Book Review: Twin Cities Prohibition—Minnesota’s Blind Pigs & Bootleggers

Before it closed, I visited the exhibit: American Spirits, the rise and fall of Prohibition at the Minnesota History Center in St. Paul, Minnesota. I found it to be a very nice exhibit. Informative, entertaining. I saw a lot of cool artifacts and even learned a thing or two. If it comes to your area, I highly recommend it. 

After exiting the exhibit, I decided to visit the book store to see if I might find a book on the subject to pick up. I surely did. There was, of course, Last Call by Daniel Okrent. A book that while informative, had me giggling at the lengths people went to get a drink. I’d read it before and loved it. Right next to it was another promising sounding book. The title? Twin Cities Prohibition: Minnesota’s Blind Pigs & Bootleggers by Elizabeth Johanneck. This sounded perfect. A local slant on what I’d read about in other books. It was twenty dollars and short, but since I’m guessing the purchase goes to help the History Center I figured, what the heck? 

I should have kept looking. 

This title is very misleading. This is a collection of rambling, second or third-hand stories that relate the dirtier side of Minnesota in the first half of the Twentieth Century. In and of itself, this would be fine as you could see how that could be organized under a Prohibition theme. Before. During. Legacy. This is not how it is organized. Or if it is, there are no sign posts along the way. 

The subtitle claims stories about Minnesota’s Blind Pigs and Bootleggers, but spends more time on the crooked politicians and businessmen. The “Masters of the Universe” as the author calls them. The only mention of the illicit liquor dispensaries were chatty blog post-like descriptions of her visits to the modern-day businesses that happen to be in the same buildings. 

In it’s short 160 page length, I learned that the man who built the Foshay Tower was crooked, but that it now houses the swank W Minneapolis Hotel. I learned that the governor during prohibition was dirty, but also considered one of the greatest governors the state has known. That there were a bunch of robberies and murders in the first half of the Twentieth Century. And I learned that the author has an almost religious hatred of the Federal Reserve. I learned very little about Prohibition in the Twin Cities, the speakeasies or the bootleggers. 

I did learn to read the reviews before impulse buying a book though. I started out really wanting to like this. I mean, Prohibition is one of my favorite American History topics. But now? Now I just want my lunch breaks back for the week I spent reading this.

Old Crow Reserve vs. Rebel Yell, Round 1, Bottom Shelf Bourbon Brackets

Round 1d of the Bottom Shelf Bourbon Brackets features a couple of old names that have fallen on a few hard times. The number 2 seed of division 2: Old Crow Reserve is facing off against number 3 seed: Rebel Yell. 

Old Crow Reserve. I’ve been curious about Old Crow ever since I went back home to the backwoods of Wisconsin and saw it was the only bourbon in the bar. I’d have gone beer, but this particular dance hall had three kinds of Miller on tap and the keg of Old Style that the groom’s family had purchased for the guests to drink. Not only did I not want any of those, but I wasn’t quite sure when the last time the lines were cleaned since this particular place is mostly used for weddings. So I went with the Old Crow. I ordered it neat, because I didn’t really trust the cocktail skills of the bartender. She didn’t now what neat meant so I was probably correct there. But, I didn’t hate it. In fact I liked it better than the Beam White I found later in the evening by wandering across the street to a liquor store that was sadly lacking in 50mL minis that I could sneak back in.

The only thing I’d heard about Rebel Yell was the statement “I hear the Reserve isn’t bad.” I’d hear that statement every time I mentioned that I’d slated it for inclusion in this tournament. No one knew anything else. And it seemed no one had tasted either the Reserve or the regular release. So, I read the bottle and by reading the label I learned that it is a wheater and that it is: “Unique. Commanding. Unforgettable.” After a bit of internet searching, I learned this is an old brand once produced by Pappy Van Winkle himself. The forum posters claim that if you find old bottles of it, it’s kinda one-note, but not bad. These days it’s a sold by Luxco out of St. Louis. No one mentions what it’s like now.

Old Crow Reserve

Purchase Info: Haskell’s Wine & Spirits, Burnsville, MN $16.99 for a 1L

Stated Age: Four years

ABV: 43%

Produced by: Jim Beam

Nose: Rubbing alcohol right at first. But that dissipates: fresh sawn lumber. Dry with just a hint of caramel, mint and orange peel.

Mouth: Maple syrup and black pepper. Hints of vegetal and soapy flavors.

Finish: Some heat. Spiced honey. Transitions to bitterness. 

Thoughts: Not one I feel like I’d grab first. If I was in a bar that had it, I’d pick it over Beam White and not feel too bad about the selection. But I might ask for it on the rocks.  

Rebel Yell

Purchase Info: Blue Max, Burnsville, MN $11.78 for a 750 mL

Stated Age: NAS 

ABV: 40%

Sourced/Sold by: Luxco

Nose: Dried Corn, Orange Peel, Caramel 

Mouth: Watery mouthfeel. Dried corn. Hints of vinegar. Unpleasant.

Finish: Decent but not overpowering burn. Grain and a nice bitterness.

Thoughts: I have no idea what I will do with this bottle, but I certainly won’t be drinking it. The finish is nice, but the taste and nose are not pleasant at all. My wife has been bugging me to give her bourbon to use in a homemade bug repellant recipe. This might be fine for that. 

Winner: Old Crow Reserve doesn’t win this one quite as much as Rebel Yell loses it. To say it was a favorable matchup is being nice. Rebel Yell might give Town Branch a run for the title of worst bourbon I’ve tasted. It lives up to the “Unique” and the “Unforgettable” that the label promised. But not in a good way. So by process of elimination Old Crow Reserve wins. We’ll see how it does in the next round before I say if I like it or not.

UPDATE: So, after fourteen hundred and some odd days, I finally got around to trying Rebel Yell again. Here are my updated thoughts: Rebel Yell: Revisited.


BourbonGuy.com accepts no advertising. It is solely supported by the sale of the hand-made products I sell at the BourbonGuy Gifts Etsy store. If you'd like to support BourbonGuy.com, visit BourbonGuyGifts.com. Thanks!

Old Charter 8 year vs Virginia Gentleman: Bottom Shelf Bourbon Brackets, Round 1

Round 1a of the Bottom Shelf Bourbon Brackets features Number 1 seed Old Charter 8 year old versus Number 4 seed Virginia Gentleman. 

Old Charter was brought to my attention in a twitter thread. The chatter was about good, cheap bourbons. This one kept coming up again and again. Not being available in Minnesota, I just sort of stuck that in the back of my head until I was driving through Kentucky on the way back from Virginia and saw a 750 mL on the shelf for $14.35. That price put it in the range for this contest and so I picked it up. This was the number 1 seed and number 1 choice overall as it is one of two bottles with an age statement (and the only one older than 4 years) meaning that, with the way marketing departments work, it is almost certainly the oldest bourbon of the bunch. 

Virginia Gentleman was initially brought to my attention when I was first getting interested in bourbon. I was online looking up something along the lines of “best bourbon under $25.” I was as cheap then, as I am now. I was especially so considering I wasn’t sure yet what I liked and wasn’t sure what I’d be willing to spend to find out. The expression listed was a 90 proof version that is no longer produced and which, sadly, I never got to try. But it put the name in my mind and when I visited Virginia in February I happened to pick up a couple of minis to include in this tasting. This is the number 4 seed.

Old Charter 8 year old

Purchase Info: Liquor World, Bardstown, KY. $14.35 for a 750 mL.

Stated Age: 8 years

ABV: 40%

Produced by: Buffalo Trace (Sazerac)

Nose: Brown sugar and hints of pickle juice mingled with intermittent cherry.

Mouth: Spice cake and cordial cherries.

Finish: Gentle, as might be expected at 40% ABV, yet complex enough to hold interest. Sweet at first and like a mouthful of cloves, this is both numbing and drying. Transitions to lingering bitterness.

Thoughts: I hesitate to say this, but I think this is better than it’s sub $15 price tag would suggest. I could see this becoming a regular on the shelf if it were distributed near me.

Virginia Gentleman

Purchase Info: VABC store, Richmond, VA. (I bought 2 minis for about a buck each, but the VABC price list lists a 750mL for $12.45 or 1L for $14.95)

Stated Age: NAS 

ABV: 40%

Produced by: A. Smith Bowman (Sazerac)

Nose: Light and sweet. Apple candy.

Mouth: Delicate. A light, but not watery, mouthfeel. Lightly fruity with some cinnamon.

Finish: Gentle with a lingering sour grain or silage flavor.

Thoughts: The finish kills this one. That silage/grain aftertaste makes me not want another sip. It might mix ok though.

Winner: Old Charter 8 Year advances to the next round. It’s a bourbon I’ll be keeping an eye out for next time I travel. It also makes me interested in it’s sibling, Charter 101 (NAS). Might have to keep an eye out for both, providing the price stays right. The Virginia Gentleman seems to have deserved it’s seeding. The finish is...not good. Upon giving it another shot as I type this, I’m getting less silage, but more apple mixed with an odd chemical note. Different, but not better.

Kentucky Bourbon Trail: Town Branch Distillery

I’ll admit it. I had a bad taste in my mouth when I visited Town Branch. I couldn’t quite figure out why they were part of the main Kentucky Bourbon Trail when they just started making whiskey. In my mind, they should have been part of the Craft Tour. Small shop, limited distribution, product that wasn’t quite there as far as I was concerned. But they are part of a much bigger company, so what do I know?

I’d tried the Town Branch Bourbon when I was at the Kentucky Bourbon Festival last. It was the year after they became part of the Trail. I figured that if they were part of this collective marketing alliance, they must be ok. I mean, if you’re the new guy, and you put yourself among all those logos, you’re borrowing their goodwill. And, if—by extention—you suck, you are using up a bit of that goodwill. Spending it and it can never be recovered. So I figured it must be, at least, ok. I tried it…it wasn’t. It was terrible. It became the first bourbon that I actually disliked. I couldn’t find one nice thing to say about it.

I do the Kentucky Bourbon Trail passport program because I like getting the T-shirt and because I would probably be stopping at most of these places anyway as I travel through Kentucky. I like T-shirts. It was because I want to get the T-shirt again that I decided that I needed to give Town Branch another chance. Plus, my wife likes their beer. And I was starting to belive that the sample I’d had a year and a half previously must have had something wrong with it. Or maybe the food I’d been eating screwed up my palate. In any case, it was time to try again.

So I walk in and pay the $7 each to take the tour. As part of the tour, you get 4 tasting tickets. Each ticket is worth one sample. You’ll need to employ a little strategy here. You will only get to try half of the items they offer for sample. They have 5 beers and 3 spirits. I used three of mine on the beers and one on the spirits. My wife did two and two.

As we waited for the tour we stood in the gift shop. It’s a very pretty shop. They made it up to look like a Dublin street scene. While we waited, I heard the guy working behind the counter council a few other soon-to-be tour takers to give Wild Turkey and Four Roses a miss. I was shocked, but seeing as the secret that is Four Roses has been leaked, I’m ok that there won’t be four more people in the competition to get their hands on some.

Soon enough the tour starts and as is standard in a Bourbon Trail tour, we watched a video. After the video we were led across the road to see the brewery portion of the tour. One thing I liked about the tour is that this is both a working brewery and a working distillery that makes both bourbon and malt whiskey. In the brewery portion, you get to learn about the beer making process from start to finish, including the ancient bottling machine (which was pretty cool to see). The other thing you get to learn about is the pre-distilling portion of the malt whiskey process. It uses basically the same ingredients and the same equipment. It just gets piped across the street to the still instead of being hopped and bottled. Then it’s on to the samples. I tried the Kentucky Ale, the Kentucky Kölsch, and the Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Stout. 

After the brewery, we walk back across the street into the distillery portion. The first thing you see is a large stack of Woodford Reserve barrels. I thought this a bit odd at first until I realized that one of this company’s most famous products is a bourbon barrel-aged beer. All of a sudden, it made sense. They’ve been making the beer a lot longer than they’ve been making whisky. After the tour guide shows us around the bottling area we moved into the bourbon fermenting area and still room.

The bourbon fermenting area and still room has been written about a lot. And with good reason. This is a beautiful room. Rough stone, floor to ceiling glass walls and stills displayed as the showpieces they are. It really is a pretty space. 

Then came the spirit tasting. I gave the bourbon another try while my wife tried the Pierce Lyons Reserve and the Bluegrass Sundown. Pierce Lyons Reserve is a malt whiskey and the Bluegrass Sundown is a coffee liqueur made using bourbon. I can’t really say how good the PLR was as I don’t have much to compare it to. But it didn’t make me want to dump it out. The coffee liqueur was served by making it into a miniature Irish Coffee style drink. Quite tasty. The Town Branch bourbon…well this is normally where I would do tasting notes. I’m not doing that because I couldn’t bring myself to buy an entire bottle for one tasting. I knew I’d have to figure out what to do with it later since I wouldn’t want to drink it. In place of a formal tasting note, I’ll quote a tweet that I published after giving it another try:

I disliked the bourbon as you can see. My thoughts on their bourbon aside, you should probably give this place a look. I liked the tour quite a bit. Some of the beer is quite good. I picked up a four-pack of the barrel-aged stout to bring home with me after I visited. People, including my wife, seem to love the barrel-aged ale (I find it too sweet). The Kölsch is tasty enough. The coffee liqueur is pretty good too. The tour guide was entertaining. And it really is a show-piece of a stop. And if all that doesn’t get you, there’s always the free T-shirt it will help you earn.

Battle of the Bigs: Head-to-head Review of Jim Beam and Jack Daniels

Today the internets are all abuzz with the news that Beam, Inc of Deerfield, IL was purchased by the Japanese company Suntory. On twitter there is shock, on Facebook there’s anger, racial slurs and xenophobia in general. Everyone has an opinion. Me? My thoughts on the matter are really boring. I’m generally apathetic as to which multinational conglomerate owns the distillery where the whiskey I’m drinking is produced. Or where they call home. Or where their stock is traded. I know bourbon jobs have to stay in the US, so ultimately I don’t really care.

But in the spirit of the news of one of America’s own moving to Japan (not really) I decided to do a head-to-head that I’d been thinking of for a while. Japan’s Jim Beam (not really) versus the local boy Jack Daniels. 

I’d been thinking of this, not because either of these end up on my shelf at home very often, but because I travel a lot. And when I’m sitting in a hotel bar somewhere, I’ll as likely as not be faced with the choice between these two with maybe a Maker’s thrown in for good measure. When faced with this prospect, I’ve often made a run to the local liquor store to try to pick up a replacement or gone without. But maybe, just maybe there is something that I am missing. I mean these are the two biggest bourbons* in the world, there has to be something to them.

Right?

Jim Beam (White Label)

Nose: Initially it’s just like standing in the Jim Beam warehouse that they let you go in while visiting the distillery. Oak, alcohol and dust. After a bit of teasing, there is some wet rock, a floral note and a bit of crisp sour apple. 

Mouth: Thin. Watered down tasting. Past that: corn, a little vanilla, pencil shavings and more sourness. 

Finish: Gentle is the only word for this. Lingering Corn. 

dislike2.gif

Thoughts: I’m not a fan of this one. The thin mouthfeel and sour flavor are off-putting to me. That said, I’ve had decent cocktails made with this so it has it’s place. It’s just not in my glass. Maybe it’s in yours?

Jack Daniels Old No. 7

Nose: The nose on this one is really quite nice. Cherry, vanilla, a hint of chocolate. It reminds me of the chocolate covered cherry cordials you can buy at Christmas.

Mouth: Dusty, dried corn and some vanilla

Finish: A gentle burn with more corn and a lingering dusty bitterness.

Thoughts: Disappointing. The palate does not live up to the nose. But unlike Jim Beam, I can see why it’s popular. This is gentle and sweet enough to appeal to the new or non-whiskey drinker. And since many people never move beyond the first thing they fall in love with, I can see it. Will it have a permanent home on my shelf? No. But that’s not because it’s bad, it’s just meh.

Overall: If forced to choose between Jack and Jim neat, I’d go Jack. But that said, I doubt I’ll ever be buying either of them for that reason (bars almost always have one halfway decent beer on tap). And as with all whiskey reviews, your milage may vary. Try it yourself. Maybe you’ll love them. 

 

*Jack Daniel’s Sour Mash Tennessee Whiskey meets all the legal requirements of bourbon and could be called bourbon if they chose to. So for the sake of stirring the pot, for this post, I choose to call it bourbon. Because sometimes I like to see people who care way too much get upset.

Whiskey Review: Cedar Ridge Iowa Bourbon (Barrel 114)

Way back in May of 2012, I decided to go on a road trip to Iowa. I'd heard of this little winery near Cedar Rapids that had expanded into bourbon. Being the type of guy who is willing to take almost any excuse to jump in the car and taste bourbon, it was only a matter of finding the right time. For whatever reason May 12th was that time. how do I know? Well, I happened to tweet about it. I remember it as a fun trip. Up at five am and there by noon.

Saturday, May 12, 2012 5:22 am: "Up early to drive to Iowa. The plan is to visit @CedarRidge4 Distillery and Winery today. Should be fun."

Saturday, May 12, 2012 7:48 am: "Can't wait to get there... driving through Iowa is sooo boring."

(With as much as I enjoy it's alcoholic progeny, I get a little impatient driving through endless corn fields.)  

Saturday, May 12, 2012 10:58 am: "If everyone in Iowa is this nice, I feel sorry for them. I've never been treated more rudely. I hope this day gets better."

(Remember, when a truck crowds the line, it's best to not park in the middle of your spot, even if you have a tiny car...this guy wanted to fight.)

Saturday, May 12, 2012 11:45 am: "So far @CedarRidge4 has redeemed this Iowa trip for me. Knowledgeable tour guide. Very nice folks at the tasting bar. And good whiskies."

But there was redemption (and whiskey) at the end of the drive so all was well. I took the tour. It wasn't long, but the young guy who gave it was immensely knowlegeable about the product that was being made. We saw the mashing, the fermentation, the stills. Then we turned around and saw the aging product. 

I said it was small.

I listened as he answered questions about the barrels, what each piece of equipment did, the water—reverse osmosis filtered for parts of the process, distilled pure for others—in case you were curious,  etc. Then the tour was over and we headed to the tasting bar.

This is a beautiful place. You know how winery's are almost always beautiful places where you could imagine people getting married? Yeah, this is one of those. The tasting bar was the type of place where the people are amazingly nice and everything tastes just a little bit better. Because of that, and because I had just driven four hours to get there, I picked up a bottle. 

Then I beer tasted my way around Iowa, stopping at a nearby brewery for a sample. Then to Des Moines to have supper and a sampler flight. Then to Ames for my hotel. All in all it was a fun trip. 

On Monday of that same week, I cracked open the bottle of Cedar Ridge Iowa Bourbon. 

Monday, May 14, 2012 8:25 pm: "Drinking my 1st glass of @CedarRidge4 bourbon. Initial thought: reminds me a lot of Big Red Gum. Looking forward to more exploration."

It was ok, but not as good as I remembered sitting in the tasting room. 

Damn that lovely ambiance. 

And it's been sitting on my shelf ever since. Every once in a while I pour another glass, I see if it's still as I remember it, then I put it back hoping to find a use for it. I used it for making a pork marinade yesterday, it paired really nicely with a lovely chenin blanc (I took a sip before mixing in the other ingredients). And tonight, I decided that I finally needed to review it.

Cedar Ridge Iowa Bourbon

Specs: Barrel Number 114, Bottle 298

Nose: Grains with a hint of sweetness. A deeply pervading, though well incorporated, ethanol scent in every sniff, even after a while in the glass.

Mouth: Silky texture with a delicate flavor of dried corn.

Finish: Bitter tannins, very drying in the back of the throat, fading to the same aftertaste as the Big Red gum I chewed when I was a kid.

dislike.gif

Overall: 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'd pass on this one, but your milage may vary. It does look to be a single barrel after all. So give it a shot, and if you're in Eastern Iowa, I recommend a visit. It's a lovely place and worth the stop.