Welcome to another edition of Barrel to Bottle with Binny's Beverage Depot. I'm your esteemed host, Kirsten Marie Ellis. As always is Jeff Carlin. Peter, Jeffrey Peter. Is it? It is, JP, that's me. That's a great name. Very good. So I'm gonna blind you today, buddy. But I like my eyes. On some bourbons. I like your eyes too, but that's not what I'm talking about. We're gonna blind bourbons to see if you can pick out the Pappy Van Winkle. Did you hear that, folks? I brought Jeffrey Peter Carlin, Pappy Van Winkle. I'll take that, all of you. You're not the only one, Jeff, that's gonna take part in this blind tasting. We've got Roger Adamson back again. Glad to be back. I'm happy to have you. And we've got our spirit specialist, the star of the Whiskey Hotline. If you guys heard our previous Whiskey Hotline podcast, Joe was here, talking all things whiskey, so here he is, Mr. Joe Maloney. Oh, Joseph Edward Maloney. I know that one. Thanks, Kristen Marie Ellis. Thanks for having me in. Roger, what's your middle name? I feel bad that you got left out in that. Clark. RC. I think you actually have the best name out of everyone. Clark is pretty awesome. Wrong name. I'm actually related to William Clark, which is ironic because I get lost all the time. Don't have a good sense of direction. Big fan of GPS. That's awesome. All right, cool. Well, anyway, while we're doing this, folks, there's a craze. We just got through the holidays and the Van Winkle release happened in the late fall and it gets nuts, you know? There's only like 80,000 bottles released every year, about 7,000 cases and you just you can't get it. What makes it so special? I mean, why the demand for it? I think it's a lot of different things. For one, it's amazing bourbon. Yes. Right. So the main thing is that it is actually really good bourbon. It's become the thing to get. So you have a lot of people coming in looking for that special gift. The standard people, the normal people that you would see in the bourbon aisle looking for something to drink, are now joined by a whole massive horde of people looking for the special gift that they have to get their boss or they're afraid they're not going to get their raise. It's just a lot higher demand and it seems like the supply continues to be a little bit less and less because we're waiting on stocks to age. Exactly. To meet those age statements, especially of the 15, the 20, and the coveted 23. So they've managed to very intelligently create a climate in which scarcity is prevalent and production cannot possibly reach demand. And so they're always going to be in business pumping out the good juice. Plus it's a weeded bourbon, correct, Joe? That's correct. And there's not many of those around. There's more and more coming online with a lot of the micro distillers that are around. But yeah, the traditional weeded bourbons that we had were basically you know, Makers Mark and your Weller, old Fitzgerald. It's an old weeded bourbon. So basically guys, what we're saying is bourbon, you know, we always think of Kentucky, but bourbon can come from anywhere in the United States of America. But it's got to have a certain mash bill. Roger, can you tell me A, what a mash bill is and then what that must comprise of to be called bourbon? Sure. A mash bill is going to be the ingredients list of all the grains that are ultimately fermented and then distilled. And the key component to bourbon is corn. People came here with long heritage and distilling whiskey. Corn was the grain that was the easiest to grow here in the US, the most prevalent, the least expensive. So if they were used to using barley back in their home country, they quickly modified it to distill with corn here. So a bourbon whiskey has to be made with at least 51 percent corn, but it's typically made with a higher amount than that, closer to somewhere around 70 or so. So what does that do to the flavor when you make it with that much corn in the mashbill? Corn definitely imparts sweetness to the bourbon. Some really nice flavors that then will evoke memories of other corn dishes. I know Joe loves corn puddin. It's a great descriptor that he uses in a lot of his bourbon reviews. But yeah, predominantly another thing with bourbon is you're using a new oak barrel every time. So you really want a lot of that flavor from the oak to be able to shine through. Yeah. So depending on what other grains you use, rye as a seasoning spice gives a lot of that spicy character to it, some of the herbal notes. And then wheat actually is pretty neutral flavor, right? Right. Yes. That's why I think they end up being a little sweeter because it lets the corn shine through as opposed to the rye showing off the spice, and the corn gets to dance a little bit more in front. So suffice to say that we did bourbon is generally sweeter and fruitier than other bourbons on the shelf. Yes. And that learning curve, and I think that's what makes it appeal to a broader audience. So some people that haven't quite developed an affinity for some of the bourbons that are a little more austere and a little rougher on the edges, they appreciate the smoothness or the easiness to drink of a weeded bourbon. I think that's a lot of the Pappy mystique is you can kind of jump right into the bourbon game there, and it's going to be a lot different than drinking like a hundred proof spicy high rye bourbon. Right. Right. Well, then some of the mystique also comes with just the kind of the general opinion of most people. You look at something and you think, well, if it's older, it's got to be better. Right. So having the age statements on there, which they are some of the highest age statements you will see on bourbon bottles these days, also puts it in quite a high demand. Cool. So a little bit of a background on Van Winkle and the distillery and how it came to be. So it's named after Julian Van Winkle or Julian Pappy Van Winkle. And he was actually a sales guy for WL. Weller back in the 19th century, late 19th century, when he was just 19 years old. Weller was acquired by the Stitzel Company in 1910, and Pappy became actually the president of the Stitzel Weller distillery. When the distillery was sold, he began to buy back barrels and bottle them as old Rip Van Winkle. So the distillery or the brand started as a buy back brand. He would buy old juice and then age the barrels and then sell them as his. So pretty cool. And the label was introduced just before prohibition. The Stitzel Weller distillery then opened back up in 1935 on the day of the Kentucky Derby. Pretty fitting down there. Pappy died in 1965 at the age of 89. In 1965 then, he was considered the oldest distiller at the time. So Stitzel Weller then was sold in 1972, and Pappy's son, Julian Van Winkle Jr., resurrected the old Van Winkle brand from the pre-prohibition glory that it once had. They got some good names there. I mean, we've got some good names here with Clark and such, but... Ellis? That's pretty good. But it's not Van Winkle. No, those are quality names. No one's buying Ellis Bourbon. No one's lining up. No one's angry because they can't get Ellis 23. It just isn't. No. So Julian Van Winkle Jr. brings it back. He dies. And then Pappy's grandson, Julian Van Winkle III, Esquire, right? I just made that up, took over old Rip Van Winkle Distillery Company. The Sitzl Distillery closed in 91. Before that, the Buffalo Trace Distillery had marketed their first single barrel bourbon. We know that as Blanton's in 1984. That's some good stuff too. We can talk about that on another cast. Since 2002, the Van Winkle brands have been bottled by the Sazerac Company at the Buffalo Trace Distillery as a joint venture with the old Rip Van Winkle Distillery Company. That, my friends, is the skinny on Pappy Van Winkle. Let's get to this blind tasting, you guys. We're staring at these four little tasting cups of of weeded bourbon here. And we've got, I'll just tell you what we have. We've got one expression of weeded bourbon from Whiskey Acres. We've got one from Jay Henry & Sons up in Wisconsin. We've got one from Wyoming. And we've got then Pappy 15. And one bit of disclosure, I believe that the Jay Henry is actually a four grain, but it does have weed. Okay. Thanks for being specific. Yeah. Oh, now I'll figure it out. And that's easy enough. Yeah. Thought you had a challenge for me, Joe. Maybe not. Keep them in order, one through four, please, guys. Go ahead and taste through, nose and make your notes if you wish. And we'll see if you guys know which one is the Pappy 15. And I did a very similar tasting to this at one of our store tastings. For our continuing education program. That's exactly right. And if you guys want to come to one of those seminars, go ahead and take a look at either binnys.com/events, or if you just look up binnys.com/continuingeducation, you'll see all of the consumer education based seminars that we have. You'll sometimes get me talking about wine. You'll get Roger talking about beer. And Joe will try to steer you right in bourbon. So what did you do during continuing education? Well, I was going to say during the class, the fun thing that happened was that we went a little even blinder than we're doing now because I didn't tell anybody. That they were weeded bourbons whatsoever. It was just, this is American bourbon, which has to inherently be American anyway. But this is just bourbon. And we went through and a lot of the people in the class were telling me how heavy the rye was and the bourbons. Nobody can really- Yeah. Just it goes to show that when we remove the labels and the mystique and drinking with expectations, then when we're just left with the liquid, there's some pretty amazing stuff available that you don't have to go fight for, or pay secondary prices Yeah. It's totally natural that what you see is drastically going to affect what you perceive in the glass. If you think that something is on allocation, or it's hard to find, or it's very expensive, if you see that and you know that going in, you're going to make that liquid seem better than it might be had you not known that. Perception is reality. Absolutely. I did a class once where I had a bottle of Pomerol, which is a right bank appellation in Bordeaux, and I took the juice from that bottle of wine, which is fairly expensive, and I switched it with an outlying AOP in the area. I switched the juices in the bottle. I brought them out to the class and I said, okay, guys, here's the expensive wine, here's the cheap wine, and I tasted them out, and I said, let's write tasting notes on these and why one is better than the other. Everybody but one person fell for it. They all wrote these loving, beautiful tasting notes for the more expensive wine and kind of a more mediocre kind of plain Jane tasting note for the lesser expensive wine, and then I kind of told them at the end, I said, you guys, I switched the juice, and it was silent and it was like they couldn't understand, they didn't understand what I was saying to them, and they looked at me, I go, no, I switched the wine, so you thought that the expensive one was the cheap one and vice versa, and People don't like being fooled. A good point, it was a good exercise to show that, you know, if you have these preconceived notions going in, you are going to formulate those perceptions and come to that conclusion without being objective. So, blinding is where it's at, folks, to make sure that you are truly objective when you're talking about quality style or just if you like it or not. Right. That's why you have to have good company to have good whiskey. Oh, I'm so happy you're here, Joseph. Yeah. Well, I've tasted, Roger, you're... Yeah, tasted through them. So... Roger's a little flush, so I'm pretty sure he's tasted through them. Yeah, yeah. I've got the old bourbon blanket on. But he's also smiling more. Yeah, exactly. He's a bit more jovial. I'm sure I am too, because I'm, you know, of Irish stock, so... Exactly. Right, right, right. Just happier. Take it on the word. The cold is going to be even less so today. Okay. So, any impressions of the whiskeys before you guys, before we talk about which one is the Pappy? I mean, obviously, I'm more of a novice when it comes to this stuff, but number two, like super high alcohol. Like, I felt like it was going to burn my tongue off almost. Like, it was very, very much a lot of alcohol. So, two was hot. We call that hot. Two was hot. Yeah. And I actually wrote hot. If you can see. Look there. I wrote hot. Good job. So, I wrote hot on that one. Number three, medicinal, more, or even older, it tasted like it had more age to it. Like, there was more going on there. Four, very peppery. And kind of like a pepper spice to it. And then number one was the, was very, it reminded me of Christmas. Had like that mulled wine, a mulled kind of essence to it. That was, those were my notes now. I'm sure Ryder's notes are much more. Roger, what sayeth thou? I was pretty impressed with these. I mean. I love all of them. I mean, I will happily drink any of these. Three, three definitely tasted younger to me. I had to guess. I would say that the third one has the multiple grains in it. It's got some graininess to it, a little bit of husky kind of. Definitely reminds me of the smell of some raw grain. But still in an interesting way. I thought two, while it was hot, was nice and complex. It had a lot going on. There was vanilla, caramel. There's some sweet notes, but it also had some nice complexity to it. Really enjoyed that one. Four, I thought was nice and soft, like what you want from a weeded bourbon. There's a little more nuances. Interesting. You picked up spice. That, to me, was just the most easy, steady rolling one. One, I liked a lot. It had a pronounced cherry note to it. A little bit of corn sweetness, but good interplay of kind of everything going on. But I totally dig what you laid out. I mean, I think that if more people did this, it would be a much better world. People would realize I don't have to constantly chase. Well, and you don't have to spend $323 on a bottle of whiskey. You can spend 60 or 70 bucks and still be hanging out with the same quality, same style, same flavor profile, and feel good about it. And this is a fun little exercise. This would be fun to do with some friends. Stop by Binny's, pick up a bottle of whiskey, and let's taste it and let's see what we think we got and versus each other. It'd be a fun little game to do, because this is quite an adventure in whiskey. Well, and the fun thing, too, is unless you have really wild friends, you'll have some leftover, and you can start to build a massive tasting at the end of the year. There you go. What I think is good to remember is that everybody has different palates, and I think we have acknowledged that enough. What ends up happening, I think, too much with the whiskey world is people think there's the one whiskey that they have to buy, because that's going to be the best. Well, think of it with the food world. You wouldn't imply like there's just one type of cuisine that's the best. Right. So, like, I only like Indian food, so forget all the other ones. I did not expect Roger to say Indian food. Yeah, I did not see that coming either. I did not. No, that was left field. I was thinking high flavor and high spice. I nailed it. There's certain people that, you know, are kind of, you know, like much more simpler basic things. There's people that want really spicy things, really earthy, really intense. So, to imply that there's just one whiskey that's going to appeal universally to everybody is kind of silly. It's kind of really silly, yeah. Even with things you drink, we're a nation of coffee drinkers. I don't drink much coffee, but I always say that everybody's affinity lately for a lot of people that are vocal at least, in really dark roast coffees, that's totally going to affect what other kind of things you like to enjoy. If you're drinking like heavily dark roasted coffee on a daily basis, your palate's probably going to be a little different of somebody that doesn't drink coffee at all. Exactly. No, that's absolutely correct. The coffee example is a really good kind of moniker as to if you're going to like strongly flavored foods or not. If you take your coffee black, then you might like that high-intensity Indian food. If you like a little cream in it, then maybe you're kind of right in the middle. If your coffee is more milk than coffee, then you're super sensitive and you're eating stuff off the kids menu. That's kind of where you live. I wish I had the understanding and pal description that Roger had over there, because that was great. I go, yeah, that is what I tasted. Oh, yeah, no, that was perfect. Yeah, that totally tastes like it is. I mean, I loved the first one. That was like my favorite. I love that a lot. I loved all of them, obviously, but the third one was my favorite. Okay. I was like, I would take that all day. Nice. Roger, what would... Do you think the third one is Pappy? Is that what you're saying? I have actually, you know, I've never actually had Pappy Stray at all, so I have no reference point. Sure. But which one do you think is the Pappy? Number three. I mean, three was my, was probably my favorite. Jeff, pick a whiskey or the dog gets it. I'll take one as the one that I say is Pappy. Okay. That was my guess as well. Oh my God. What? What? They both got it. You guys actually guessed it correctly. But the fun thing is, so number three was your favorite. For my style is like, I like that hot heat. Which was? Whiskey acres. That's right. Made right out in DeKalb. Oh my God. You can actually go to the field where the grain was grown and go visit the distillery. Yeah, they're great in the glass right here in Illinois. Very nice. Make an amazing bourbon and amazing rye. Excellent. My favorite is number two. It's a J. Henry & Sons, not just because it's from Wisconsin, but I just think that the bourbons that these guys are producing are just exceptional. And it's just my style, you know? Sure. I love J. Henry. Which was number two. What proof was that one? Yeah, really. 120 proof. Okay. Yeah, 120. And then number four was the Wyoming Whiskey. Yes, the Wyoming Whiskey, which was my least favorite of the four. I don't, I'm sorry to say, but it was. I like it. They always say you should never change your answer. I changed my answer on the fourth one and I got it wrong. Always use your initial answer. You were actually trying to, I got it. That's a study skill like ACT, SAT prep, like odds are the first thing you think, that's the answer. You're overthinking. Yeah, nine times out of 10. Don't overthink it. Unfortunately, you're not going to get a $20 gift card today, Roger. But you know who will. Oh my gosh, you guys are so good. This is really fortuitous that Brian S wrote into us at Binny's Bev on Twitter, and he's going to get $20. We chose him. Yeah, I love Brian. So anyway, $20 to Binny's, that'll buy you. How much Pappy Van Winkle? Oh my gosh. Not much. Not much. Not much. But you don't need to buy the Pappy Van Winkle. We'll give you the box. Okay, man. Anyway. All right. What advice do you give the average bourbon drinker trying to pick up a simple unicorn like Weller 12 or 107? What do you see as being the next bourbon unicorn's being? Any advice for finding the harder ones like the Pappy or the Old Forrester Birthday Bourbon or Michter's 10, Michter's 25? So we chose this because it goes right on with what we're talking about, Brian. So hopefully you've listened to the podcast and you kind of get a few more ideas as to what you're looking for. So with the weeded, we're talking about the less expensive side, Larseny, of course, Maker's Mark, David Nicholson, the 1843 right weeded, Jay Henry, which is very, very fairly priced, as well as the Whiskey Acres. What else do you think, Joe, Roger, is something that, you know, you can, you can buy as an alternative. And also, what do you think the next Pappy Van Winkle will be? Brian, thanks a lot for the question. I get this question a lot. Like you heard, I bet. And it's the way that you get those bottles, really, they get handed out in the stores to regular customers as best as possible. And regular doesn't mean you got to spend a ton of money. You know, it just means coming in, trying different things, getting into bourbon, showing that you like to buy different bottles and get to know the people that you shop with. You know, I try and pick one person and go to them and say, hey, what do you taste and what do you like? And they can turn you on some different things. And then if they get some bottles, then likely they're going to try and take care of you, that they're seeing you on a regular basis. Calling and yelling at Joe at the Whiskey Hotline is not going to get you. Doesn't work, but it is entertaining. So keep those yelling calls coming. But unicorns, I think there are unicorns on the shelf right now. You know, one that we just closed out was the wild turkey decades that I couldn't give away at $150. And we closed it out at $100. And you know, now of course, now that it's gone, everybody wants it. But there are unicorns out there. The main thing is just to figure out what do you like to taste? What tastes good to you? Because there are 525 different bourbons that we have in the store, including a lot of the hand picks. So I would look for our sticker on the bottle because we go down and we will compare the regular item on the shelf with the barrels they're giving us. And if we don't like that barrel a whole lot more than what's already on the shelf, then we have absolutely zero reason to bring in a whole barrel, which is about 200, 225 bottles a barrel. And that's the name of the game. I mean, you guys do so much research and leg work to try to figure out what is the best, what's really the bang for the buck, or even what's the new thing, or what's the best of the best of the best. And you guys haven't served me wrong yet. The larceny, hat tips to that. I mean, that's something I tried. We love larceny. Yeah, and I'm a whiskey guy. I love whiskey. I've tried tons and tons of whiskeys. But I hadn't tried the larceny and came in and talking about how it's really got a lot of bang for its buck for it. It's not the super high end whiskey. But it tastes like a super high end whiskey. And it's so good. It's like $22. Right, exactly. And that was one of those ones where I was like, oh yeah, I'll try and give us a shot. And it's now one of my favorites. I mean, I've got two bottles on my bar at home because one to keep and one to share. So one of the downsides of the Pappy Van Winkle phenomenon is that it's making people think they have to spend a ton of money to get a good bourbon. And that's just not true. Right. There are bourbons and especially the ones you mentioned before that Pappy is unique and that a lot of their expressions are age longer than most bourbons. That is costs a lot of money. Years there's a loss over the years. The angels share. There's not a ton of liquid left. But there's still beautiful bourbons that sometimes I get this look when you recommend them like, well, I said I wanted a good bourbon, though. Like, there's no way that this could be good. It's too cheap. And that's what's unfortunate. Like Evan Williams' Single Barrel, for example. Phenomenal bourbon. Four rows of Single Barrel under 40 bucks. It's a go-to. I have a bottle at my house all the time. But I think the take out of this is that start tasting your bourbons blind. Yeah. Even ones you know and own. Have your friends over and do what we just did tonight. And have somebody, you know, a friend or something, lay them out, number them, and then just evaluate them on taste alone. Yep. That's always the truest. Even though you know what you have, you gotta know what's in the glass when they do that. Roger, I didn't hear, what was your favorite bourbon of the lineup? I think probably number two. Number two? Yeah. Yeah, J. Henry. The J. Henry I thought was really phenomenal. It had tons going on. Cool. So we got two guesses on which one was the Pappy, but our favorites were other ones that are actually available right now. So, I mean, are those unicorns? I don't know. I like them quite a bit and I would go snap them up. Is it safe to say the unicorn is in the eye of the beholder? It's safe to say there is no way to pick what a unicorn is, because a lot of it is what is everybody going to gravitate to? You know, and I'm not good at dealing with who the masses are going to decide is the best thing to go grab. We need to stop worrying about rarity and focusing more on if you like how it tastes. Yep. And yeah, quality for you. Okay. Really great job today, guys. Thanks for joining. Ladies and gentlemen, I hope that you enjoyed this episode of Barrel to Bottle. I know I sure did. So come on in to Binny's and we'll help you find the bourbon that's right for you. If you take anything away from this week's podcast, it's to blind taste whiskey because there's more to whiskey than just being a label or just being a brand. Exactly. Perfect. All right, guys, until the next time, keep tasting. We'll see you. Thanks.