Review: Four Roses Small Batch Bourbon

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Bottle purchased by EZdrinking.

Owned by Kirin Company based in Japan, Four Roses Small Batch Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey is distilled at the Four Roses Distillery in Lawrenceburg, Kentucky and bottled at 45% ABV.

Price: $28-$45

Four Roses Small Batch is made from vatting four different bourbons made at the distillery. Two of the bourbons are made from mash bill "E" which consists of 75% corn, 20% rye, add 5% malted barley, one of which is fermented with a yeast strain "K" which is meant to emphasise light spice and caramel flavors; and, the second is fermented with yeast strain "O" which is meant to emphasise rich fruitiness as well as light caramel and vanilla notes. The second set of bourbons are made from mash bill "B" which consists of 60% corn, 35% rye, and 5% malted barley. And, once again each is fermented with yeast strains "K" and "O." Each of these mash bill/yeast strain combinations are distilled and aged separately. For the Small Batch bourbon, these four whiskeys are aged less than 7 years, vatted together and then proofed down before bottling. While many distilleries credit their yeast for making their spirits unique, Four Roses is one of the only major bourbon distillery that goes through the added work of propagating five different yeast strains to further control the flavor profiles of their bourbons.

Lastly, Four Roses Small Batch was one of nine bourbons I selected in a blind tasting of bourbons less than $50. You can read how it did here.

Tasting Notes

Nose: Immediately on the nose are fruity notes and acetone. Underneath these initial aromas are notes of burnt oak and a strong presence of vanilla.

Palate: On the palate the first flavor is a sightly astringent green note that is then followed by light heat on the tongue. After the heat dissipates, you notice both a sweetness and a big wallop of spice.

Finish: After swallowing the bourbon lingers for a long time with clear notes of oak and vanilla.

Conclusion: Four Roses Small Batch Bourbon is a nice bourbon, though not my favorite. That said, Four Roses Small Batch is well balanced and easy to drink bourbon well worth its price tag.

Review: Henry DuYore's Straight Bourbon Whiskey

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Bottle purchased by EZdrinking.

Distilled by Ransom Spirits, Henry DuYore's Straight Bourbon Whiskey is bottled at 45.65% ABV

Price: $30-44

Ransom Spirits was founded by Tad Seestedt in 1997 and in 2008, the distillery moved to its current home on a forty-acre farm in Sheridan, Oregon. While Seestedt distills a variety of spirits, his Old Tom Gin is probably his most successful and widely distributed product. Henry DuYore's was first released in 2012 and has a mash bill of 56% Corn, 31% Rye and 13% malted barley. The whiskey was made using a hand-hammered, direct-fired French alembic pot still. Henry DuYore was aged a minimum of four years in new American oak bourbon barrels, with some percentage finished in French oak barrels. I am using the past tense here because Seestedt recently told me that he doesn't plan to keep making this bourbon. However, he told me that he still has a few barrels of it quietly maturing which he will eventually release as a special extra-aged edition.

When I organized a blind tasting of bourbons under $50 Henry DuYore was the only craft spirit in the group and the only bourbon not from Kentucky. Despite being the odd man out Henry DuYore got a lot of positive marks and it was was the second highest ranked bourbon among all of the tasters.

So why didn't it catch on? While I don't know for certain, I suspect there are a couple of reasons. First, it ain't your pappy's Kentucky bourbon. In the last few years the conversation about bourbon has largely been dominated by those coming out of Kentucky. This makes some sense since 96% of all bourbon is made in the Bluegrass State. And, even though not all Kentucky bourbon's taste alike their version of a high rye mash bill is something around 20% +/- not 31%.  Nor are any of the Kentucky bourbons made using a direct fire alembic still. All this to say, Henry DuYore is a bourbon, and it doesn't taste like anything coming out of Kentucky. While this isn't a bad thing, I suspect that those who bought and drank Seestedt's bourbon, didn't exactly get what they were expecting even thought he bourbon in the bottle is very good.

The second reason I think Henry DuYore might not have caught on with drinkers is its label. One of the strongest marketing tools whiskey makers use to sell their products are stories and often those stories or some portion of them are on the label. The Henry DuYore label is an odd mixture. The central image is of a faceless man, presumably from Virginia, the label says the spirit is distilled by Joad Spirits not Ransom and the side text starts off by telling the reader that the person who made the whiskey isn't named Henry DuYore. The story this label weaves is of a faceless man with a fake name is selling you bourbon by a distillery you've never heard of before. This combined with a non traditional tasting bourbon profile might partially explain why Henry DuYore failed to find an audience. 

Tasting Notes

Nose: The nose is very pleasant with strong notes of vanilla, leather and oak undergirded by aromas of malt and caramel.

Palate: On the palate the flavors are complex and well balanced. The bourbon is both sweet and earthy with a subtle spice kick on the back of the tongue from the rye. The oak character has a slightly resinous quality to it which evokes an image of being in a slightly damp coastal forest.

Finish: After swallowing the whiskey, the spice slowly tapers into a long and light finish of caramel, vanilla and tobacco.

Conclusion: Henry DuYore's Straight Bourbon Whiskey is a a very lovely  spirit whose flavor falls outside the mold of Kentucky Bourbon. This bourbon is  well balanced, nuanced and slowly evolves both in the glass and on the palate. It's a shame that this bourbon isn't being made any more however, those lucky enough to find a bottle can drink a glass of America history that is a mighty fine bourbon.

Review: The Maturation of Distilled Spirits

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Free review copy provided by the publisher.

Hubert Germain-Robin, The Maturation of Distilled Spirits: Vision & Patience , (Hayward: White Mule Press, 2016), 146 pages, $35.00. ISBN: 9780996827706

Hubert Germain-Robin comes from a long line of Cognac producers in France. But after years of training in traditional methods of distillation and maturation he moved to California to explore new possibilities. Free of the strict laws and traditions of Cognac, Germain-Robin was able to experiment and take chances in some areas while keeping the most effective traditional methods of making brandy. What resulted were some of the finest American brandies ever produced.

Germain-Robin’s newest book The Maturation of Distilled Spirits: Vision & Patience, is the follow up to Traditional Distillation: Art & Passion. In the new book Germain-Robin walks the reader through the entirety of the maturation process, from the oak that goes into the barrels, cellaring, proofing, blending and bottling the finished spirit all focused on the central theme of vision and patience. However, at 146 pages this book is more akin to a seminar than years of apprenticeship. To fully capture the wealth of knowledge that Germain-Robin learned over his lifetime of work would probably be near impossible, but the purpose of the book is to invite the reader into thinking about the active role the cellar master takes in guiding the maturation of the spirit as it sits in barrels for years or even decades.

The Maturation of Distilled Spirits is a good place to start for any distiller who wants to explore and employ traditional methods of maturation. Each chapter offers a brief explanation of a variety of maturation techniques, some of which are common in Cognac but completely novel for American whiskey. Following the theme of vision and patience, Germain-Robin explains the important role of the cellar master and how their choices and decisions serve both themselves and future generations. While creating a spirit that can age for 70-plus years is an obvious skill, so too is the patience and ability to know when to allow barrels to keep aging, when to transfer them to glass demijohns, and when to blend and bottle these older spirits.

Germain-Robin is a proponent of what some are calling “Slow Distillation,” a movement that looks to encourage the production of great spirits made from high quality ingredients with traditional techniques. U.S. craft distillers can learn much from masters like Germain-Robin and develop new traditions that will allow future generations to reap the benefits of their vision and patience.

Originally published in Distiller (Winter 2016): 151

ADI's Judging of Craft Spirits Continues to Set a High Bar

In February, the American Distilling Institute will hold its 11th Annual Judging of Craft Spirits, making it one of the longest running and most respected spirit competitions in the United States. The mission of ADI's judging is to help promote the craft distillers, blenders, bitters makers and producers of aperitif & fortified wines that are making the finest quality artisan spirits and to give participating producers valuable, unbiased, third-party feedback on the quality and process of their products. To achieve this mission ADI has developed a set of industry leading protocols that govern how the spirits are handled and tasted, we select our judging staff from the top spirit experts in the world, and our awards are solely earned based on individual merit.

What most spirit competitions will not tell you is that it is impossible to eliminate all subjectivity from a judging performed by human beings. However, because ADI is committed to seeing that each spirit receives the most objective evaluation possible, we put a lot of thought into all aspects of the judging that might impact how a spirit is perceived. Once all of the spirits have been received they are sorted by spirit class (whiskey, gin, etc.) and category (bourbon, old tom gin, etc.). Once this sorting has been finished the spirits are then organized into flights by the stewards based on proof, maturation, or flavoring. Once the stewards finish flighting the spirits, our lead steward David T. Smith, creates a schedule so that flights of unaged or lighter spirits go out first before aged or strongly flavored spirits. This schedule is split into a morning session and an afternoon session. This allows us to give some stronger spirits to the judges before lunch after which, a meal and an hours break allows their palate to rest and reset for the afternoon session. We even arrange special meals for the judges' breakfasts and lunches that eliminate strong flavors such as garlic and peppers that might linger and obscure their full sense of smell and taste. All of this is done so that the judges are able to fully taste and evaluate each spirit as well as the one that comes after it.

When flights are sent out to a panel of judges they receive some basic class and category information such as, unaged rum between 80 and 86 proof, and a line of Glencairn copita glasses, each marked with a different number. Each panel consists of at least four judges and each panel is organized to include a variety of training and experience such as, distillers, wholesalers/retailers, bartenders/owners, consultants, and journalists. While other spirit competition sometimes draw judges from more limited backgrounds, ADI believes that having judges from different disciplines on each panel helps create a fuller perspective of each spirit. The judges nose and taste each spirit individually, write tasting notes, comments about what they like, what potentially could be improved, and a numerical score. Because we use judges like Nancy Fraley, Aaron Knoll, Martian Cate, and Hubert Germain-Robin who have the experience to identify specific production process that create both positive and negative flavors, they are able to give more meaningful feedback to the distilleries that entered. Then this process is repeated for each spirit in the flight. In this system each spirit is evaluated and scored on the basses of its own merit and not in comparison to the other spirits that happen to be next to it. Once the judges have finished a flight the panel has as discussion to decide if any medals should be awarded. Sometimes this means no spirit in a flight receive a medal and at other times more than one might earn a gold medal.

Flavien Desoblin of the Brandy Library

ADI's Judging is know for having some of the highest standards and historically it has awarded fewer medals than other competitions. Each spirit has to earn an award solely based on whats in the glass, not its name, not its price point, not where it comes from, just how good the product is. What this means is that those spirits which earn a medal from ADI are among of the best craft spirits in the  world. The American Distilling Institute is committed to helping small-scale, independently owned spirits producers improve their craft, grow and promote their products in a growing market. And because of this commitment, ADI's Judging of Craft Spirits will continue to be a leader in the industry, refine our processes to achieve our mission, and to find new ways to preach the gospel of craft spirits to all the world.

Review: Bourbon by Fred Minnick

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Free review copy provided by the publisher.

Fred Minnick, Bourbon: The Rise, Fall, and Rebirth of an American Whiskey, (Minneapolis: Voyageur Press, 2016), 240 pages $25.00 ISBN 9780760351727

Fred Minnick is the author of five books, three of which are about whiskey and the history of bourbon. His book Whiskey Women earned a Gold Medal at the ForeWord Reviews Book Awards and a Silver at the Indie Publisher Awards. Minnick serves as a judge for the San Francisco World Spirits Competition and the World Whiskies Awards. Minnick is also an Iraq War veteran where he served as a U.S. Army public affairs photojournalist.

Minnick’s newest book, Bourbon: The Rise, Fall, and Rebirth of an American Whiskey is a thorough history of bourbon, which for over 200 years has been one of the nation’s most important spirits. The book is broken down into 12 chapters that chart, as the subtitle says, the rise, fall and rebirth of an American whiskey. Minnick quickly jumps into contested waters by exploring who has the most legitimate claim to be called the “Father of Bourbon.” Unlike many other whiskey books that just repeat marketing myths, Minnick has done the work of diving into the historical record and offers a better picture of the history of bourbon than has been seen in some time. He traces the large social movements as well as the lives of individuals that supported and fought the bourbon industry throughout U.S. history.

In an attempt to appeal to more readers, the pages are illustrated, and Minnick uses quite a few sidebars in each chapter to give quick details or extrapolate on an interesting moment or person in bourbon history. Bourbon is one of the best histories on the subject to come along in a while. 

Originally published in Distiller Magazine (Winter2016):  151