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.

Elmer T. Lee Single Barrel Bourbon - A Fitting Memoriam

 

Elmer T. Lee Single Barrel Bourbon is one of the amazing variety of bourbons that flow from the Buffalo Trace Distillery in Frankfort, Kentucky. I've previously reviewed a different bourbon from this distillery: Old Weller Antique Reserve, which is just about my top value bourbon.

The whiskey is named after Buffalo Trace's former master distiller, who recently passed away. Lee was credited with reviving bourbon drinking in the US by creating the premium bourbon category with Blanton's Single Barrel Bourbon in 1984. I haven't reviewed Blanton's yet, but it's one of my top 4 bourbons ever, and has a permanent place on my bar.

Despite being from the same distillery, these are distinctly different offerings. First off, there's the grain bill. While both are, by law, required to be at least 51% corn, the grain bill for Elmer T includes rye, whereas Old Weller replaces that with wheat. As a result, you'd expect the Elmer T be spicier, and the Weller to be sweeter.

Elmer T is also bottled at 90 proof (45% abv) , which means it's watered down to sipping strength, while Old Weller is essential cask strength at 107 proof (53.5% abv). I drink both with some water added, which mean I likely end up making them pretty close to equal strength in my glass.

However, they are similar in the incredibly reasonable prices they go for on store shelves. Elmer T. Lee runs around $25 a bottle in the US, which makes it an easy choice for a regular dram.

Which is good, because the flavor will keep you reaching for the bottle. This is an amazingly well-balanced bourbon. It starts off sweet, then there's some fire, and then the spice of the rye and oak comes in and then it all fades away to honey. This is a medium-bodied dram that smells of vanilla and honey and oak, and the rich amber color looks lovely in the glass. It sips nicely, cleanly, with a medium long, sweet finish.

One quick not about the bottle. You can't tell from the photo, but the bottle has a distinctive feel in the hand. The unlabeled sides are hollowed in, providing a perfect hand grip. It's a small touch, but a well thought out one.

I'd say it's a fitting tribute to a bourbon pioneer. And now that my bottle is empty, I'll be hunting for a replacement - this deserves to be a permanent fixture on my bar.

As to where this fits on my bourbon continuum, I'm provisionally putting it above Old Weller Antique Reserve and just a hair below the my personal top quartet of bourbons. I reserve the right to reevaluate and possibly promote it once I procure another bottle for further tasting.

In terms of absolute value, I'd score this equal to the Old Weller Antique Reserve. As a gift idea for a whiskey enthusiast, this a definite step above the Old Weller: the cork stopper (as opposed the Old Weller's plastic cap) makes a better impression, and the link to the master distiller and fact that it's a single barrel whiskey push it a couple of notches higher up the gift chain.

 

 

 

The Best Damn Rye - Willett Family Estate Single Barrel Rye, Rare Release

 

WIllet Family Estate Bottled Single Barrel Rye is simply the best rye whiskey I have tasted. All my whiskey-loving friends who like rye rave about it. Even those who don't like rye admit that it's the best rye they've ever had.

If you manage to find this, buy a bottle. It's not too pricey (around $35 a bottle in the US as I write this) and even if you don't like rye, it's a fantastic addition to your bar for your friends who do. It also makes an excellent gift to a rye whiskey drinker - I gave myself a bottle for my birthday, in fact. :-)

This is the whiskey that redeemed rye whiskey for me. My first taste of rye was horrid: astringent and unpleasant and completely off-putting. I was planning to give rye a complete miss, until a friend convinced me to try the Willet Family Estate Bottled Single Barrel Rye (hereafter referred to as Willett SBR).

That designation, detailed at length on the label, as a single barrel whiskey, makes this a rare bird in the marketplace. Most whiskies of all types (bourbon, scotch and so on) that are bottled are produced by mixing the contents of many, many barrels to produce the desired flavor and amount of product. This is necessary because different barrels of whiskey age differently, depending upon a host of factors, such as temperature, place in the warehouse, the wood of the barrel, variations in the quality of the grains in the mash and so on.

So, each individual barrel can have its own unique taste. However, successful branding requires a consistent product, and successful business minimizes waste.  So barrels are mixed to smooth out the variations and maximize utilization of the distilled spirit.

Willett SBR is one of a handful of whiskies on the market where the contents of the bottle came from a single barrel of whiskey: no mixing. Flavor consistency is maintained by the taste buds of the Master Distiller, which leads to an interesting phenomenon - WIllet SBR bottles don't carry a consistent age statement. I have bottles that were aged for 4 years, and bottles who had to spend another year in the cask to become "right".

This is also a cask-strength whiskey. The strength varies a little from cask-to-cask, but the bottles I've seen or drank have ranged from 109 proof to 116 proof ( 54.5% to 58% ABV).

In the glass, this has a rich reddish gold color. The aroma is of oak and alcohol and spice.

I occasionally sip this straight, which is frankly amazing for such a strong spirit, but I generally prefer it with a little water. That cuts the hefty alcohol content down and lets some of the other flavors come through.

WIllett SBR has a nice rich mouthfeel. I taste notes of mint and spice, maybe some oak, and a lovely sweetness that's not quite honey.

I think it's delightful. But rye, because of it's spicy notes, tends to divide folks more than a sweeter grain, such as barley, does when it is the primary ingredient in the mash. As an American Rye, WIllett SBR is legally required to have at least 51% of the mash grains be rye. I have found several places online claiming that the mash bill is actually 95% rye and 5% barley, but I haven't found what I consider to be an authoritative source for that information.

As I said at the beginning - if you can find it, buy it. If you don't like rye, buy it for your bar anyway. Trust me, you will find folks who do and will love you for introducing them to the Willet SBR.

Willett Pot Still Reserve Bourbon (Single Barrel) - Keeping the Bottle's Promise

[caption id="attachment_38" align="aligncenter" width="546"] Such a cool bottle.[/caption]

First things first - that is a damn cool looking bottle. It's shaped like a pot still, which makes it self-referential as well as striking.

Also interesting is that this a single-barrel whiskey, not to be confused with cask-strength whiskey. A whiskey can be one or both.

In this case, it's single-barrel, but not cask strength. It's been watered down a little to 94 proof (whiskey tends to come out of the barrel around 110 proof or higher, unless it's been aged a couple of decades or more). Mine is bottle 80 of 259 from barrel 80, for what that's worth.

"Single Barrel" denotes a bottle whose contents come from a single barrel. This is distinct from the normal practice of marrying the contents of many, many barrels together to smooth out the barrel-by-barrel variations that occur during the aging process and create a distinctive, but repeatable, flavor for the expression.

So, while the master distiller does his best to choose the representative barrels for single barrel bottling, it's reasonable to expect more variation between bottles from different barrels than you would  between bottles from different mixed barrel bottlings. So, if you find a bottle of single barrel whiskey that you dearly love, you might want to keep an eye out for other bottles from that same barrel.

Willett Pot Still Reserve carries no age statement. However, information online seems to indicate that it's aged between 8-10 years in oak barrels.

However neat the concept and striking the container, though, booze earns its place on my bar by its taste, and taste alone. So, do the contents live up to the promise of the bottle?

Yes, yes they do.

WIllett Pot Still Reserve is a lovely deep amber. Neat, the nose is sweet, with some oak spiciness. On the tongue, it is medium bodied, smooth. The flavor starts with a rich sweetness of honey and vanilla that fades into a pleasantly long spicy finish.

Add a little water, not much at all, and the caramel and vanilla become discernible in the nose. The initial sweetness subsides some what, but more caramel comes through. The finish loses some length, but the spicy notes multiply, making for a pleasantly more complex dance of flavors on your tongue.

A quick check online shows prices running between $35-$40 a bottle, which makes this a solid value. The fact that the bottle is a conversation piece is just icing on the cake, as it were.

This now has a home on my bar - when the bottle is finished, I will find a way to replace it. That said, I'm still figuring out where this fits vis-a-vis my big 4: Blantons, Woodford Reserve, Elijah Craig 18, and Black Maple Hill. I think it's just below them - which still makes it an excellent dram. More testing, I think, is required.

Learn more about the Kentucky Bourbon Distillers (Willett Distillery).