Louisville's Evan Williams Bourbon Experience Joins the Kentucky Bourbon Trail

Today, the Kentucky Bourbon Trail adventure barreled into River City, as Heaven Hill's new Evan Williams Bourbon Experience became the eighth stop on that world-famous journey, and the first ever in Louisville.

Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer made the announcement at the downtown site on historic Whiskey Row where Heaven Hill is building its multi-million dollar artisanal distillery and immersive tourism experience, scheduled to open this fall. (Pictured here in an architectural rendering.)

“I can’t think of a better way to celebrate National Travel and Tourism Week,” Fischer said. “This is a huge step to enhance the city’s Bourbon tourism efforts."

Heaven Hill executives and other leaders of the Kentucky Distillers’ Association, which created the Kentucky Bourbon Trail program in 1999, gave Fischer a commemorative barrel filled with whiskey from all eight distillery stops to mark the occasion.

“Today starts a great new tourism partnership for our signature industry and the city of Louisville that will pay benefits for years to come,” said Max L. Shapira, President of Heaven Hill Distilleries, Inc., the largest independent family owned and operated distilled spirits company in the United States.

“The skyrocketing success of the Kentucky Bourbon Trail tour has been amazing,” he said. “It is a world-class and much-celebrated attraction, drawing hundreds of thousands of visitors from around the world, all eager to spend and savor our unique Bourbon history.”

More than 2.5 million people have visited Kentucky Bourbon Trail distilleries in the last five years, including a record 509,292 in 2012, said KDA President Eric Gregory. That was the first time the tour broke the half-million mark in a single year.

Gregory called Louisville "a Kentucky Bourbon Trail anchor.” As Kentucky's largest city and business capital, Louisville has much to offer bourbon-oriented visitors. For years, it has offered its Urban Bourbon Trail, a collection of bars deemed hospitable to bourbon seekers. Earlier this year, it debuted "The Bourbon Classic," which is slated to become Louisville's annual bourbon festival. Louisville has many other visitor attractions, such as the Louisville Slugger Museum and Muhammad Ali Center, many great lodging choices, and a dynamic culinary scene.

The Evan Williams Bourbon Experience, located at 528 West Main Street, may mark the beginning of a trend of brand welcome centers based in downtown Louisville. The Main Street neighborhood itself is historic for bourbon fans. Evan Williams' original 1783 distillery was located almost directly across the street from the new visitor attraction and that whole section of Main Street housed dozens of whiskey company offices and warehouses through the late 19th century.

The 'Experience' will offer guided tours where guests will travel back in time to see Evan Williams’ original distillery, Louisville town hall meetings, and wharf scenes and video renderings of turn-of-the-century Whiskey Row. The highlight will be a fully functioning artisanal pot still distillery, with gleaming copper pot stills that are a modern version of the same type of equipment Evan Williams used in his distillery more than 200 years ago.

One of the signature features is the façade of the building (pictured above). The five-story-high Evan Williams Bourbon bottle graphic will transform into a large, glass, flowing Bourbon fountain in the lobby. “We’re confident that this new attraction will continue the revitalization of Whiskey Row and bring the same kind of success that we’ve been fortunate to receive with our Bourbon Heritage Center in Bardstown,” said Harry J. Shapira, Executive Vice President for Heaven Hill.

Marcheta Sparrow, Secretary of the Kentucky Tourism, Arts and Heritage Cabinet, said the Kentucky Bourbon Trail program is “perhaps the most innovative and best example of private sector tourism development Kentucky has ever experienced."

The Best-Kept Secrets in Bourbon Are Hiding in Plain Sight

There are some really terrific bourbons out there that most people overlook. In many cases they are old brands that the manufacturers sell but don't support. Some offer a chance to taste something a little different, others are among the best bourbons you can buy, and all are great values. While a few have limited distribution, many are hiding in plain sight at your neighborhood whiskey monger.

A prime example is Weller 12-Year-Old. This wheated bourbon from Sazerac is right up there with the very best bourbons available today, and it costs less than $30 a bottle in most places. A few years ago it was in very short supply but now seems readily available. If you are pining for Pappy but have never had Weller 12, what's wrong with you?

At the other end of the spectrum is Very Old Barton, another Sazerac product. It is a 6-year-old, rye-recipe bourbon that used to be sold only in Kentucky and a few southern states. In Kentucky, it is very popular and competes head-to-head with Jim Beam and Jack Daniel's. It is now more widely available but not national. Unless you drink 1792 or Ten High, you've probably never tasted a bourbon from this distillery. Very Old Barton is a solid, reliable, standard bourbon that usually sells for less than $20, often a lot less.

Old Forester is the brand that launched Brown-Forman 143 years ago. It was the first bourbon to be sold only in bottles. It has the same recipe as Woodford Reserve. The 86° proof (43% ABV) is usually about $20 and the 100° proof (50% ABV) is usually about $25. Again, it is just a good, solid, dependable rye-recipe bourbon at an excellent price.

Old Grand-Dad, discussed here on Monday, is one of the few high-rye bourbons and definitely the least expensive one. Its bonded expression has long been the best-selling bonded bourbon in the country. The bond usually sells for about $20, the 80° proof (40% ABV) is about $17. It's made by Beam.

Also from Beam is Jim Beam Black Label, which is 8-years-old, 86° proof (43% ABV), and about $22 a bottle. Compare that to Knob Creek, which is the same juice at 9-years-old and 100° proof (50% ABV), and about $30. Even though it carries the Jim Beam name, or perhaps because of it, many bourbon fans overlook this superb value. It's available everywhere.

Evan Williams Black Label is Heaven Hill's flagship brand and the #3 best-selling American whiskey, after Jack and Jim. Again it's a good, solid, standard rye-recipe bourbon, selling in many places for around $10.

No one who really knows bourbon would turn their nose up at any of these.

New Barrel Proof Elijah Craig 12-Year-Old

Heaven Hill announced yesterday a special bottling of Elijah Craig 12-Year-Old Barrel Proof Small Batch Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey. This limited edition bourbon will be allocated to all markets that currently offer Elijah Craig.

According to the company, this release takes advantage of both the surging popularity of high end bourbon and American whiskey, and the trend toward high proof or barrel strength bottlings. It also leverages the critical acclaim for Elijah Craig Bourbon and the high regard with which critics and aficionados hold the brand.

The new Elijah Craig Barrel Proof Small Batch release will begin shipping next week. Quantities are limited. The suggested retail price is $39.99. Proof of the initial release will be 134.2° ( 67.1% alcohol/volume). The 12-year-old age statement has moved to the back label to make room for 'Barrel Proof' on the front.

In addition, the release will forgo traditional chill-filtering, meaning all the natural esters and taste components from the barrel are preserved, giving the bourbon a particularly rich flavor and mouthfeel.

The new release will be offered in the traditional, distinctive Elijah Craig flask-style 750ml bottle, with the familiar oversize cork stopper and Elijah Craig signature blown into the front of the glass.  It will carry a dark brown version of the cartouche-style Elijah Craig label, with 'Barrel Proof' highlighted in red and hand written proof/alcohol by volume information, which will vary from one dump to the next.

“With the current unprecedented popularity of American whiskeys in general, and high end bourbon releases in particular, we feel that this release of Elijah Craig Barrel Proof is poised for great critical acclaim and sales success,” noted Heaven Hill Senior Brand Manager Susan Wahl. “It hits all the right sweet spots for today’s ultra-premium Bourbon consumer—barrel proof, 12 years of aging in open rick warehouses, non-chill filtered, and very small dumps of barrels. This barrel proof bottling, and the recent 20 year old Single Barrel bottling, have taken the Elijah Craig range to unprecedented levels of demand and stature.”

Heaven Hill and ALS Association Team Up to Honor Parker Beam

In 2012, legendary 6th Generation Master Distiller Parker Beam was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a disease of the nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord that control voluntary muscle movement. ALS is also known as Lou Gehrig's Disease. ALS affects more than 30,000 Americans at any given time. Parker Beam is in the early stages of ALS.

Today, Heaven Hill Distilleries announced that it, in Parker's honor, it is working with the ALS Association to promote awareness and raise money to battle the disease. Heaven Hill and Parker Beam will dedicate the upcoming fall 2013 edition of Parker’s Heritage Collection, an eagerly anticipated and highly regarded limited annual release of rare American Whiskeys, to raising funds for the ALS Association. Heaven Hill will donate $20 from each bottle sold and projects that a minimum of $250,000 will be raised.

Parker Beam is a charter member of the Kentucky Bourbon Hall of Fame and a grand-nephew of James Beauregard 'Jim' Beam. He has been crafting some of the world’s most critically acclaimed whiskeys at Heaven Hill for more than 50 years; first with his father, Earl, and now with his son, Craig.

Despite his condition, Parker is continuing to work and contribute to Heaven Hill and the bourbon industry’s rising profile. He will continue to personally select the barrels used for his namesake Parker’s Heritage Collection bottlings.

The ALS Association has established a special fund, known as the Parker Beam Promise of Hope Fund. Details and quantities of the next Parker’s Heritage Collection release will be made public later this year.

"Both my wife, Linda, and myself have become very involved in the ALS Association and in raising awareness of the disease since I was diagnosed with it," noted Mr. Beam. "We are pleased to help in any way we can and are most appreciative to Heaven Hill and the Shapira family for helping with such a generous financial contribution from the sale of the upcoming edition of Parker’s Heritage Collection.

"We hope that others will become more aware of ALS and will find additional ways to help us in our fight."

Beam Is Selling Bellows and Other Value Brands to Luxco

It takes different kinds of companies to make up the distilled spirits business. One way to divide them is between brand companies and commodity companies.

The brand companies base their business on household-name brands, which become and remain household names because the companies spend a lot of money to support them. They count on consumer demand to pull product off the shelf.

Commodity companies base their business on narrow margins, high volume, and efficiency. They push their products into distribution with price, and count on the distributors and retailers to push them out to value-conscious consumers. Commodity companies spend almost nothing on marketing support. Both types of companies make money, it's just a different approach.

Of course, brand v. commodity is a simple dichotomy and, consequently, not entirely accurate . Most of the brand companies have a few commodity products tucked away, and many commodity companies have a recognizable brand name or two.

Heaven Hill and Sazerac would be classed as commodity companies, for example, but Heaven Hill's Evan Williams is a serious brand, #3 in American straight whiskey. So is their Pama Pomegranate Liqueur, and a few others. Same with Sazerac (Blanton's, Weller, Van Winkle).

The commodity companies, generally, are privately-owned, while the brand companies are public. The announcement of this transaction, for example, came from Beam, not Luxco.

On the other side of the coin you have Beam, Diageo, Pernod, and Brown-Forman. Brown-Forman especially has a very lean portfolio, but it's packed with category leaders like Jack Daniel's and Woodford Reserve. Diageo, Pernod, and Beam--all much bigger than Brown-Forman--emphasize their category leaders, but they all have some 'cats and dogs' in their stables too.

So it is that, periodically, a brand company will off-load some of its commodity brands (also known as 'value' brands) to an established commodity company, as Beam announced it was doing this week. The buyer, Luxco, is a St. Louis-based rectifier and bottler (they don't distill).

For $65 million, Luxco got Bellows and Calvert, both of which Beam acquired in 1987 when it bought National Distillers. Bellows and Calvert are pretty old brands, but they never got off the bottom shelf. Calvert is blended whiskey, both Canadian and American, as well as gin. Bellows is bourbon, American blended whiskey, gin, rum, scotch, and vodka. Luxco also got a couple of vodkas, most notably Wolfschmidt, and a couple of other Canadians.

Wolfschmidt is a good example of a commodity 'brand.' It's a top seller in some markets, but strictly because of its distribution and price. Skol, a similar brand, was once described by its owner as the company's 'aircraft carrier.' Its profit margin was minimal, but its volume was so great that it paid to roll the trucks. The company's smaller but more profitable brands rode for free.

So a move like this is good for both companies. Beam gets $65 million and gets rid of what, for it, were mostly nuisances. Nobody at Beam wanted to manage Bellows. That's not how you advance your career.

Luxco, for its part, got that much more volume. It will keep selling everything Beam sold everywhere Beam sold it. Nobody is going to stop buying Wolfschmidt vodka because it's now sold by Luxco instead of Beam. Luxco will absorb its new acquisitions easily, because that's the business they're in.

The deal should close at the end of this month. Beam will continue to produce and bottle the brands for Luxco until at least January of 2014, according to Beam.

The New Evan Williams Single Barrel Vintage Is Here

In 2003, the Iraq War began, “Chicago” won Best Picture, Tampa won the Super Bowl, and the next release of Evan Williams Single Barrel Vintage (EWSBV) was distilled and barreled.

Advance release bottles of the 2003 vintage are making the rounds now and it will start to appear in stores any day. EWSBV rarely disappoints and 2003 is no exception. It’s similar to the 2002, a bit deeper and richer. Easily overlooked because it is so consistently excellent, there is no better way for a bourbon drinker to start the new year.

The EWSBV series began 17 years ago, a remarkable feat in its own right. It anticipated the bourbon renaissance and in a small way probably helped to bring it about. No other producer has done anything quite like it.

Even 17 years on, the concept is innovative and sophisticated. Each year, Heaven Hill bottles, in single barrel format, whiskey distilled nine years before. Although by law age statements just reflect a minimum age, EWSBV dump dates always reflect at least nine years but less than ten in wood, and they put each barrel’s exact fill and dump dates on the label, along with an identifying barrel number.

The idea is that there are slight differences from barrel to barrel within a vintage as well as between vintages, but there is always a family resemblance. As the series evolved it came to represent what Heaven Hill felt was the best of their bourbon output during a given year, a calling card of sorts, a sample of liquid from their vast inventory that possesses all the qualities they feel a first-rate bourbon should have, a benchmark.

Heaven Hill makes many different distilled spirits products for many different tastes, but they began in 1934 as a bourbon maker and have always been a bourbon maker most of all. Because the age of EWSBV is fixed at nine years it will never be their oldest bourbon. Instead it is the bourbon that says, “this is who we are, this is what we’re all about.”

One unique characteristic of Evan Williams Single Barrel Vintage is that it is not a limited edition in the usual sense. Instead of making a finite number of bottles, they dump and bottle throughout the year based on how many orders they receive. They can run out theoretically but not practically, and scarcity is not the point as it is with a typical limited edition. This is reflected in, among other things, its modest price. Heaven Hill has always been about value so it makes sense that their signature bourbon is a good one. The suggested retail price is the same as last year, $25.99.

Now is the time to start looking for it at your local whiskey monger. They probably will still have some 2002 on the shelf too. The new vintage typically rolls out during the first two months of the year. Distributors and retailers tend to want the previous vintage to sell through before they release the new one, so if you don’t see the 2003 but see a lot of 2002, that’s probably why.

Since it’s always new without being newsy, the new EWSBV release doesn’t receive a lot of publicity, but it’s consistently one of the year’s most important bourbon releases.

Whiskeys Top Shanken's 'Hot Prospects.'

For the first time ever, the whiskey category has the highest number of brands in Impact’s spirits 'Hot Prospect' rankings. Seven whiskey brands earned Hot Prospect honors for 2011, narrowly edging out vodka, which had six.

The winning whiskies are Woodford Reserve Bourbon from Brown-Forman, Pendleton Canadian whisky from Hood River Distillers, Bulleit Bourbon from Diageo North America, Glenmorangie single malt Scotch from Moët Hennessy USA, The Balvenie single malt Scotch from William Grant & Sons USA, Devil’s Cut Bourbon from Beam Inc. and Seagram’s 7 Dark Honey from Diageo North America.

The Hot Prospects designation is for brands that posted at least 15 percent depletions growth in 2011, while also showing consistent growth in 2009 and 2010. Brand volume must be at least 50,000 cases but not more than 200,000 cases. New products can also qualify as Hot Prospects if they pass the 50,000-case mark in their first year.

Also on the list, as a liqueur, is Evan Williams Honey Reserve from Heaven Hill. It is through only the narrowest of technical distinctions that Evan Williams Honey is considered a liqueur while Seagram's 7 Dark Honey is considered whiskey. Both can be found in the American whiskey section of most liquor stores.

That the list includes more bourbons than single malt scotches is notable. That it includes flavored whiskeys at all raises worries about category confusion, but also shows that these products have developed a strong following in a short time. Seagram's 7 Crown, the #1 American Blended Whiskey, has been a moribund brand in a moribund segment, making the rise of Dark Honey a surprise.

The Genealogy Of Beam Yeast

The post earlier this month, in which Sam Cecil briefly outlines the careers of the many Beam family distillers, raised a question about the yeast all of those Beams were using, not just at Jim Beam but at Heaven Hill, Four Roses, Yellowstone, Maker's Mark, Barton, Stitzel-Weller, Early Times, and many others.

The specific question: Jim Beam's yeast has a reputation for imparting a 'foxy' taste, a characteristic not associated with any other producer, despite having Beams in their lineage. How come?

Historically, 'yeast making' meant propagating a strain from a wild source. Although the Beams all started from the same place, with the same yeast mash recipe, and were all taught the same organoleptic standards, each distiller in each generation would have made his own subtle adaptations after years of practice, and would have passed his way of doing things on to his son.

I say 'son,' knowing that some Beam family distillers were trained by their grandfathers more than their fathers.

Either way, the genealogy of the yeasts is essentially that of the yeast makers.

David Beam (1802-1852) had three sons who became distillers. If you're a fan of Underworld, think of them as the three sons of Alexander Corvinus.

The youngest, Jack Beam, started Early Times and although his only son followed him into the business, there was no third generation. That line died out. It's unknown if that strain was preserved and passed on to the people who revived Early Times after Prohibition, but it seems unlikely.

The other two were Joseph B. Beam and David M. Beam. Those two traditions split more than 150 years ago, and there have been many other subdivisions since.

Each of them had two distiller sons. Joseph B. had Joseph L. (Joe) and Minor Case, and David M had the famous Jim Beam and his brother, Park.

We know from Booker Noe, Jim Beam's grandson, that the Jim Beam yeast was 'caught' by Jim on his back porch in Bardstown as Prohibition was ending and he prepared to build a new distillery.

When Park's son, Earl, left the Jim Beam Distillery in 1946, he took the Jim Beam yeast with him to Heaven Hill, replacing the Joe Beam yeast Joe's son Harry was then using. Under Earl Beam, Heaven Hill's bourbon had a reputation for being oily, but not 'foxy' like Beam.

I should note that, to me, the 'foxy' yeast characteristic is only noticeable in the white label Jim Beam expression.

It's hard to say what changed at Heaven Hill. It may have been the water. Yeast can change for very subtle reasons -- different water, different atmospheric conditions, different airborne microorganisms, different mash temperature, a different amount of back set, etc. The loss of the 'foxy' characteristic may have been deliberate, or an accidental by-product of different practices in a different place.

In addition to training his sons Joe and Minor Case, Joseph B. Beam may also have trained Will McGill. Will was a friend of son Joe, who married Will's sister, Katherine McGill.  Will must have been a good student because he became Pappy Van Winkle's master distiller at Stitzel-Weller after Prohibition.

It is likely Joe and Will also learned from Joe's older brother, Minor Case, who was 11 years Joe's senior. Minor had his own distillery at Gethsemane, which made the brand Old Trump, and which eventually merged with the nearby Yellowstone distillery. Joe and Will worked together at many different distilleries during their early careers, including at the Tom Moore distillery, today's Barton.

So the Stitzel-Weller yeast that made its way to Maker's Mark would have originated with Joseph B. Beam and probably went through Minor Case to get to Will McGill, and from him into the hands of Elmo Beam, Joe's firstborn, who would already have been familiar with his father's version.

That Pappy gave the yeast to Bill Samuels Sr. is known, but what Elmo actually used is not, at least not by me. Sam Cecil probably knew, since he followed Elmo at Maker's Mark.

Among his many feats, Joe Beam restarted Four Roses (then in Shively) after Prohibition, and employed some of his seven distiller sons there, as well as some of their sons. Seagram's bought Four Roses during WWII and Roy's son, Charlie, spent most of his career with Seagram's, where he developed the Eagle Rare Bourbon brand before finishing his career at Four Roses in Lawrenceburg.

Minor's son, Guy, was a distiller or master distiller at several different distilleries, including Heaven Hill, Fairfield, and Cummins-Collins. During Prohibition he was a distiller in Canada. Guy had two distiller sons, Burch and Jack. A third son, Walter, who was better known as Toddy, operated a liquor store in downtown Bardstown that still bears his name.

Jack worked for Barton. The two brothers who recently started the micro distillery Limestone Springs in Lebanon are descended from Guy.

Nobody is catching wild yeast these days and if distillers want to tweak their yeast, they do it in the lab, not on a back porch as Jim Beam did.

New Larceny Bourbon Is A Mystery Times Two.

These are the labels for a new bourbon from Heaven Hill. The story they tell is true. It was revealed in a book published in 1999. It is about John E. Fitzgerald, the man after whom the Old Fitzgerald brand was named.

The Old Fitzgerald brand was created by Charles Herbst, a pre-Prohibition wine and spirits wholesaler, based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. It was made at a distillery Herbst owned near Frankfort, Kentucky, called Old Judge (now long gone).

When Herbst created the brand he made up a story to go with it, that Fitzgerald was a distiller in Frankfort who, starting in 1870, made a fine bourbon whiskey that he sold only to railroads, steamship lines, and private clubs.

It was all fiction, but Fitzgerald was a real person, a U.S. Treasury agent. Treasury agents in those days, and up until the early 1980s, controlled access to all whiskey warehouses, the better to ensure that all taxes were paid and all whiskey was made to government standards. This made the local 'government man' very powerful and there was little a distiller or distillery owner like Herbst could do if the agent assigned to his distillery helped himself to a taste now and then.

Fitzgerald had a reputation among the Herbst folks for being a particularly good judge of whiskey. The barrels that received most of his attention almost always turned out to be exemplary, and it became an inside joke to refer to a particularly good barrel of bourbon as 'a Fitzgerald.' The joke was immortalized when they chose John E. Fitzgerald as the fictional producer of a brand they called Old Fitzgerald.

No one knew the true story until author Sally Van Winkle Campbell and her historian consultant, Sam Thomas, uncovered it. Campbell is the granddaughter of Julian 'Pappy' Van Winkle, who acquired the Old Fitzgerald brand from Herbst during Prohibition.

The label above was discovered through a different kind of sleuthing. It didn't come from Heaven Hill, which owns the Fitzgerald brand today. Instead it was discovered by a COLA troller. COLA stands for "Certificate of Label Approval." All alcoholic beverage labels have to be submitted to the Treasury Department's Alcohol Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) for approval, and when approved they become matters of public record and are posted on the TTB's web site.

COLA Trollers are enthusiasts who search the TTB web site for clues about new products. Label approval doesn't necessarily mean a product is imminent, or that it will be released at all, but they can be tantalizing, as this one is.

Reports Of The Death Of Elijah Craig 18-Year-Old May Have Been Exaggerated.

A. H. Hirsch Reserve Straight Bourbon Whiskey, the subject of my new ebook, was released at ages ranging from 15- to 20-years-old. The Van Winkle range is 10- to 23-years-old. Several of the Buffalo Trace Antiques are in the 15- to 18-year-old range. Many of the limited edition offerings from various producers have been north of 12-years-old. Through all of that, for the last decade or so, Heaven Hill's Elijah Craig 18-year-old has been the most readily-available very old bourbon on the market.

So it was sad for many when they learned of its demise. Now it seems the mourning may have been premature.

The official word from Heaven Hill is that they have "temporarily suspended bottling of the 18-year-old Elijah Craig Single Barrel." Special, limited (and expensive) bottlings of even older bourbon will fill the gap.

For instance, just 1,300 750ml bottles of a new 20-year-old (label pictured above) are being released, at a suggested retail of $130 per. Last year, an even more limited release derived from one barrel of the same juice was named Whiskey Advocate's "American Whiskey of the Year." Editor and Publisher John Hansell called it, "seamless, richly textured, and impeccably balanced." This new release represents the rest of that batch, about 80 barrels. The small yield is because 20 years of evaporation leaves most barrels less than half full.

They should be shipping now, so check with your whiskey monger right away if you're interested.

In lieu of the regular 18-year-old, Heaven Hill will offer various "extra-aged single barrel limited editions."

“With literally thousands of aging barrels over 10-years-old, we have a huge and one-of-a-kind resource to tap into,” noted Heaven Hill’s 7th generation Master Distiller Craig Beam. “We’ve carefully identified several hundred that are at middle to high storage in our best rickhouses, and these will be the source for these very special future Elijah Craig Single Barrel editions. These are some of the best older barrels of traditional rye-based Bourbon we have in our inventory.”

No one is predicting how long "temporarily" will in this case be. As with the recently suspended Wild Turkey 101 Rye, it seems likely that if and when the standard expression returns, it will bear a significantly higher price.

Your Vote, Your Bourbon.

It is an indication of how mainstream American whiskey has become in recent years that novelty products are now being made using whiskey as their platform.

This is a new/old trend, as there were many novelty bourbons 50 years ago, when the Republican Elephant in the picture above was made by Jim Beam for the 1960 presidential election. It had, of course, an equine counterpart. Beam continued the series through several more presidential election cycles, with new designs each time.

The pictured decanter held Beam straight bourbon at 43% ABV, aged 100 months (8.3 years).

The contemporary version is Heaven Hill's new Red State and Blue State bourbons, which should be in stores now. The whiskey is Heaven Hill straight bourbon (i.e., Evan Williams) at 40% ABV, with no age statement. The price should be about $15.

The idea, of course, is to express your political preference according to which one you buy. Another suggestion is that you buy both for a party and see which one wins among your guests. No one pretends it's anything other than a fun way to sell a little more bourbon.

If you go to either product's Facebook page and 'like' it, a donation will be made to the USO.

The irony of both bottles containing the exact same whiskey is probably unintended.

Next Time, Take Whiskey.

It is considered good form to take a host/hostess gift whenever you attend a party in a private home. Obviously, there are exceptions, but even when it's not really expected it is almost always appreciated.

A bottle of wine is the most common gift. Many people misunderstand this tradition and think the gift is necessarily supposed to be used at that evening's festivities. It can be but it doesn't have to be. It is a gift and as soon as you hand it to your host/hostess it is their property and theirs to use as they see fit.

Don't be offended if they put it away and don't open it. Don't assume that means they don't like it. It may mean they like it very much and don't want to share it. That's their business and you should be okay with whatever they do. That's the etiquette rule. You can look it up.

Obviously, if it's a BYOB party or you have previously agreed to provide wine for the event, that's a different story, but a pure host/hostess gift is just that, a gift.

And it doesn't have to be wine. I've used flowers successfully. Candy or some other treat can be good, though it shouldn't be something perishable that seems to demand immediate consumption. Again, it's a gift. Your interest in it expires the moment you hand it over.

If wine is good, why not whiskey? I just heard from a correspondent who bought a case of Rittenhouse Rye Bottled-In-Bond (BIB) to make that his standard host/hostess gift. Buying a case brings the per-bottle price down to about $20. Rit is a nice choice because it's very good whiskey at any price, and happens to be a good value. In some markets, it's even a few bucks less. That price is here in Chicago.

Rittenhouse Rye BIB has been in short supply lately, but the drought seems to be over. I was in the Lincoln Park Binny's tonight and they had a floor stacking of about 50 cases, priced at $22.99 for the individual 750 ml bottle (less for a 12-bottle case).

Rittenhouse Rye is a straight rye whiskey. The BIB is 50% ABV. There is a 40% ABV version too, but that one is not widely distributed. The BIB is very popular with bars and cocktail enthusiasts. It is a Heaven Hill brand but the current product was made for them by Brown-Forman, before Heaven Hill increased capacity at its Louisville distillery. Now their rye is all made there, but it will be a few more years before that whiskey reaches market.

Buffalo Trace Proves Small Barrels Don't Work.

Some time over the summer, I was asked by Buffalo Trace if I would like to come to the distillery in September, during the Bourbon Festival, to taste one of their failed experiments.

It's a measure of how strange this obsession is that I didn't hesitate. "Of course," I said.

Buffalo Trace has been experimenting for about 20 years. Everybody experiments, but Buffalo Trace has done things others don't, like release the results of some of the experiments as part of their Experimental Collection.

It's always been understood that some of the experiments are pronounced failures and the whiskey is discarded. Here was a case where they considered the experiment a failure, but thought I might like to taste its product anyway.

That's because the experiment involved aging bourbon in small barrels. Specifically, 5 gallon, 10 gallon and 15 gallon barrels. Yes, those are the sizes micro-distillers use.

I last wrote about small barrels in July, prompted by something John Hansell posted on his blog.

I write in depth about the Buffalo Trace experiment in the new issue of The Bourbon Country Reader, which dropped today. You really should subscribe and read the whole story, but I won't keep you in suspense. The whiskey was standard Buffalo Trace bourbon and it was aged in the small barrels for five years. It tasted bad. The whiskey from the 5 gallon barrel tasted worst.

Tasting them, you could get some ideas about why they tasted so bad. I talk about that too.

The December, 2011, issue of The Bourbon Country Reader is Volume 14, Number 2. In it, we also tell the story of The Great Whiskey Glut, observe the changing of the guard at Virginia Gentlemen, and taste two limited edition releases from A. Smith Bowman and Heaven Hill.

Subscriptions to The Bourbon Country Reader are $20/year for U.S. addresses, $24.50 for Canada, and $28.50 for everybody else. It is published six times a year. Well, maybe not, but your subscription always includes six issues.

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Brandy And The Holidays.

This is the time of year when people who never buy brandy buy brandy.

Although bourbon whiskey is great in egg nog, many people prefer the more traditional brandy. It also figures in other holiday and winter season recipes, not just for drinks but also desserts and other dishes.

So this is when a lot of people who aren't normally brandy drinkers buy and drink brandy, and a lot of that brandy is American-made.

Most American brandy comes from California, or so most people think. Two of the five largest brands are entirely made in California while the other three are distilled in California from California-grown grapes, but aged and bottled in Kentucky. And as I told you Sunday, four of the top five American brandies are aged in used bourbon or Tennessee whiskey barrels.

The United States doesn't have the fine brandy tradition of France, Spain, and Greece. Except for a few boutiques like Germain-Robin, American brandy producers go for a utilitarian spirit, typically aged for two to three years. Most of it is perfectly acceptable for egg nog, punches, and other holiday uses, and it's much less expensive than the imports.

There are four major grape brandy producers in the United States. I specified 'grape' there because Laird's, in New Jersey, is technically a brandy producer but their fruit of choice is apples.

There are countless small brandy producers, in California and elsewhere, mostly associated with vineyards and wineries.

The Big Four are all in California. They are:

1.  E&J Gallo, in Modesto. They make E&J Brandy, the most popular brand. At about three million cases a year, E&J outsells all other brandies, domestic and imported.

2.  F. Korbel and Brothers/Heck Cellars, in Arvin. Korbel Brandy is #4 in sales at about 350-thousand cases. Although Brown-Forman markets and distributes the better-known Korbel Sparkling Wines line, its sole involvement with the brandy is in supplying Jack Daniel's barrels for its aging. Korbel's sales are concentrated in Wisconsin.

3.  O'Neill Vintners & Distillers, in Parlier. O'Neill is one of the two big independents. It provides all of the distillate for Heaven Hill's Christian Brothers (#3) and Coronet (#5) brands, and possibly some of #2 Paul Masson for Constellation. It produces more than five million gallons of brandy and neutral spirit a year. Some customers, like Heaven Hill, just buy their distillate. For others they do the aging, blending, and bottling too.

4.  Vie-Del Company, in Fresno. Vie-Del is the other big independent. It's a former Seagram's plant, now owned by the Nury family. Together Vie-Del and O'Neill supply distillate for just about every brand except Gallo and Korbel. Like O'Neill, Vie-Del is strictly a producer, selling grape juice, wine, and brandy to customers who handle the branding, marketing and distribution of it.

Heaven Hill Finds Another Good Use For Corn.

When producers send me whiskey to taste, they invariably use a lot of packing material. When Heaven Hill sends me something that requires packing peanuts, they use the biodegradable kind made from corn.

Just like their whiskey.

Biodegradable peanuts are non-toxic, so you can just throw them in the sink and let the water run. They dissolve completely in a few minutes. Warm water seems to works better than cold and it helps if you stir them a bit. While they are dissolving the kitchen smells like fresh corn. Nice.

The alternative is polystyrene peanuts, which are made from petroleum. They can be reused but not recycled. The UPS Store where I do my shipping accepts and reuses them, but putting them in a bag and taking them over there isn't nearly as easy as just throwing them in the sink and turning the water on.

If you get something packed with peanuts and you're not sure whether or not they're biodegradable, hold one under running water and squeeze it a few times. If it's biodegradable it will get sticky and start to dissolve. Polystyrene peanuts don't do anything.

Polystyrene peanuts are a little lighter and about 10 percent cheaper, so congratulations to Heaven Hill for making the greener choice and demonstrating that corn isn't just good for making whiskey.

Elijah Craig Did Not Invent Bourbon.

Elijah Craig is a brand of bourbon made by Heaven Hill Distilleries. It comes as a 12-year-old or an 18-year-old, both excellent.

Elijah Craig was also a real person, c. 1738-1808, a Kentucky pioneer, community leader, entrepreneur, and Baptist minister.

But he did not invent bourbon whiskey.

The durable but unsubstantiated claim that Elijah Craig ‘invented’ bourbon can be traced to Richard Collins and his 1874 History of Kentucky. Collins does not identify Craig by name, but writes that "the first Bourbon Whiskey was made in 1789, at Georgetown, at the fulling mill at the Royal spring." This claim is included, without elaboration or substantiation, on a densely-packed page of "Kentucky Firsts." Since Craig operated "the fulling mill at the Royal spring" in that year, the "invention" is attributed to him.

There are several major problems with the claim. First, what made Craig's whiskey different from other whiskey made in the region? Second, the Georgetown site was never in Bourbon County, so if the place name and the whiskey have to go together, Craig cannot be the originator. In fact, the name 'Bourbon whiskey' was applied to all whiskey from that region beginning early in the 19th century but the style of whiskey we now call bourbon didn't really evolve until many years later, in about the middle of the century, long after Craig’s death.

The Craig claim has been convenient. His ministerial vocation was played up by wet forces in the run-up to Prohibition. When something has an inventor the story of its origin is much easier to tell, but actual history is seldom so neat. Whatever else it may be, historically the Craig claim is unsupported.

Who Was John E. Fitzgerald?

Old Fitzgerald Bourbon is an old brand with genuine 19th century roots. Today it is made by Heaven Hill. The whiskey itself is unusual because it is one of a handful of bourbons that use wheat instead of rye as the flavor grain. The best known 'wheater' is Maker's Mark. W. L. Weller is another.

I like wheaters and Old Fitz is good bourbon. This isn't about that. This is about the name and the man behind it.

The Old Fitzgerald brand originated with Charles Herbst, an international wine and spirits dealer based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Among his various holdings was a Kentucky bourbon distillery which to locals was known by the name Old Judge, on Benson Creek near Frankfort, Kentucky. Members of the Bixler family were distillers there.

That is where Herbst made all of his bourbons and ryes, including Old Fitzgerald. It closed with Prohibition and never re-opened.

Herbst, in his marketing of Old Fitzgerald Bourbon, claimed the distillery was built by John E. Fitzgerald who, after selling it to Herbst in about 1900, moved to Hammond, Indiana (a suburb of Chicago) to run a distillery there. Under Herbst, Old Fitzgerald became a successful brand. During Prohibition, Herbst sold it to Julian P. 'Pappy' Van Winkle. After repeal, Old Fitzgerald became the flagship brand of Van Winkle's Stitzel-Weller Distillery.

Back when the Old Fitzgerald brand was created, just like today, producers thought nothing of creating completely fictitious origin stories for their products. Evidence that only emerged about ten years ago reveals the true story of John Fitzgerald. I shan't go into every twist and turn here. Suffice it to say that based on the evidence I've seen, this is the most likely story.

John E. Fitzgerald was neither a distiller nor a distillery owner. He was a Treasury agent with a powerful thirst who also happened to be a good judge of whiskey. Not only was he known to help himself to a sample now and then, he supposedly only poached from honey barrels. As a result, Herbst and his associates got into the habit of calling any particularly good barrel of whiskey 'a Fitzgerald.' Naming a brand in his honor was for them a wonderful inside joke, which Herbst revealed many years later.

Some people, in telling this 'new' story, have taken to referring to Fitzgerald as a ‘security guard.’  Perhaps they are doing this to avoid offending the Feds. The story is that Fitzgerald had the ‘keys to the warehouse,’ which they interpret as 'security guard.'

The problem with that interpretation is that this was a bonded warehouse and in that era the only person who had ‘keys to the warehouse’ was the assigned Treasury agent. Even the distillery owner didn’t have keys. This was true from passage of the Bottled in Bond Act of 1897 until the system was changed in the early 1980s. Every distillery had a 'government man' on the premises who controlled all access to the warehouses. If Fitzgerald had keys to the warehouse, he had to be a Treasury agent. That's all there is to it.

The Deconstruction Of Black Maple Hill.

The memo above just came into my possession and I knew it would be of interest here. It illustrates my contention that although whiskey companies will rarely tell an outright lie, they will twist themselves into pretzels to mislead you or, at least, avoid telling you the whole truth.

Black Maple Hill (BMH) is a line of very pricey, very small batch, extra-aged bourbons and ryes. It has been around for about ten years. I'm not a big BMH guy myself, but I know many people who love the stuff. BMH whiskeys have a great reputation.

The brand is owned by CVI Brands of San Carlos, California. CVI does not operate a whiskey distillery. The bourbon and rye it sells as BMH was made by someone else. About that there is no dispute.

The money line in the memo above is this: "Black Maple Hill has no connection whatsoever with Heaven Hill."

Let's review what we know.

The earliest BMH releases were bottled for CVI by Julian Van Winkle III at the Hoffman Distillery (DSP-KY-112) just outside of Lawrenceburg, Kentucky. According to VWIII, that was 'his' whiskey, i.e., wheated bourbon from Stitzel-Weller.

When Julian left Lawrenceburg, BMH went to Kentucky Bourbon Distillers (KBD) in Bardstown (DSP-KY-78), where it remains to this day. Like CVI and Van Winkle, KBD is not a distiller. No one will say who made the whiskey KBD bottles as BMH. There has been speculation that some of it is from the Medley Distillery in Owensboro, which stopped distilling about 20 years ago. And there has been speculation that it's Heaven Hill.

Here's why:

KBD operates out of the old Willett Distillery in Bardstown. Heaven Hill is right across the street. The folks at KBD get all pissy when someone says that all of KBD's whiskey comes from Heaven Hill, but they can't plausibly deny that most of it comes from there. There is nothing wrong with that. A non-distiller producer has to get whiskey from somebody. KBD and Heaven Hill have a long beneficial relationship.

So KBD has relationships with both Heaven Hill and BMH, but there is no relationship between BMH and Heaven Hill. Fair enough.

But saying "Black Maple Hill has no connection whatsoever with Heaven Hill" is not the same as saying "there is not one drop of Heaven Hill-made whiskey in any bottle of Black Maple Hill." Although true literally it certainly would be disingenuous if, in fact, KBD is using Heaven Hill whiskey for BMH.

If it's not Heaven Hill, then who made it? As readers of this space know, the list of possible suspects is a short one.

If CVI intended to be transparent and, therefore, credible in refuting "the Bloggers and Tweeters on the Internet," they wouldn't just deny a corporate relationship with Heaven Hill. They would announce who actually makes their whiskey. That's what people want to know.

By refusing to answer they encourage the "pure speculation" they claim to deplore.

And that is also why I don't have very many bottles from non-distiller producers like CVI and KBD in my personal portfolio. You just never know where they've been.

LDI Determined To Remain A Mystery.

Fans of American whiskey will sometimes see an unfamiliar label on a liquor store shelf and wonder if they have discovered some previously-unknown distillery. In most cases, what they have found is either an obscure brand from a major distiller, or the product of a non-distiller using whiskey bought from one of the majors.

These days it might also be the product of a micro-distillery, but they are easy to spot and their combined whiskey output doesn’t amount to 1/10 of one percent of US whiskey production.

A straight rye might come from a non-US distillery, such as WhistlePig from Canada, but if it’s bourbon and not from a micro or defunct distillery (now very rare), then it was made by one of the thirteen US whiskey distilleries that are currently active.

If a bottle is bottom shelf, possibly a store brand, vague origins are no big deal. If you don’t pay much you don’t expect much.

But if the product has a premium price you are smart to ask questions and the first and most obvious one is, “who made this?”

Which brings us back to those thirteen large distilleries that produce 99.9 percent of the whiskey made in the USA.

Nine of them are so open they give regular public tours. Three of the remaining four give occasional press and trade tours. That leaves one.

Lawrenceburg Distillers Indiana LLC, usually abbreviated as LDI.

Lawrenceburg, Indiana is near Cincinnati and developed in the 19th century as the main distilling center for spirits brokered and distributed through Cincinnati firms. Until the American distilling industry began its big contraction in the 1970s, two of the Big Four -- Seagrams and Schenley -- had large whiskey plants there.

LDI is the old Seagrams place. It traces its roots back to 1847, although little is known about its early days. The name was Rossville then and after 1875 it was owned by the James Walsh Company. They operated it up to Prohibition, and even during Prohibition under a medicinal whiskey license.

At the end of Prohibition, Walsh sold Rossville to Seagrams, which expanded it and operated it until that company was sold for parts in 2001. Pernod-Ricard had it until 2007, then sold it to Angostura, the current owner.

LDI is actually two distilleries. The larger one makes neutral spirits (vodka and gin) while the smaller one makes whiskey. It has maturation warehouses and a bottling house. According to the LDI web site, it sits on 78 acres and is one of the largest beverage alcohol distilleries in the world. It makes distilled and compound gin, corn whiskey, rye whiskey, and three different bourbons.

Of greatest interest to the enthusiast community are their rye, which is 95 percent rye grain, 5 percent malt; and their high-rye bourbon, which is 60 percent corn, 36 percent rye, 4 percent malt.

Unlike the other twelve major whiskey distilleries in the USA, LDI makes no brands of its own. It sells its entire output in bulk to other producers, large and small, up to and including Diageo (Bulleit 95 Rye) and Pernod (Seagrams Gin). Some LDI whiskey in current distribution was brokered by Pernod, the rest seemingly comes from LDI directly.

In that word “seemingly” lies the rub. The people who run LDI won’t give interviews, at least not to me. Some of LDI’s customers will provide a little bit of information but they don’t necessarily know very much, except what type of whiskey they bought and the fact that LDI made it.

Being secretive and close-mouthed is what bulk producers do. Heaven Hill has always had a big bulk whiskey business but getting them to talk about it is like pulling teeth. Four Roses and Brown-Forman will both confirm that they sell whiskey to Diageo, primarily white dog that Diageo barrels and ages in the maturation warehouses at Stitzel-Weller near Louisville. Buffalo Trace has been in and out of the bulk business and currently says it is out, including at its Tom Moore Distillery, which sold bulk when it was owned by Constellation. Everybody sells bulk whiskey from time to time, to adjust their inventory or when the price is just too good to pass up.

Neither the producers nor their customers will say much about the bulk whiskey business. Since a bulk producer doesn’t really know what happens to the whiskey after it leaves their plant, and since they don’t own the brand names under which it is sold, their reluctance makes a kind of sense. If a marketing company wants you to think it’s really a distiller, as some do, its reluctance to talk about the real producer makes sense too.

Or consider this. Diageo confirms that its new Bulleit 95 Rye is LDI. The LDI high-rye bourbon mash bill is the same as the one Four Roses makes, which is no surprise since both plants used to be owned by Seagrams.

That bourbon recipe happens to be the Bulleit Bourbon recipe. Is Diageo taking spirit distilled in Indiana, aging it in Kentucky, mixing it with the all-Kentucky bourbon from Four Roses, and calling the whole thing “Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey”?

Can they? The rules say producers may not misrepresent where a product was manufactured, but they don’t define ‘manufactured.’ They do say that when distilled spirits are bottled by or for a rectifier, the phrase ‘manufactured by’ may be used in lieu of the phrase ‘bottled by.’

If mere bottling is considered ‘manufacturing’ then surely aging is too.

Beyond the TTB’s general misrepresentation rule above, no entity regulates the use of ‘Kentucky’ in the phrase ‘Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey.’ Nowhere is it decreed that whiskeys using the phrase must be distilled and aged in Kentucky.

So I’m not saying Diageo has done anything wrong if they are doing this, but it sure would be interesting to know.

Maybe that tells you why nobody wants to talk about LDI. The problem, of course, is that when you can’t get information from authoritative sources, the rumor mill takes over. I may hear something that doesn’t sound quite right but if I can’t get a company to confirm or deny a rumor there’s not much I can do to set the record straight.

The best hope is that LDI’s customers will convince them to open up. The place makes good and interesting whiskey. Somebody should be bragging about it.

Review: Evan Williams Single Barrel Vintage 2001

Just as the Kentucky Derby is a race for 3-year-olds, Evan Williams Single Barrel Vintage (EWSBV) is a race to be the best 9-year-old rye-recipe bourbon in Heaven Hill's warehouses.

After 14 years, the series is also like an old friend. It's not always the same but it's not very different either. The familiarity is always welcome. While the basic profile stays the same there is enough variation from year to year so that you look forward to each new release. It's an annual harvest of Heaven Hill's best. Because of that it is much more true to the traditional meaning of 'vintage' than most other annual whiskey releases.

Heaven Hill and thus EWSBV spent several years in the wilderness after the distillery in Bardstown was destroyed by fire. That history is reflected in the 1997 to 2000 vintages. If some of those years were a bit iffy, the series is back on track now.
 
The new EWSBV 2001 represents Heaven Hill settling down at its new distillery in Louisville, making exactly the whiskey they want to make. Its principal charm is exquisite balance. It has pipe tobacco on the nose, with tannin, deep char and candy corn on the palate.
 
Evan Williams Single Barrel Vintage 2001 won't knock you on your ass. It's more like a comfortable visit with an old friend. Nothing spectacular and nothing new, but deeply enjoyable nonetheless.