Well, I feel horribly out of touch right now.
Apparently Knob Creek released a 12-year-old Limited Release bourbon sometime in late 2019 that I either missed or ignored. These things happen. I see so many press releases (though none from Beam since I seem to have fallen off of their radar) that I sometimes look past the PR emails to the emails that will pay my bills. I try to read a lot of articles about bourbon in order to stay up on things, but since I gave up Twitter, I see less and less of those. And even if I read it, I almost never look at the ones about limited releases because I’m not the type of person to go hunting them anymore. If it isn’t sent from a distillery rep, I usually don’t review them. Mostly because I usually can’t afford them (freelancer…).
But that isn’t the reason I feel horribly out of touch at the moment. Apparently after Knob Creek 12 year old was announced as a limited release, it became part of the regular Beam lineup. And it did so at a halfway decent price point too. Which is pretty cool. We need more bourbons with age statements that aren’t priced more than three-quarters of the way to a C note.
So when I was doing my online COVID/Quarantine booze delivery orders and noticed a Knob Creek 12-year-old on the Total Wine website, I was a bit shocked. I knew nothing about it, except that I wanted it. But I needed to go to the store to pick it up. So I had to wait.
I didn’t have to wait long however as I found an excuse to run to Menards a day or so later and figured that I might as well stop into Total Wine “as long as I was nearby.” I mean making a special trip to a store where you just placed a hundred dollar plus order a day or two earlier would be silly. But stopping in as you happened to drive past? Well, that just makes sense. They have a lot of things available in the store that you can’t get for delivery.
Knob Creek 12-year-old
Purchase Info: $59.99 for a 750 mL bottle at Total Wine, Burnsville.
Price per Drink (50mL): $4.00
Details: 12 year age statement. 50% ABV.
Nose: Oak, floral, cherry cough drops, and caramel.
Mouth: Dry, caramel, rich vanilla, wintergreen, oak, and cinnamon.
Finish: Warm and long. Follows the mouth.
Thoughts: This is delicious! I really like it. While tasting this, I was struck by an intense craving for a root beer float. Which makes sense since a lot of the flavors in the mouth, vanilla, caramel, and wintergreen, are those that also lend their flavors to root beer. This, however, does not taste like a root beer. For one thing, it is very nicely oaky and dry. It is not at all sweet. It is so good, however!
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