My Wandering Eye: Plantation O.F.T.D. Overproof 69% Rum

My Wandering Eye is an ongoing series reacting to the rising prices in the bourbon world. We’ve reached a place where even average products have hit the range where they compete price-wise with other types of aged spirits. If I’m going to be asked to drop $40 to $70 on a mid-range bourbon, I might as well see what else I can get for that money. I hope to see if another spirits category offers something downright tasty in that price range. The goal isn’t to find cheap spirits but to maximize the quality I’m getting at a particular price point. The reviews in this series will all be written through a bourbon drinker’s lens.

As we are quickly coming up on the Autumn Whiskey Release season, I think it is just about time to take a quick break from whiskey and let our eyes wander around the liquor store a little bit. Kind of a palate cleanser before we start taking a look at a bunch of bourbons that we will probably never see on the shelf or won’t be able to afford should we see them. And so I’m taking a look at an inexpensive, by bourbon standards, rum that works amazingly well both with a little ice or in a cocktail.

Here is what the producer has to say about this one:

Plantation O.F.T.D. Rum is our take on that classic style of overproof rums. And not just ours: to join him on the quest to get the blend and the proof just right, Alexandre Gabriel scoured rum joints around the world to find six grizzled old salts who knew which end of a rum bottle was which. Together they came up with this blend of Guyana, Jamaica and Barbados rums, bottled at 69 percent alcohol. O.F.T.D. officially stands for Old Fashioned Traditional Dark but if you ask any of the seven collaborators who were in the room when this blend was born, they’ll tell you it really stands for something else that was exclaimed when the winning rum was tasted…

Let’s see how it tastes.

Plantation O.F.T.D. Overproof 69% Rum

Purchase Info: $30.99 for a 750 mL bottle at Total Wine, Burnsville, MN

Price per Drink (50 mL): $2.07

Details: Blend of Jamaica, Guyana, and Barbados Rums. 69% ABV.

Nose: This is like the best molasses and ginger cookie you've ever had. Strong notes of molasses and ginger are backed up by cinnamon, citrus, and coffee.

Mouth: Very hot (as expected at 138° proof) with notes of caramel, molasses, chocolate, ginger, nutmeg, and citrus.

Finish: On the long side of medium length and warm. Notes of molasses, nutmeg, and chocolate.

Thoughts: To paraphrase the quote above. Oh fuck, that’s delicious! It’s good on its own but is very hot. Water tames the heat and ups the sweetness, and brings in a little mint. I've used this in cocktails many times, and it works amazingly in all the ones I’ve tried. To me, it didn’t matter whether the cocktail normally calls for a light rum or dark. It still worked. Overall, O.F.T.D. is a great rum. I’m a big fan.

---

Did you enjoy this post? If so, maybe you’d like to buy me a cup of coffee in return. Go to ko-fi.com/bourbonguy to support. And thank you, BourbonGuy.com is solely supported via your generosity.

Of course, if you want to support BourbonGuy.com and get a little something back in return, you can always head over to BourbonGuyGifts.com and purchase some merch. I’ve made tasting journals, stickers, pins, and more.

Corkcicle Whiskey Wedge

If you’ve met my wife, you will know that she has a bit of a glassware problem. We have so many whiskey glasses that we’ve had to sort them. We have the ones we use regularly. We have those that are pretty and sit on knick-knack shelfs. And we have boxes of those that don’t fit into either category in our storage facility. So because of the multitude of glassware we own, I seldom buy more.

Unless we are on vacation, that is. This is how we got so many in the first place, I like souvenirs.

I also like cocktails. And so when Total Wine decided to stock what had the possibility of being the perfect cocktail glass in amongst the bourbon, I noticed. And since I am always on the lookout for content, I thought I’d put Corkcicle’s Whiskey Wedge through its paces and bring you along for the ride. Total Wine was selling it for about $25. The Corkcicle website charges the same.

So first off, what is the Corkcicle Whiskey Wedge? Basically, it’s a glass that comes with a silicone mold that freezes ice into a wedge shape in the glass. The tagline on the box is “Goodbye, Watered Down.” The company claims that the wedge shape of the ice minimizes surface area and melting, resulting in a drink that is cold but not watered down.

Now that is the same claim that is made by makers of fancy ice sphere molds as well. And as I have one of these fancy ice molds, I’ve noticed that the large chunk of ice does, in fact, melt slower than the same volume of ice in cube form. So is the Whiskey Wedge better than a glass with a large piece of ice in it?

To find out, I conducted an experiment. I had a large ice cylinder left over from a photo shoot, so I used that in a glass alongside the frozen Whiskey Wedge. The experiment is simple. Freeze the Whiskey Wedge, and when it is ready, put the Ice Cylinder in the glass, and pour in two ounces of high-proof whiskey. I used Elijah Craig Barrel Proof. I initially did this exactly the way I would do it if I were making a cocktail. The glass was room-temperature. I never remember to pre-cool my glassware, and this was no exception. My notes are below:

• After 2 minutes: the drink with the ice cylinder has noticeably melted compared to the Whiskey Wedge. The one with the cylinder tastes more dilute.

• After 5 minutes: the Whiskey Wedge has visibly melted and changed shape.

• After 15 minutes: the Whiskey Wedge is noticeably darker than the drink with the ice cylinder. The Whiskey Wedge is also still much less diluted in the mouth.

Initial Thoughts: Square glasses are hard to drink out of, but I'm impressed. The drink in the Whiskey Wedge held up much better than the one with the ice cylinder. I wonder how much of that is because the glass containing the ice cylinder was fresh from the cupboard, whereas the Whiskey Wedge was fresh from the freezer. The initial round goes to the Whiskey Wedge, but let's give it a fair fight. For try two, I will freeze both glasses.

• After 2 minutes: Both pieces of ice have melted about the same visually. The drink with the ice cylinder is slightly more dilute in taste.

• After 5 minutes: The dilution in the Whiskey Wedge glass has caught up, and both are about the same in taste.

• After 15 minutes: The drink with the ice cylinder is visibly lighter in color, and the drink in the Whiskey Wedge is much stronger in the mouth.

Conclusion: The only knock on the Wedge is that I personally dislike drinking out of a square glass. It works as advertised. In the same time frame, it melted less than a comparable volume of ice in a different shape. Though freezing the glass containing the ice cylinder helped it close the gap, the Whiskey Wedge still worked better at not overdiluting the drink while still adding a bit of needed dilution. When I bought this, I thought it was a pretty gimmick. But it works as advertised.

I fully admit that this is not a very scientific experiment. If it were, I would have measured the volume of liquid that went in (which I did), let it sit for the allotted time, and then measured the volume of liquid that was poured out after time. I was not about to waste tasty and expensive bourbon that way, though, so you get this result instead. Overall, I’m impressed. I’ll probably be picking up a second glass to go with the first.

Elijah Craig Barrel Proof after 15 minutes in a glass with a cylinder shaped piece of ice and in the Corkcicle Whiskey Wedge.

---

Did you enjoy this post? If so, maybe you’d like to buy me a cup of coffee in return. Go to ko-fi.com/bourbonguy to support. And thank you, BourbonGuy.com is solely supported via your generosity.

Of course, if you want to support BourbonGuy.com and get a little something back in return, you can always head over to BourbonGuyGifts.com and purchase some merch. I’ve made tasting journals, stickers, pins, and more.

Smoke Boards: Cocktail Smoking Kit

When I was a kid, my brother and I visited my father every other weekend as part of my parent’s divorce agreement. My dad and younger brother were (and are) avid outdoorsmen. And since I wasn’t interested in hunting, fishing, trapping, etc (like, at all, not even a little bit), that left me at his place watching my even younger siblings from his second marriage.

As you might imagine, Saturday afternoons in a rural trailer park in the middle of Northern Wisconsin weren’t very exciting for a 10- to 12-year-old boy. This rural trailer park was surrounded by a creamery that made cheese, a post office, a bar, a car/farm equipment dealership, and a cemetery. That was the “town” I spent about 52 days a year living in as a child and young teen. And I wasn’t thrilled by it. Mostly because the only things to do were to get into trouble or watch tv. And I did plenty of both while babysitting.

Now, this was long enough ago that rural cable systems were basically non-existent. My dad had a tall antenna that was able to pull in the ABC, CBS, and PBS stations. No NBC station and FOX wasn’t even a thing yet, at least not locally. And while I would watch ABC and CBS for my Saturday morning cartoon fix, the afternoons on those stations were pretty boring. So I’d switch over to PBS and watch what they had on. Basically a lot of This Old House and various cooking shows.

I loved the cooking shows as a kid, which is weird since I was a super picky eater. But that love never went away. As a young adult, early Food Network was my favorite thing for a while. These days about half of my YouTube subscriptions are cooking channels. Which is how I stumbled upon the idea that I wanted to start smoking meat. And I jumped into that whole-heartedly. It’s become my favorite hobby.

So it was only natural that when I walked past the Smoke Boards booth at the Kentucky Bourbon Festival, that I‘d be easily convinced to stop and give their cocktail smoking kit a look. And after talking to the guys manning the booth, I was convinced to grab a kit for myself. I haven’t had many smoked cocktails. But the ones I’ve had are usually more theater than flavor. A local restaurant serves their smoked manhattan in a smoke-filled box. It is dramatic, but the flavor of the drink isn’t affected that much. The folks at Smoke Boards told me that their kit would do better. So let’s check out how it works.

Step 1: Light the chips on fire.

Place a small amount of one of the types of the kit’s wood chips on the smoke board and light them on fire using the provided torch.

Step 2: Smother the fire.

Or wait for it to go out. Place the provided mason jar over the smoldering chips to allow it to fill with smoke.

Step 3: Add your whiskey.

Put the cover on the jar and shake it up to dissolve the smoke. I’ve tried adding just the whiskey and adding the entire cocktail. I got better results infusing the whiskey and then making the cocktail out of the infused whiskey than I did by infusing the premade cocktail.

Step 4: Make the cocktail and enjoy it.

It really is that easy. It took me a few tries to nail down the best procedure for me. But, I tell you what. I have a new appreciation for smoked cocktails. A smoked Old-Fashioned is delightful on a cool Autumn evening. The smoke isn’t as strong as it is in the various smoked American Whiskeys on the market so it doesn’t over-power the drink, it just sort of adds another layer to the drink. All in all, I like this. They do sell extra containers of chips on their site, but I’m actually kind of excited to try some of the many smoking chips I currently have in the house to see how they play. I’m thinking an Old Fashioned smoked over peach wood might be tasty.

---

Did you enjoy this post? If so, maybe you’d like to buy me a cup of coffee in return. Go to ko-fi.com/bourbonguy to support. And thank you, BourbonGuy.com is solely supported via your generosity.

Of course, if you want to support BourbonGuy.com and get a little something back in return, you can always head over to BourbonGuyGifts.com and purchase some merch. I’ve made tasting journals, stickers, pins, posters, and more.

Just A Bunch of Things I Found on Vacation

I am an impulse buyer. Sure, I can make it through a grocery checkout line without buying a candy bar. But it isn’t likely that I will leave a liquor store, festival or distillery without buying at least something. Here are a few of the ones I picked up last month while visiting Tennessee and Kentucky. Even though some of them travelled almost as far as I did to get there.

Lincoln County Reserve Bourbon Barrel Aged Maple Syrup

Until my teenage years, we never bought syrup. My family made it. We tapped the trees and boiled the sap into syrup. But then we had a fire and the sugar shack we boiled sap in burned down. And since it was a collaboration between my grandparents and one of their cousins, the shack never got replaced. My brother has decided to carry on the tradition though, in order to teach his kids. I however buy mine from a 92-year-old lady who has been making it forever.

So, one could say that I am quite the connoisseur of maple syrup. Either that or you could say that I’ve been spoiled by amazing maple syrup my entire life. And I’m pretty biased. I really do think that the best maple syrup comes from the upper midwest. Fight me Canada. That said, I do like trying new things and so when I saw Lincoln County Reserve selling Bourbon Barrel Aged Maple Syrup at the Kentucky Bourbon Festival, I knew that a bottle would be coming home with me. And funny thing, that syrup was made in Wisconsin. Merrill, Wisconsin, a city of fewer than 10,000 people and an innumerable number of maple trees. This bourbon was aged in 10 gallon used bourbon barrels from Distillery 291 in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

But is it any good? In a word, yes! It’s buttery with a nice bourbon flavor. The bourbon is not overpowering bringing a lot of brown sugar and caramel notes. It has a great mouthfeel, nice and thick. And let me tell you, it is amazing on French Toast and sausage. Highly recommended.

View fullsize

Freddie's Old Fashioned Root Beer

Let me tell you about my college life. I had a wife, a kid, a job, and a major that was deceptively time-consuming. You might think that a fine art degree would be a cakewalk, but at least at the university I went to, you’d be wrong. Multiple all-nighters per week were extremely common as, due to our finances, I tried to fit a five-year plan for college into as few quarters as possible. One way we saved money was by renting an old farmhouse about a half-hour outside of town. Honestly, it was a pretty nice place. It was maintained by the local student-housing property management company. Meaning it was not maintained at all except by the elderly owner who was paying the property management company to, supposedly, do all of that for him.

Anyway, this farm was near a very small village of about 800 people. There was one grocery store, though it didn’t carry much. But one thing it did carry was Dr. McGillicuddy’s Root Beer Soda. I had no idea that the liqueur brand had lent its name to a soda, but every time I went to that tiny store for something, a bottle of that root beer came out with me. Eventually, I finished college, moved, and couldn’t find anywhere that carried the stuff. Until I first visited the Buffalo Trace Distillery. Apparently, Sazerac was the producer of that root beer, and one of the few places it could be purchased was at the distillery. I was super happy to pick up a six-pack every time I visited.

In 2019, Sazerac rebranded that root beer after beloved tour guide Freddie Johnson. He is a great guy and this is a great root beer. So I think it is a great match. But how does it taste? Caramel at first, followed by wintergreen. Unlike some root beers, the wintergreen is not overpowering though. This is subtle. After that is vanilla. The vanilla lasts long after you swallow. The thing that makes this so good is how well-balanced these flavors are. They're melded together so well that it is hard to tell where one ends and another begins. It has a nice creamy mouthfeel as well. This is my favorite root beer. A good part of that is nostalgia, but let an old man have that, ok?

View fullsize

MB Roland Kentucky Dark Cherry Moonshine

This was a gift from my friends at MB Roland, but I found a great use for it so I wanted to share. Thought I’d mention that since everything else on this post was purchased.

The folks at MB Roland are some of the nicest people I’ve met. And one side effect of them being so nice, I gave their whiskey a try shortly after they opened. That whiskey was the start of my personal whiskey journey. So I guess what I’m saying is that if you enjoy reading BourbonGuy.com, on some level you have them to thank.

We visited them while on vacation, spent the afternoon just hanging out, and since they are good friends we were given a bottle of MB Roland Dark Cherry Moonshine. Something we hadn’t tried before. I’m a big fan of this in cocktails. Especially this Cherry Manhattan from FoodandWine.com. Scroll down the page, it’s worth it. But since this could be consumed alone, let’s give it the ol’ tasting notes treatment.

Ripe, dark cherries on the nose. The month is sweet with a strong, natural dark cherry flavor. No artificial flavors or cough syrup flavors here. Very little alcohol flavor so be careful drinking neat if you really love cherries. Works great in cocktails like the one above. I could also see this playing nicely with lime juice in a cocktail or even a highball. It does need to be refrigerated after opening, but a little fridge space is a small price to pay for delicious cocktails.

View fullsize

Old Forester Oleo-Saccharum Lemon Oil Syrup

I first heard about Oleo Saccharum in David Wonderich’s book Punch. I reviewed it here. Spoiler, I really liked it. It’s basically sugar and lemon peels left together until the sugar draws the lemon oils out of the peels and dissolves in it, creating a syrup. Easy to do, if a little time-consuming. So it was with interest that I saw this little bottle of premade Oleo-Saccharum at the Old Forester Distillery Gift Shop in Louisville, KY. I was staying in the Whiskey Row Lofts which are basically upstairs and had the thought that I might make a few cocktails with it. I did not and so it came home with me.

But what did I think of it once I did open it? It has a strong lemon nose. It’s very sweet and lemony on the mouth when you taste it by itself. It does really well in the champagne cocktail on the bottle (1 oz bourbon, 0.5 oz syrup, 4.5 oz brut sparkling wine, ice, lemon twist). It’s good, but at the end of the day, a lemon oleo-saccharum is too easy to make for me to buy this again. Especially since you use a quarter of the bottle for one cocktail. Maybe if I was on the road, travelling. But not for home use.

---

Did you enjoy this post? If so, maybe you’d like to buy me a cup of coffee in return. Go to ko-fi.com/bourbonguy to support. And thank you, BourbonGuy.com is solely supported via your generosity.

Of course, if you want to support BourbonGuy.com and get a little something back in return, you can always head over to BourbonGuyGifts.com and purchase some merch. I’ve made tasting journals, stickers, pins, posters, and more.

Nooku Bourbon Cream

It’s been a weird week here in Minnesota. There has been smoke in the air from Canadian wildfires causing air quality and air quality warnings as I’ve never seen before in the state of Minnesota. The smoke was thick in the air. So thick that it impaired visibility and carried the smell of the fires as you breathed it in. It was so bad, that even spending as little time outdoors as possible, I was still dealing with respiratory issues. As such, I decided to pivot away from the tasting I had been planning to do this past weekend toward a couple of small cans I had in my fridge from my recent trip shopping trip in Colorado. I figured it might be best to take a look at something that I wouldn’t be drinking from a nosing glass. Just in case the old sniffer was acting up.

I grabbed these as I was walking toward the checkout at Hazel’s Beverage World in Boulder, Colorado. I hadn’t really been in the market for a Cream Liqueur, but something about the tiny little can, and the fact that one was coffee-flavored, piqued my interest. I figured that for four bucks, I could indulge that curiosity. Might be good in coffee one morning while on vacation. And while I never had the chance to have it in my coffee while on vacation, I did get that opportunity this past weekend as I hid inside from the air outside.

Nooku Bourbon Creme uses two ingredients: dairy cream and Bourbon. In this case, two-year-old, high-malt bourbon from Old Elk. I’m going to go out on a limb and say that the coffee version uses some sort of coffee flavor on top of that (not much of one though since it literally says that on the can). And while I haven’t had Old Elk Bourbon, I haven’t heard great things about it. Even so, I was curious to give this a try. I tried each of them straight and then added a healthy amount to an afternoon cup of coffee, just to see if my hunch on these was correct.

Nooku Bourbon Cream

Purchase Info: $3.98 for a 100 mL can at Hazel’s Beverage World, Boulder, CO.

Price per Drink (50 mL): $1.99

Details: 17% ABV. "Bourbon Whiskey with Real Dairy Cream"

Mouth: Thick, velvety, and sweet. Notes of cinnamon, caramel, and dairy.

Finish: Not much to speak of, as expected.

Thoughts: It's a bit like drinking coffee creamer. I’m not getting a lot of “bourbon” notes in it though. Speaking of that, it works pretty well in coffee. If you take your coffee with creamer, that is. In this case, I liked it about half and half. So make that coffee hot.

Nooku Bourbon Cream, Cold Brew Coffee

Purchase Info: $3.98 for a 100 mL can at Hazel’s Beverage World, Boulder, CO.

Price per Drink (50 mL): $1.99

Details: 17% ABV. "Bourbon Whiskey with Fresh Dairy Cream and Natural Coffee Flavors"

Mouth: Thick and sweet. Notes of cinnamon, chocolate, coffee, and dairy.

Finish: Chocolate Milk.

Thoughts: This is better than the regular version. And it also tastes good with coffee, even more so than the original. Personally I like my coffee black, so I’d probably prefer just a shot of bourbon instead of the cream if I felt the need to spike my coffee. Neither of them are particularly to my tastes when tasted alone either, but they aren't bad for what they are. That said, I can see a lot of people liking this.

---

Did you enjoy this post? If so, maybe you’d like to buy me a cup of coffee in return. Go to ko-fi.com/bourbonguy to support. And thank you, BourbonGuy.com is solely supported via your generosity.

Of course, if you want to support BourbonGuy.com and get a little something back in return, you can always head over to BourbonGuyGifts.com and purchase some merch. I’ve made tasting journals, stickers, pins, posters, and more.

Tattersall Distilling Pre-Made Cocktails

It is May and I am officially “almost ready” to put the shovel away and bring out the deck furniture. It isn’t quite planting season here in Minnesota, at least not for things that can’t handle frost. But we are getting oh, so close. My wife has her greenhouse up and the plants are at least outside, albeit with a heater to keep them warm at night.

We are so close to travel season too. Well for me at least. I try to take two vacations per year. One is to Kentucky in September. The other varies. Sometimes I escape the winter cold in February. Sometimes I head to the beach. And other times I do something crazy like visit the desert in the summer. That’s what is planned for this summer. I take all of my nieces and nephews on a road trip of their choosing when they turn 7. My niece however has had to wait until she was 10 due to a combination of her family being busy, my finances and then Covid. But this year, now that we are both vaccinated, we head to Utah to show her something new. It should be a great time.

Once we get through Iowa and Nebraska.

In any case, when you are traveling to places off of the beaten path, getting a good cocktail can be challenging. I’ll often just pick up a bottle of bourbon somewhere and call it good. But if I wanted something a little more complex, my options would be limited to what I wanted to bring with. Do I want to bring three bottles along to make a Manhattan? Probably not. But I could be convinced to grab a few small bottles of a pre-made cocktail to throw in the suitcase?

Well that just depends on how good the cocktail is.

Tattersall Distilling Pre-Made Old Fashioned

Purchase Price: $4.99 for a 100 mL bottle at Viking Liquor Barrel, Prior Lake, MN.

Price per Drink (50 mL): $2.50

Nose: Malted rye, dried fruits and spices.

Mouth: Sweet with a nice thick mouthfeel. Dried fruit notes are the star of the show here and are supported by the baking spice notes of the bitters.

Finish: Sweet with notes of cherry and baking spices.

Tattersall Distilling Pre-Made Manhattan

Purchase Price: $4.99 for a 100 mL bottle at Viking Liquor Barrel, Prior Lake, MN.

Price per Drink (50 mL): $2.50

Nose: Delicate with notes of brown sugar and baking spice.

Mouth: Baking spices, dried fruit and brown sugar.

Finish: Notes of cherry, baking spices, and vermouth. After a bit, a menthol note appears.

Thoughts: Both of these are very good. I think half the fun of drinking cocktails at home is making the cocktails, but if I was traveling I'd happily grab a few of these to toss in the suitcase. They would make a wonderful nightcap after a day of driving, exploring, or hiking. This is something I may have to consider for that upcoming summer trip.

---

Did you enjoy this post? If so, maybe you’d like to buy me a cup of coffee in return. Go to ko-fi.com/bourbonguy to support. And thank you, BourbonGuy.com is solely supported via your generosity.

Of course, if you want to support BourbonGuy.com and get a little something back in return, you can always head over to BourbonGuyGifts.com and purchase some merch. I’ve made tasting journals, stickers, pins, and more.

Fire Department Coffee: Spirit Infused Coffee

I’d like to thank the folks at Fire Department Coffee for providing these free media samples with no strings attached.

View fullsize

I don’t have to tell you that it has been cold lately. Places that seldom get snow are just getting dumped on, and…well…it’s been cold enough here to freeze bourbon. Literally, I have an entire post about how I froze bourbon out on my deck from the last time it was this cold.

I hate the cold. I really hate the cold. And the past couple of weeks have been brutal. But I am very thankful that, aside from when I need to usher dogs in and out to go potty, I don’t need to go outside. I can just sit in my chair with a cup of coffee each morning and watch the temps slowly climb to negative ten Fahrenheit throughout the course of the day.

Speaking of coffee, I love coffee. It is probably the thing I love most in the world—the one thing I love more than bourbon, barbecue, or pizza. Well, except my wife, of course (I don’t want to be dodging any shoes when she proofreads this). If I had to give up every vice, I could unless they included coffee. I would rather become a vegetarian teetotaler than give up coffee. There is a reason the support link above says “Buy Me a Cup of Coffee” and not “Buy Me a Bourbon.”

And it just so happens that I received an email a few weeks ago that combined two of my favorite beverages. Bourbon and coffee. It was from Fire Department Coffee, and they wanted to send me samples of a couple of their “Spirit Infused Coffees.” I was a little hesitant at first. I’m very particular about my coffee. I’ve been getting my coffee from the same small roaster in Montana since 2006, and no matter what else I’ve tried, I have had no desire to change that. And normally, I’m not too fond of flavored coffee. It tends to get sweet and overpowering, completely obscuring the coffee part of the coffee, which is the part I love. (I feel the same way about most flavored bourbons.)

Before we get too far into the weeds, though, let’s find out a little about Fire Department Coffee. Their website says the following:

Fire Dept. Coffee is a veteran-owned business and certified by the National Veteran-Owned Business Association (NaVOBA), we're dedicated to providing great-tasting coffee to people everywhere. Every order is freshly roasted in Rockford, Illinois, by a dedicated team of firefighters, first responders, and coffee connoisseurs.

Inspired by the vital role that coffee plays in helping firefighters stay alert and energized through long shifts, Fire Dept. Coffee was founded in 2016. Founder and CEO Luke Schneider is a full-time firefighter/paramedic and a U.S. Navy veteran who teamed up with firefighter/paramedic Jason Patton who is also a full-time firefighter and VP for Fire Department Coffee.

Fire Department Coffee is run by active and retired firefighters, including our operations officer and chief coffee roaster.

Along with providing a growing selection of incredible coffee — including its signature spirit-infused roasts — Fire Dept. Coffee also supports heroes in need through the Fire Dept. Coffee Foundation. Ten percent of net proceeds are donated to help provide essential resources and assistance to first responders who have been injured on the job, mentally or physically, or who are facing other serious health challenges.

Seems like a good operation. So let’s talk about the coffee. I made each of these the same way I make the coffee that I drink every day. I ground the beans and made a 14 cup pot. Yes. I actually prefer automatic drip coffee to any of the other methods of brewing it. (It might be because I learned to drink coffee to stay awake while working the third-shift at a small-town gas station with few customers.) Let’s see if it was any good.

Fire Department Coffee: Vanilla Bean Bourbon Infused Coffee

Purchase Info: This was graciously provided to me for review purposes. The regular price is $19.99 for a 12 oz bag.

Nose: Subtle vanilla pairs nicely with nutty chocolate notes.

Mouth: Slightly sweet with vanilla and spirit notes layered over a coffee base.

Thoughts: This literally tastes like when you make a coffee drink with whiskey. I was afraid that the vanilla or bourbon would be overpowering. Instead, it strikes the perfect balance between coffee and boozy coffee. I will have no trouble finishing this bag. It reminds me of camping with family and having a little "spiked" coffee to wake up and shake off a fun night around the fire. Don't let it cool too much, though. The flavoring gets overpowering if it cools in the cup.

Fire Department Coffee: Black Cherry Bourbon Infused Coffee

Purchase Info: This was graciously provided to me for review purposes. The regular price is $19.99 for a 12 oz bag.

Nose: Roasted nuts with vanilla, caramel, and a light fruitiness.

Mouth: Spirit notes dominate initially but fade in intensity as you consume more of the cup, allowing the fruity and chocolaty coffee notes to come more to the forefront.

Thoughts: I like the vanilla better, but not by much. These are both good. Speaking as a coffee purist (not even cream or sugar are allowed in my coffee), these are probably the only flavored-coffees I've had that I actually liked. In both of them, the spirit notes are the larger portion of the "flavorings" than the vanilla or cherry, and I think that was a wise choice as the others could easily overpower the coffee.

---

Did you enjoy this post? If so, maybe you’d like to buy me a cup of coffee in return. Go to ko-fi.com/bourbonguy to support. And thank you, BourbonGuy.com is solely supported via your generosity.

Of course, if you want to support BourbonGuy.com and get a little something back in return, you can always head over to BourbonGuyGifts.com and purchase some merch. I’ve made tasting journals, stickers, pins, and more.

Kentucky Bourbon Festival 2020 (virtual edition)

I am not going to lie. I honestly did not expect to be writing about the Kentucky Bourbon Festival this year. Mostly because it didn’t happen, at least not in the traditional sense. But since nothing in 2020 is has happened as tradition dictates, why should the festival be any different?

And let me be clear. I would not have attended a traditional festival this year even had it happened. I try not to leave the house these days, much less travel across the country. But in any case, the folks running the BourbonFest wisely decided not to tempt any of us and gave us a “Virtual” festival instead.

And, honestly? I was pretty impressed. Every evening I was sitting in my living room, feet up, bourbon at hand, and watching each new video as it premiered on YouTube. There were a few clunkers, but I really enjoyed the videos they put out for the most part.

I thought writer Steve Coomes was a great host. I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting him, but I’ve read a lot of his work. He had an easy rapport with all of his guests, and skillfully led the conversations and interviews.

The topics covered were interesting. There were cocktail classes, cooking shows, a five-part series on the making of bourbon, and conversations with bourbon royalty such as Fred Noe, Eddie Russell, and Bill Samuels Jr. I think the most informative part was the series on bourbon making. The series included episodes about fermentation, distillation, aging, rick houses, and blending…err…mingling (since Four Roses was there). The most entertaining show featured Fred Noe, Eddie Russell, and their sons talking about the adventures they’ve had while promoting their brands. About the only ones I didn’t enjoy were those about collecting. But then again, working on a freelancers budget doesn’t make me the target market for videos about spending a ton of money on rare whiskey.

Overall though, I really enjoyed myself. And here’s the crazy thing, last year, my wife and I had decided that maybe we were done going to the Kentucky Bourbon Festival. It had gotten stale for us and the changes weren’t really helping. We’d planned on probably not attending this year even before the pandemic hit, maybe just head down a different week. But, watching these videos made me miss it as nothing else could. I really like Bardstown. And I love the way the community gathers to celebrate their local industry. It a fun time. So I’m happy I took the time to watch the virtual festival this year.

Visit the Kentucky Bourbon Festival YouTube Channel and you can watch them too.

---

Did you enjoy this post? If so, maybe you’d like to buy me a cup of coffee in return. Go to ko-fi.com/bourbonguy to support. And thank you, BourbonGuy.com is solely supported via your generosity.

Of course, if you want to support BourbonGuy.com and get a little something back in return, you can always head over to BourbonGuyGifts.com and purchase some merch. I’ve made tasting journals, stickers, pins, and more.