.” If you wanted to spend the extra cash on it, there was also a VIP hour ahead of the tasting where you could taste even more whiskeys surrounded by fewer crowds. And of course there was whiskey. A lot of whiskey. I was told it was a fairly pedestrian pouring list, but I was satisfied. 

There were two concurrent sets of master classes. The first of which started at 1:30 pm. I attended one being held by High West’s head distiller. Ordinarily, 1:30 is a little early for me to be tasting whiskey so luckily it got into all sorts of sciency goodness that made me forget about how early it was. After the class was over, it was a half hour wait or so for the opening of the VIP session of the “Grand Tasting.”

The Whiskey on Ice Grand Tasting at the ice rink in The Depot, Minneapolis. Yes. In the winter you can skate here.

Bagpipes. Why does there always have to be fucking bagpipes?

This really was worth the price of admission. Tickets were limited to 150 and there were only about 60 or so tables so it was easy to find one where you could talk to the brand representative or in the case of the smaller distilleries, the owner or distiller. I was able to taste a few things that I really liked which I’d never purchase for myself due to a combination of price (Jack Daniels Sinatra), availability (Compass Box Hedonism Quindecimus) and rarity (Kilbeggan 18 year old). Of course just as valuable to me are the things that I tasted during this time that I didn’t like and now do not need to spend the money on (GlenDronach 21 year Parliament, Kavalan Vunho Barrique and the Hudson Whiskey range). 

Directly after the Grand Tasting VIP hour I attended the other of the master classes I attended. This was an entertaining look at the products of Jim Beam with American Whiskey Ambassador Adam Harris. Once again, we got to taste things that haven’t made it to Minnesota yet such as the Harvest Collection, Distiller’s Masterpiece and Old Tub. The Old Tub was brought along as a bit of fun since it is only available at the distillery. It also is either not very good or really suffered from being tasted last. The Harvest Collection I found a bit surprising. All of them were interesting though none were fantastic. And I was about to be fine with the fact that they weren’t available here. Then I decided to try an experiment. I mixed them all together. Now that I enjoyed. Either that or it benefited from being used to get the taste of Old Tub out of my mouth.

And after this class we wandered back into the tasting hall. This was a mistake. I met up with another local blogger and we sort of made the rounds. After a bit of time I found myself dumping less and less as I got more and more invested in the various conversations we were having…

And now we come to the part where I re-establish the fact that I am a big advocate for moderation in drinking. I highly advise it. And I can’t stress it enough: you do not want to be in the shape I was in after that festival. Next year, I’ll probably just skip the main tasting and only go to the VIP session and the classes. Also I’ll drink lots of water, eat the food and always, always remember to dump. Though my hotel got both channels, I still haven’t seen Game of Thrones or Mad Men from Sunday. Thank goodness for my DVR.

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Mixed Results on the Kentucky Bourbon Trail Craft Tour

One of the things I like to do in Kentucky is visit distilleries. To this end, when I heard a couple years ago that the Kentucky Bourbon Trail was organizing an offshoot passport program for craft distillers, I was not only intrigued, but excited. I owe my entire love of whiskey to one of the founding members of this tour (MB Roland) and so the very first opportunity I had to pick up a passport, I did. The reward is a julep cup. I really love free stuff.

My first stop was the Willett Distillery in Bardstown, KY. The Kulsveen family has been selling amazing bourbon out of this facility for many years. The current craft distillery is relatively new though. So new that they only recently released the first product distilled there, a two year old rye. This is a beautiful place. I highly recommend stopping in for a tour. (I did a review of my first visit back in 2012, though I know some things have changed in intervening time).

The second stop on my Craft Tour experience was at Old Pogue. Old Pogue was as much of a history tour as it was a distillery tour. And I loved that about it. Good history, good bourbon, a pretty drive. It hit all the right notes for me. (I did a separate review for this one as well.)

Barrel House Distilling was kind of an impromptu stop for me. I was trying to get over the disappointment that was Town Branch and found I had just a little time to kill before my planned drive to the Party Source to do some shopping. They were literally minutes away from where I was. Barrel House Distilling is located in the barrel house of the old James E. Pepper distillery on Manchester Street in Lexington. I was a bit unsure what to expect as I drove up to what looked like an abandoned building. But, ever the adventurer, I parked the car and made my way to the door. 

Upon entering I was greeted by Noah Brown, Operations Manager for the company. There was no one else there so even though we didn't have enough time for a full tour, we chatted a bit about what they were working on. I saw the still, some of the experiments they were conducting and did a tasting. Along the way, I decided I needed to do a little shopping before heading out of town and bought a bottle of rum. All in all, I found the place fascinating and need to get back to do the full tour.

Fast forward almost a year between stops in my journey to complete the passport and you'll find me driving southwest from Elizabethtown toward Bowling Green in search of a visit to Corsair Artisan. Corsair is one of those places that I've admired for a while. They literally wrote the book on experimental whiskey recipes. And while I've never had the opportunity to buy one of their liquid products, I do own the book. And have enjoyed it the numerous times I've read it. 

Corsair is located just off of a lovely little park/commercial area in Bowling Green. The space they are in is beautiful and spaceous in a manner that suggests that it had a previous life, maybe light industrial or retail. (A little searching of the internet suggests that my theory on the retail is correct.) Exposed brick and polished wood floors abound in the gift shop and tasting area. I have a feeling I may be stopping here again.

Paul and Merry Beth Tomaszewski at MB Roland Distillery are two very fine folks that I consider friends. I try to either stop in for a visit or meet up with them every time I pass near their place. The distillery is on the grounds of an old Amish farm just a mile or two north of I-24 in Southwestern Kentucky. Tours are available (and I would encourage you to take one), there is a gift shop and tasting room and several times throughout the summer they host a concert series named Pickin' On The Porch at the distillery. If you visit, you will not be disappointed. Great people that make great products.

I will admit to bias, but I love the stuff they make. I currently have bottles of their bourbon, white dog, Kentucky Black Dog, Pink Lemonade and St. Elmo's Fire on my shelf (or in my fridge). 

I just posted a review of Limestone Branch Distillery last week. But I will give you the 30 second synopsis. Great people making tasty products. Visit them next time you are near Lebanon. You can team it up with a visit to Independent Stave's Kentucky Cooperage and Maker's Mark if you wish.

And since that was my last stop, I got my julep cup. It was smaller than I expected. And had some rust/discoloration on it. Disappointing, but I’m not one to complain to loudly about how my free thing isn’t perfect.

Because I picked my passport up fairly early in the life of this endeavor, my passport only had seven distilleries on it. There are currently two more and someday soon I hope to visit those as well. But wait, you might be saying, you've only listed six above? You are correct. I couldn't bring myself make this next one look nice.

You see, I find people that use women as accessories to be offensive and I go out of my way to not give them money. This is the only weapon I have in the fight to get companies to treat women as if they are equal human beings worthy of equal respect. In this case, in order to get my stamp, I had pay up. You see, the only way to get a stamp is to go to the distillery. The only way to go to the distillery is to buy a $7 ticket. You are free to make your own choices, but I won't be visiting here again. 

I'm going to be a little judgmental here. Silver Trail is reason that I can't recommend participating in the Kentucky Bourbon Trail Craft Tour passport program. I think that every other one of the distilleries that I visited are worth visiting in their own right. They make great products and you absolutely should visit them all. But Hardin is very far out of the way, the company at least presents itself as misogynistic, and it will cost you $7 per person to get your stamp. I recommend saving that money. Maybe spend it at one of the other distilleries to buy…oh, I don't know...a non-rusty julep cup?

A Visit to Limestone Branch Distillery

For a bourbon fan, no trip to Kentucky is complete without making a few stops to visit the place where your favorite whiskey is made. Odds are though, that your favorite whiskey is not made in Lebanon, KY. At least, not yet. Limestone Branch Distillery in Lebanon, KY sells sugar shine in unaged, flavored, or (as of last month) aged varieties.

Sugar Shine is a clear unaged spirit, typically made from a combination of sugar and corn. Limestone Branch's version follows that tradition, being made from a mash of 50% corn and 50% cane.

As you pull into the parking lot, the first thing you see on the side of the building is a large Moon Pie sign. One of the products they produce is a Moon Pie flavored moonshine that, my wife tells me, is scarily close to the real thing in flavor. I'll have to take her word for it as I have never developed a taste for Moon Pies due to an aversion to marshmallows. 

You enter the building into the gift shop and are warmly greeted and offered a tour. We accepted and since we were a bit early, we passed the time with a trip to the tasting bar to try some of the products. After trying a few we wandered around the gift shop for a little bit deciding which of the products we couldn't live without. 

I have to mention one thing about the gift shop. It had the most ingenious ceiling I've ever seen. It's a metal roof. Being such, it's bound to get hot if there isn't any insulation. So there is insulation, black spray foam looking insulation. You wouldn't think, from reading about it, that this was something worth mentioning. But with the color of the walls, the floor, and all the visible wood around, it reminded me of nothing less than the inside of a charred barrel. It was an amazing effect. 

Once the tour started we were given a little history of the owners. As you might guess from their names, Paul and Steve Beam are part of the whiskey-making Beam clan. And from the little I talked to them, they seem to be a couple of really nice guys. 

After the history lesson, we enter the distillery area itself. This is not a big distillery. In the room is the research lab, mashing, fermenting, distilling, bottling and shipping area. 

This is one of the fermenting areas, if I remember correctly. I believe the tour guide told us that it is repurposed from a winery. In any case, it is really pretty.

This is the still. I hesitate to use the word cute, since that normally has condescending connotations. I don't mean it that way, but it is the best word I can come up with. It's a little over my height. It's little, but it gets the job done.

The condenser, the last part of the distilling process. The product is coming out of the tube below the gauge. As you can see it is clear as water. It won't get color unless it spends some time in a barrel or gets flavored.

This is the entire set up shown in the last three photos. Behind the condenser and the still is the fermenter. There are a few other smaller barrels acting in the same capacity scattered around as well. Behind us is the research lab and over to the right is the rest of the process. 

If you visit Limestone Branch, you may very well be coming from Maker's Mark which is just down the road. And if you do, you may think that you will be disappointed. I want to assure you that you won't be. After you get there, talk to the people, see the passion they have for what they do, and taste the fruit of their labors. You will understand what draws people to visiting craft distilleries. The ones worth visiting are exactly like Limestone Branch—filled with excited, passionate people who make a tasty product and are glad you are there to visit.

Speaking of products, the one I found I couldn't live without was the Apple Cinnamon Pie Sugar Shine. It's their unaged shine flavored with natural flavors. I assume apple and I can see the cinnamon stick since it is still in the bottle.

Limestone Branch Sugar Shine: Apple Cinnamon Pie flavor

Purchase info: $18.99 for a 375 mL at the distillery gift shop

Details: 20% ABV. "Mashed, Fermented, Distilled and Bottled by Limestone Branch Distillers" (I thought that was a nice touch.)

Nose: Apple pie, I swear I can even smell the crust.

Mouth: Thick, syrupy mouthfeel. Leads with cinnamon but transitions to cooked apples as it moves back. 

Finish: Slight lingering bitterness. No burn. 

Thoughts: This is a tasty liqueur. Tastes exactly like a baked apple pie that has been allowed to cool. Even the mouthfeel is correct since the liquid in an apple pie gets nicely thick and syrupy. I like it better cold, but ice waters it down too much. I'm keeping mine in the fridge. And this being October, I can promise that it won't last there until Christmas. It's autumn in a glass.

I urge you to go visit these guys even if you aren't a fan of shine. It's an interesting tour and they now have an aged product that is made from the sugar/corn mash. I got to sample it during Bourbon Fest and remember liking it. 

Maker's Mark: Beyond the Mark Tour and Cask Strength Review

While in Kentucky, I took the opportunity to take a more in-depth tour of the Maker's Mark Distillery. It's called the Beyond the Mark tour and it costs $35 per person. There is a maximum of 12 people per session. My wife and I purchased out tickets ahead of time and didn't hear them offer it to anyone while we were waiting so it probably wouldn't hurt to do the same if you choose to do this.

The tour starts the same way they all do. You cross the bridge and walk down the path, pausing along the way to hear a little bit of the history of the distillery from the time the land was cleared until today. We stopped off to peek inside the Quart House, the first liquor store in the state of Kentucky.

Then we enter the distillery proper. Up to this point, the tour isn't that much different from the nine dollar tour. Smaller, more intimate, the tour guide seems more knowledgable (even acknowledging the gentleman who called her on the myth of the recipe origin with a sidelong, "hush, we'll discuss that amongst ourselves"). All in all, Aggie was the best part of the tour up until this point and the one thing that made it different. Everyone gets to see the stills and the tanks as they are beautiful.

Not every tour gets to drink the white dog dipped out of that tank. I don't care for white dog, but this was too cool to pass up.

Of course we saw the fermenters. Lovely old wood. (We even got to see Bill Samuels, Jr. getting interviewed by a tv crew of some sort. He stopped over to say hi and thanked us for touring so that was nice.)

But after that, we got to see the "real" fermenters. Not that the others are fake, but these are the 34 stainless steel ones that make the bulk of the mash.

After the fermenters, it was up the stairs to have a very nice shift supervisor tell us about their yeast. It's hopped to keep the bacteria from taking it over. We got to taste it...tasted like a flat Belgian beer.

Every tour gets to see the printing presses and die cut press that makes the labels.

​But this was the first time I got to enter the Quality Control Building. This was one of the samples. I didn't get to taste it and make notes, though come to think of it, I didn't ask either. The tickets in the background are prizes to incentivize the employees to participate. I guess when you are around bourbon all day, tasting it might be just...work. 

Gotta go through the warehouse. No distillery tour would be complete without that awesome smell.

Watching the folks on the bottling line is always impressive. 

But going through the room where they dip all the specialty items and different wax colors was really cool. It was nice to see the "not-so-polished" side of Maker's. I've worked in factories and always knew it had to be there. I liked seeing it.

No tour would be compete without a tasting. We got the standard four (Under-aged, normal, over aged and 46) plus a sample of the Cask Strength.

The Cask Strength which we toasted to one another under the light of the Dale Chihuly art installation on our way to the Gift Shop.

Maker's Mark Cask Strength

Purchase Info: $39.99 for a 375 mL at the Distillery Gift Shop

Details: 56.6% ABV

Nose: fresh cut apple, spearmint, honey and oak

Mouth: very sweet, cinnamon and clove with distinct floral notes

Finish: good, long warmth that sits in the chest and a sweetness that hangs around, but then transitions to sharpness.

Thoughts: This is Maker's just stronger and more concentrated. It's fabulous and well worth the equivalent of $80 for a 750 mL when compared to other cask strength offerings. It's very drinkable and I like it more than either regular Maker's or Maker's 46. 

This whiskey was money well spent and the tour even more so. I gathered a lot of knowledge from a very good tour guide. I got to see places and have experiences that I didn't normally get to have and got to geek out just a little bit. I'd recommend both.

Kentucky Bourbon Festival: Ticketed Events

Paul Tomaszewski of MB Roland Distillery signing the Louisville Slugger made famous on WhiskyCast

While at the Kentucky Bourbon Festival I like to attend some of the ticketed events. As the tickets to some of these are expensive, I aim to attend three each time. This year I attended Kentucky Bourbon All-Star Sampler™, Let's Talk Bourbon™, and the ARCO Speakeasy.

Chris Morris, Master Distiller at Woodford Reserve, pouring a couple Old Foresters at the All-Star Sampler™.

Kentucky Bourbon All-Star Sampler™

Picture it: a large open room that looks like it could house a small manufactuing company inside it. Down the center of the room is a large table heaped with food. Scattered around the room are tables and barrels with lighted tops for you to eat that food. All around the exterior of the room are small bars pouring spirits for you to taste. 

Sounds like a nice place to be right? Well for $50 per person you could be there. And as far as I’m concerned, you probably should. It’s not every day that you get the opportunity to shake hands with and be poured a drink by the likes of Jimmy Russell, Chris Morris or Jim Rutledge. I met up with a few friends, both old and new, while there and had a great time. Most of the distilleries were pouring their standard line up. Jim Beam had their Small Batch Collection, Heaven Hill was pushing Evan Williams, Woodford Reserve had both Woodford and Old Forester there. I was especially interested in what some of the craft folks were doing though. MB Roland from south-western Kentucky had their bourbon and Black Patch Whiskey available to try. Old Pogue had Five Fathers Pure Malt Rye to be sampled. Limestone Branch debuted their aged product, Precinct No. 6 at the event. There was also a brandy from Copper and Kings in Louisville that wasn’t too bad.

All in all it was a great evening and it made me very happy I decided to go back again this time.

Your materials to help you enjoy Let's Talk Bourbon™: the lyrics to My Old Kentucky Home, some notepaper, a booklet on how bourbon is made and a breakfast cocktail.

Let's Talk Bourbon™

The ticket is $30. For that you get breakfast, should you want it. You get cocktails, both with breakfast and after the event. You get a gift, this year a Four Roses branded Tervis glass. Plus, to top it off, you get to listen to Jim Rutledge talk about how bourbon is made and answer any questions the audience might have about it for about two hours. There is no event I can reccomend more than this one. This is my favorite event. I try to be early and get into the front row because I like to take notes, even thought the base presentation might be the same, the questions and tangents are always different and very informative.

The band, the screen, the distilleries and the costumed attendees all help to set the scene for the ARCO Speakeasy.

The ARCO Speakeasy

This was an event that I almost did not go to. I hadn’t planned to do anything on Saturday night because I was supposed to be up at 6am Sunday morning to drive 13 hours home. I was talked into it by my friends at MB Roland. And boy am I glad I was. This was a very fun event put on by the members of the Kentucky Bourbon Trail Craft Tour. They each made a cocktail or two and you got to drink them. The best part, of course was that almost everyone was dressed in Prohibition-era costume. The people watching was fantastic. The cocktails weren’t bad either. 

It’s $50 or $100 per person depending on if you considered yourself a VIP or not. I did not. The event happens at the same time as The Great Kentucky Bourbon Tasting and Gala™ which is a black-tie event for $150 per person. Too rich and too fancy for my blood. The Speakeasy was just right. I didn’t have to dress up too much (I didn’t have a costume so I just dressed nicely and didn’t feel out of place) and it was a third of the price. I mean, that money could be spent on bourbon (and was). Plus I met and talked to a lot of great folks that are part of the Craft Trail while enjoying drinks showcasing some of their products. All in all it was worth needing extra coffee for the drive home the next morning.

A Visit to the 2014 Kentucky Bourbon Festival

For the last 23 years the city of Bardstown, Kentucky has held it’s annual Kentucky Bourbon Festival in September. It’s a celebration of the town’s unique position in the heart of Bourbon Country and a way to celebrate one of the area’s major industries.

This year was my second time attending the festival and I may have had even more fun this time than I did the first. The festival starts on Tuesday with an event or two each day. It isn’t until Friday, though where things really kick into high gear. The festival itself mainly centers around Spalding Hall, the home to the Oscar Getz Museum of Whiskey History. 

The lawn out front is covered with a variety of exhibitors from local charities and small craftspeople to the heavy hitters of the bourbon industry, distilleries and cooperage. The distilleries have extremely nice, but small and temporary, branded buildings that are set up as extensions of their gift shops. Sans alcohol, of course. The cooperage and the rest of the exhibitors were in tents. I wandered around, bought a few things from a charity, but otherwise just enjoyed the people and the surroundings.

Behind Spalding Hall were the food trucks and the Barrel Rolling. I’ll admit, last time I was there, I didn’t really understand this event. After talking with a few people and reading up on it between then and now, I have a better feel for it. It’s basically a bunch of people who are very good at what they do for a living, showing off and competing with their colleagues. All in all a fun event to watch, though I feel for them since the sun was really hot and those barrels looked extremely heavy.

The museum itself is one of those places that when you first walk in, you aren’t sure if you want to keep going. This is an old building and the exhibits have been there for a while. But, let me tell you, it is well worth a stop. There are so many old bottles, advertising and bits of memorabilia that a whisky/history geek like me is in heaven. Aside from that, on Saturday the museum is the setting for the Master Distiller’s Auction. I attended this mostly because a friend told that it would be interesting. He wasn’t wrong. We wandered in and got a number. I gave it to my wife who is much more responsible than I. There were a few things that we bid on, but nothing that ended up finishing in our budget. There were some really cool old whiskies, such as a prohibition-era bottle of Golden Wedding bourbon. It ended up just under selling for around $800. Of course, the highest prices went for the signed bottles of Pappy. (The 23 was $2100, but all were $500 or over.) I really found the event fascinating. I’ve never watched so many people so casually spend that much money. Luckily, it was for a good cause as the proceeds go to help fund the museum.

Of course, there were a lot more events. Some of which cost money, like the Speakeasy, The Gala or the All-Star Sampler. Some were free, like the barrel making demonstrations, the Ballon Glow and the art exhibits. But my favorite part was the people. I met some new friends, many people that I’d talked to online for just about forever and hung out with some friends I’d met previously. I think as I go more, this part will grow to overshadow all the official events.

If you are a bourbon lover and haven’t been, I’d highly recommend it.

Bourbon News: Margie Samuels to be Inducted into the Kentucky Bourbon Hall of Fame

I'm not normally the type of writer who just passes along press releases. I prefer telling stories. But in this case I'm going to do it for a couple of reasons. One is that it I think this is a pretty cool story. It's nice to see people who are due recognition get it, especially when they happen to be female in a stereotypically male industry.

I say stereotypical because woman have always played a big part in the whiskey industry. Fred Minnick's great book—Whiskey Women: The Untold Story About How Women Saved Bourbon, Scotch & Irish Whiskey—showed us that woman are a big part of the history of whiskey. 

In this case, the person being honored is Margie Samuels of Maker's Mark fame. The story goes that the entire Maker's brand was built on her ideas. The red wax? Margie. The distinctive and beautiful look of the distillery? Margie. Heck, they say even the name was her idea.

So like I said, I think this is a pretty good story and you can read the press release here: 

The other reason I feel ok passing this along is purely selfish. I'm going on vacation. I'll be in Kentucky next week visiting bars, distilleries and events. I'll be finishing the week with the Kentucky Bourbon Festival. If you are in the area and you see me out and about be sure to say hi! 

Kentucky Bourbon Trail Craft Tour: Old Pogue Distillery & Five Fathers Pure Malt Rye

A word of advice. Do not try to visit the Old Pogue distillery if you are running late. Maysville is farther away from anywhere than a map would lead you to believe. And once you get there, you realize that the your GPS has taken you to the exit, not the entrance. (The entrance is around back, turn on the road just before you get there.) But if you plan a little extra time, you will be rewarded with a pleasant drive through the country, an historic small town and a beautiful distillery on a hill. A very steep hill. With switchbacks. 

I on the other hand did not plan enough extra time. I had set up my tour at 10 am and parked the car at 9:59 am. I was almost late, or as I like to call it: on-time. All of the tour takers met in the gift shop. We signed in and the tour started. 

The first stop was the house. This is a lovely old home that used to house the Pogue family. Now, according to our tour guide/distiller, it gets rented out for weddings and events. We wandered around inside, listening to our host tell the family history and looking at the old bottles and ads that line the mantle and walls. I love old ads, so it was a real treat for me.

After the house, it was back across the driveway and into the distillery. The distillery is the back room of what I had originally thought was the gift shop. I see why you need to sign up for a tour. It gets a little cramped as everyone tries to get a look. The space is little, but seems to do the job. 

After everyone cycles through the distillery it is time for the tasting. We tasted Old Pogue Bourbon and Five Fathers Pure Malt Rye Whisky. I’ve already stated that I like the Old Pogue bourbon. I wasn’t quite expecting what I got with the Five Fathers though. It was interesting enough that I needed to pick up a bottle and spend a little more time with it. 

All in all, I highly recommend setting up a tour and stopping off. It’s a short tour. But the guide was nice, the history is very interesting, and the drive was pretty. What more can you ask for, really?

Five Fathers Pure Malt Rye Whisky

Nose: Grain/silage on top. Some black pepper lives under that.

Mouth: At 110° proof (55% ABV) it's understandable that this leads with a tingle. This is followed closely by a big sweet grain flavor. Bringing back the black pepper as it moves back. Mouthfeel is thick and almost velvety. 

Finish: Long and a little bitter with some black pepper spice, but not too hot.

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Thoughts: This was unlike any whiskey I've ever had before. It had elements of your typical rye, but also had similarities to malts that I've had. It was certainly young, but that didn't seem hurt it. It was very interesting and I'm very glad I bought it, but I'm pretty sure I won't find myself reaching for it very often. It's just not to my tastes.