Woodford Reserve Double Oaked - That's A Spicy Bourbon

 

One of the best trends in bourbon these days is the experimentation with finishing the whiskey in casks other than the traditional charred american oak. New woods and casks previously used to age other spirits expand the bourbon flavor universe, increase the diversity of flavors and and open up a new vistas for exploration.

Which is a good thing, because until now bourbon's flavor variety was painfully constrained compared to the immense flavor universe offered by single malt scotch. The difference in flavor between Woodford Reserve and Old Weller Antique Reserve, for example, is a tiny, inchworm-measured thing, compared to the flavor differential between Ardbeg Uigeadail and, say, Dalwhinnie.

In fact, you can almost see the bourbon makers looking across the pond at the scotch distillers and wondering how they get so much taste (and market!) differentiation out of whisky that essentially all has the same mash bill: 100% malted barley (by contrast, bourbon makers generally have three mash bills (recipes), to choose from).

Part of the secret is something the scots have been doing for decades now: aging their whisky in all sorts of different barrels: used bourbon barrels (!), used sherry cask, used port pipes, rum pipes, and even, occasionally, in french oak barrels. The interaction between barrel and whisky, usually over the course of many years, changes the flavor of the spirit, as compounds dissolve out of the wood and into the whisky, and other compounds in the whisky are absorbed by the wood.

Woodford Reserve is on the first bourbon distillers to step up to the plate and imitate the scots. The standard expression gets an additional 9 months in a second oak barrel, prepared differently than the standard maturation cask. This second oak barrel gets a longer toasting, but a lot less char. As a result, it imparts a lot more of its oak flavors to the whiskey.

So, how does the Double Oaked compare to the standard Distiler's Select, which one of my all time favorite bourbons?

Colorwise, the the Double Oaked is noticeably darker and more burgundy hued. The aroma is caramel and vanilla and honey, similar to the standard Distiller's Select, but softer, not as sharp.

Both are bottled at 90.4 Proof (45.3% abv), share a similar mouthfeel and are best, to my taste, with just a little water added.

And now we reach the heart of the matter - flavor. The Double Oaked starts off just like the standard Distller's Select: you get the caramel, vanilla and honey promised by the aroma, some pepper and spice from the rye and just as that's fading away..

BAM! Spicy oak jumps out and slaps you upside the taste buds.

It's a surprise all right. The nose promises a softer, richer Distller's Select, but gives no warning of that aggressive oaky pop waiting for you at the end. My Distller's Select review mentions oakiness 'reasserting' itself in the finish: in that expression, the oak notes in the finish say distinctly, "we are here." By contrast, the oak waiting for your taste buds at the end of a sip of Double Oaked kicks down the door and yells "Oak in da house!".

Is this bad? Is this good?

It depends on what you like. It took me completely by surprise when I first cracked the bottle, but I've decided I like it.  Those extra notes at the end add a new dimension to the flavor and the drinking experience and cause me to pay more attention to simple pleasure of tasting what I'm drinking.

Now, the next question is, is it worth the price? As of this writing, the Double Oaked will run you $15-$20 more a bottle than the Distiller's Select, which is a hefty price premium.

That one, I'm punting on. What will say is this: if you like bourbon, the Double Oaked is definitely worth trying. You may decide that extra oak pop at the end just doesn't do it for you. Alternately, you may decide that the extra layer of flavor elevates the Double Oaked to must have on my bar status.

 

 

Aberlour a'bunadh - Richly Flavored Throwback

 

Aberlour a'bunadh is a cask strength  - my bottle weighs in at 119.8 proof (59.9% abv) - single malt scotch from the Speyside region of Scotland. It's aged in used Spanish Oloroso sherry casks, which adds distinctive flavor and color to the whisky. Aberlour boasts that a'bunadh is produced and bottled without modern falderal such a chill-filtering for clarity or watering down to lower, sipping proof (usually between 80-86 proof).

It's released in small batches, in a bottle style that was distinctive when it was introduced, but that has been successful enough that Aberlour has switched its two other standard distillery expressions, the 12- and the 16-year-old to the same style bottle.

The bottle carries no age statement.

It's irrelevant. The whisky is awesome.

It has a lovely burgundy color, and, when cut with some water, a wonderful aroma of sherry and malt with just a hnt of allspice. With the right amount of water, it has a medium heavy mouthfeel, and rich sherry flavors blending with malt sweetness, with some spicy hints along the way, especially in the medium long finish.

One of the fun parts of drinking cask strength whisky is figuring out just how much water to add bring out the maximum flavor and gentle the alcohol burn without diluting it too much. Some folks claim they can drink cask strength whisky neat and not miss anything ... to each their own. I'm part of the greater mass of folks who generally need some water to make the cask strength stuff sing.

For me, a'bunadh hits its sweet speed when I cut it with about 25% water...put another way, 4 parts a'bunadh, 1 part water in the glass, swirl it around, and then send your tongue to heaven.

a'bunadh will set you back about $75 - $90 a bottle in the US, so it's not a cheap dram. But if you like your whisky sweet and rich with lots of sherry flavor, you should avail yourself if you can manage to fit it into your budget at all.

This, naturally, brings up a comparison to the Macallan Cask Strength that I reviewed last year. It's a tough call, but I think I give the edge, by a small margin, to the a'bunadh. I feel confident in saying that if you like one, you'll probably like the other.

On a more practical note, a'bunadh has pretty wide distribution, at least in the US, and may be easier to find than the  Macallan Cask Strength.

Highly recommended, and, incidentally, a great gift for the single malt fanciers on your birthday and holiday lists.

Elijah Craig 18-Year-Old Single Barrel - Worth the Wait if You Can Find It

 

So what do you get when you leave good bourbon in charred oak barrel in the back of a Kentucky warehouse until it's old enough to vote?

You get a bourbon that is luscious, smooth, gorgeous and all around wonderful. And, if a warehouse fire interrupts the supply chain, you apparently get to wait until 2018 or so until they bottle it again (hat tip to Chuck Cowdery and commenters for that tidbit).

Which means, alas, the Elijah Craig 18-Year-Old Single Barrel (ECSB 18 for short) is in exceedingly short supply. I see it listed online for $60 a bottle, but no one has stock. Back in the day, it was a $40 a bottle..but if you're a bourbon fancier and you spot a bottle in liquor store somewhere, it'll be worth the $60.

(Side note - Heaven Hill, the folks who make the Elijah Craig bourbons, have been putting out extremely limited editions of 20- and 21-year-old Elijah Craig Single Barrel in similar looking bottles, for increasingly much  higher prices, to sort of fill the gap.)

So, what would you get for your $60, should you find one of these rare bottles on a store shelf?

The short answer is one of the top 3 bourbons I've ever had.

The long answer is a richly colored reddish brown bourbon, with a subtle aroma of oak and honey with a dash of maple syrup.

In the mouth it has a nice weight to it, heavy without being oily. The flavors come on smoothly, and blend together so seamlessly it can be hard to distinguish them. I taste some rich honey, followed by oak and rye spiciness that fades pleasantly to alternating sweet and spicy notes and then to a faint, lingering, happiness of the taste buds.

As a straight bourbon whiskey, ECSB 18's grain bill is at least 51% corn. The "flavoring" grain is definitely rye ( as opposed to wheat - see my review of Old Weller Antique Reserve) which provides a nice counterpoint to the corn's sweetness. It is, by all accounts I can find, a low rye recipe, which limits the amount of rye bite in the final flavor.

For the record, the third grain in bourbon is barley, which provides important enzymes and mouthfeel to the whiskey, but whose flavor contributions are apparently greatly outweighed by the corn and rye/wheat, even when the barley amount exceeds the rye/wheat amount.

As a single barrel whiskey, each bottle of ECSB 18 comes from one and only one barrel.  This is different from most whiskies, which are bottled from the contents of tens or hundreds of barrels being mixed together to create the distillery's signature flavor.

As a result, some bottle-to-bottle variation is to be expected if you manage to procure bottles from different barrels. That variation will be bounded by the tastes of the master distiller selecting the barrels, but there will likely be more variation than with whiskies bottle from mixed barrels.

ECSB 18 is bottled at 90 proof (45% abv) - which means it's been watered down some from cask strength (probably closer to 110 -120 proof). It drinks nicely neat, but I prefer it with just a little water added.

It's going to be hard making this bottle last until 2018...

Which brings me to a closing note: that bottle. That lovely unique, antique style bottle with the intricate designs, which is guaranteed to have all your crafty or artistic friends asking you just what you're planning to do with it when you finish the whiskey inside. It's gorgeous, and the whiskey inside is every bit as good.