177. Old Forester Rye Review

Welcome to another trip down the Bourbon Road with your hosts, Jim and Mike. So grab a glass of your favorite bourbon and kick back.

We would like to thank our friends at Premium Bar Products for sponsoring this episode. If you're ready to step up your game at your home bar, check out premiumbarproducts.com to choose from their wide selection of glassware, all of which can be custom engraved with your personal message or logo. And there's no minimum order. So after the episode, head over to premiumbarproducts.com and check out everything they have to offer. Now let's get on with the show. Hello, everybody. I'm Jim Shannon. I'm Mike Hyatt. This is The Bourbon Road. And today, Mike, it's Craft Distillery Monday. Yeah. It's the Monday before our big show where we announce our bourbon blending contest, where we put out all the rules and how you do it, right? Yeah. So kind of excited for this Wednesday coming up. But today is Monday. It's Craft Distillery Monday. But we do have a big boy on today. We do.

You know, every once in a while we have to throw that in. I wouldn't say it's a big boy. It's a big boy distillery. Um, old Forester is their rye, 100 proof. You'd left us over here the other night, unopened. And I was like, I don't know who left us here.

So this has kind of become my, uh, my, my house rye for daily kind of rye activities. And I do have daily rye activities, so I need a good rye for that. Old Forester's rye is a good choice. And we'll talk a little bit today about why that is a good choice. But yeah, I brought it over the other night because I was going to actually, we're going to sit by a fire. It's a nice hot evening down by Jephthah Creek. And I thought, well, you know, I want to have some mules tonight. I want to have some ginger beer and rye whiskey. So I brought that one with me. But then I got here and you had all these bottles set out on the table and all the roadies were gathered around your bottles. And I felt guilty that I had one hidden away in my bag. So I set it out on the table. Well, nobody opened it that night. Well, I understand why, because there were some pretty fine whiskies you had out that night. And this is just a good solid rye. It's not anything spectacular. And probably most everybody there's had it before.

So I guess when they bought the old Kentucky distillery along with it, the Normandy rye whiskey brand. So this has got that 65% rye, 20% malted barley and 15% corn. That's that Kentucky

a Kentucky rye, right? That's right. So 65% rye is pretty reputable for a rye. It's not 50, so it's a little bit higher, 65. But think about that second component that you just said, 20% what? Malted barley. Wow. Now, normally old Forester mash bills are in the four to five percent range, right? Yeah. In fact, a lot of people are in the five percent range of malted barley. Twenty percent malted barley. That's what you would call a high malt rye. What do you think?

Yeah, I would think, you know, anything above that right there, that 20 would be a high malt.

Yeah. So this is it's got a little bit of corn content 15% but having the rye exceed the corn content and the Kentucky rye is pretty special Yeah, so it's gonna bring some special flavors and aromas to the to the taste.

So let's nose this joke.

Let's do it

Yeah. I'm getting that sweet stickiness of a, of a rye, you know, on the nose, a little sweetness there.

Yeah. Like smell that kind of a cinnamon spice to it. Yeah. It's got a little, it definitely has the baking spices. I'm getting a little bit of citrus there, not too much, but just a tad bit of citrus.

Are you picking up that banana at all? Maybe not. Not. You said like a banana taffy. Yeah. Yeah. Saltwater taffy.

Yeah. Like those banana, a banana, um, a Laffy taffy. What was the name of those candies that came and they were in the shapes of a banana, the shape of a cherry, the, uh, what were they called? Those aren't, uh, that's not taffy.

That's like, uh, man, I'm trying to think what those are called. Runts.

Runts. It was runs. Yeah, so a little bit of banana in it for me as well. I think, you know, probably the biggest, the biggest note on the nose that I have for this is kind of the baking cabinet, you know, kind of the baking cabinet, a little bit of fruitiness to it. It does have that sticky rye note. The banana is a little bit in there, a little bit of citrus. It's kind of got a lot, actually got a lot going on in the nose. Yeah. And maybe that's that malted barley. Yeah. Well, I'll say cheers. Let's taste it. Let's taste it. Yeah. So I'm getting, I'm getting cinnamon nutmeg, you know, kind of the, that whole round of baking spices. It was specked out of the cabinet.

Just a tad bit of sweetness. I would get that. Uh, but, and I thought I would get more pepper on the tongue, but I didn't, but I did get a big Kentucky hug from this.

Um, I'm getting a little bit of pepper on the back end. Um, a little bit on the finish, I think the finish on this is actually kind of medium. Now this is a, this is a $23 bottle. Uh, you can find it varying prices, different places, but you know, you're looking at her at a hundred proof. Rye whiskey from old Forrester, you know, on the shelf, just about anywhere you shop for 23 bucks. I think it's got a lot more going on in the nose than it does on the pallet. The pallet's fine. It tastes great. It's again, those baking spices.

I get a little bit banana nut bread on this is what I'm getting. Um, cause you know, if you put a little, I don't know if banana nut bread has cinnamon in or not, but if you put cinnamon banana nut bread, that's what this would be right here. I get that warm banana taste to it. Kind of those spices. A little bit of, I wouldn't say chocolate on this.

There's something in there to that though. It's got a little chocolate on it. Yeah, I think you're right there. A little bit. Yeah. But it's got a little bit of citrus too. So a little bit of citrus on the nose, a little bit of citrus on the palate. The banana plays on both a little bit. Um, it doesn't have a lot of depth to it, but it's got a lot of width to it. Yeah.

I'd say that medium, that medium finish, like you said, it's definitely not a long finish at all. It's a, it kind of just goes away from you. It's not very oily at all. Not very viscous, um, very light. I think not a bad little ride though. Um, I could see where you'd like it on a, uh, you know, not a hot summer day, but a cool summer evening.

Yeah. Well, we can thank Chris Morris, Master Distiller, and Jackie Zichen, Master Blender, together. What a team, right? What a team. They put together this rye. It's been a couple of years now. It's not new to the market, but it is new to the show. We haven't had it on before. For me, this is a wise choice. So if you have a home bar and you wanna have a rye on it, that's gonna be kind of a crowd pleaser in general for blend, for mixers, for even for sipping in some cases, I think this is a good choice. It's light enough with that barley to be enjoyed in the hotter weather, I think. This is not an aromatic, menthol-y kind of summer sipper that we talk about all the time, but it's light enough. It's not deep. It's not heavy. It's light enough where you can enjoy it in the summertime. That's why I brought it over the other night.

I think it's perfect for, like you said, making a Kentucky meal. That price is right, $23. How could you beat that? Now, if you haven't been to Old Forrester Listeners, it's a great tour. They also have private events there. There's some great places to eat right near there. You could go over to Murrell's Whiskey Kitchen. Doc Crow's is right there.

O'Shea's and all the good places right there on Whiskey Row. Um, yeah. Uh, it's coming back to life, Mike. I was downtown. Well, you go downtown every day. Uh, but I was downtown a few weeks ago and, uh, yeah, just seeing the streets full of people walking around. It's, it's so awesome.

Make sure you get in there, pay them a visit. Uh, they got a great gift shop in there. Some great tours. If you want to hold a private event, I've been to a couple of private events there. A great place to have a private event. They have up on the third floor, I think, is where they have their private event room. It holds like 150 people in there. You can also, part of your private event, they'll set up a tasting for like 20 people at a time. So make sure you check that out.

And if you're listening to the show on the day that it airs, it is the 4th of July. God bless America. America the great.

No doubt about that. I think all those sailors, soldiers, airmen, Marines, coasties out there that are serving right now and protecting us and protecting our freedom.

So definitely grab yourself a glass of bourbon, grab yourself a beer, grab yourself a glass of wine, whatever it is that you like to raise up. Raise up to our great nation today, the 4th of July. What an amazing opportunity it is to live here. It's a pleasure to live here. It's also an honor to live here. And every year we get to celebrate the founding of our country and the birthday and it's awesome. It's awesome.

Well, Jim, this is obviously a buy for you. And I would say it'd be by for me to have on the shelf or on the counter to make sure that my guests could have a nice mixer around or even a sipper. Either way, it's still good bottle. Not that expensive. Like I said, a medium finish. It's not going to overwhelm you. Not going to overwhelm that checkbook either. So great bottle, Jim.

Yeah, I think so. I think Old Forester is pretty happy to know that this bottle resides in the well. You know, this is not a top shelf or this is not something that is going to steal the show, but this is something that's in the trenches every day making cocktails. And they're glad to have it because that's where the money comes from.

Yeah.

They got to pay the bill somehow. That's right. All right, Mike. Well, where can people find us?

You can find us on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube. Heck, I don't know what else is going to come out that we're going to have to be on, but we're going to be there. We'll be in your faces. We're going to be putting out great shows on Facebook. If you check us out there, we got this little group in there, 2200 people. Make sure you check that group out. This is the bourbon roadies. You got to be 21. You got to like bourbon and you got to agree to play nice. That means no rudeness. Just lift people up in there. A great group of people with master distillers, master blenders, people across the industry, people across the world are in there. having a good time, celebrating birthdays, anniversaries, retirements, even celebrating death in there. You know, if they have a family member that dies and passes away, they raise a glass to them and ask everybody else could too. So that's what we want to see in there. If you like the shows we're putting out, make sure you scroll on up to the top, hit that subscribe button, then roll on down and hit that five star review. Otherwise, you know what's going to happen to you. Jim, what's going to happen to them?

Big old cheese is going to come barreling down on them.

The big, bad booty daddy of bourbon is going to come find you. No, seriously, we would love you to give us a five-star review. It helps us open doors, helps distilleries give us a call and say, hey, we want to talk to the bourbon road. So please do that for us.

Yeah, so make sure if you've got an idea for a show, you've got an idea for an individual, a bottle, something you'd like to hear about on the show, you can let us know. You can always find us on Instagram. I'm jshannon63. I'm OneBigG. And we will see you down the bourbon route. But you know, you can't drink whiskey without glassware and Mike and I are extremely pleased to have a sponsor like premium bar products. Premium bar products offers direct to consumer, the finest whiskey glasses, cocktail glasses, and bar tools with your own personal engraving. I mean, you can write anything you want on these glasses, anything from a company logo to a personal statement. And there are no minimum orders. Their direct consumer platform offers you the opportunity to purchase small quantities of your favorite glass shapes that enhance the pleasure of enjoyment and drinking a whiskey and make it all very positive. They offer the absolute finest trending and handmade glasses as well as a comprehensive range of styles and all of their items have been designed with purpose, practicality and longevity in mind. So if you're a bourbon or whiskey group and you need custom logos, you need to reach out to Premium Bar Products. If you're an individual, you just want a few for your bar to impress your friends to give out as gifts. You need to call premium bar products. They need to be your one and only source for custom glassware. I can tell you right now the bourbon road and that's who we use. Janie and Carson and the team there at premium bar products will take care of you. They'll treat you like family and they'll take care of you with every order.