285. Made South Southern Whiskey Society

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.

Hey this is Big Chief and you're listening to The Bourbon Road. You know what I love to pour in my old fashions? Is a little maple syrup. It can't be just any maple syrup. It has to be from seldom seen farms up in Ohio. He takes bourbon barrels. pours his syrup in there and ages it for six to nine months making for some delicious just some delicious syrup that you could pour on pancakes you can pour on waffles chicken waffles like this fat guy likes but seriously you want to make a delicious cocktail with some maple syrup and not that old simple syrup check out seldom see maple.com pick up some stuff from there today we'd appreciate it

Hello everybody. I'm Jim Shannon and I'm Mike Hyatt. This is the bourbon road and today, Mike, it's a, it's a great sunny day outside, but. We're inside, we're on Stream Yard, and we've got a very special guest with us.

We got Mr. Chris Thomas from Maid South. And what we're here to discuss today is a little event he's got going on down in Franklin, Tennessee, the Southern Whiskey Society. A bunch of whiskey nerds are going to get together, eat some amazing food, drink some amazing whiskey. We actually got some of that whiskey on hand today. to go back and try. We've already tried it a couple of times. I actually tried some other straight out of a whiskey thief. But yeah, Chris, welcome back to the bourbon road.

Guys, I appreciate y'all having me. It's always a pleasure when I can see your two handsome faces, whether in person or on a big old computer screen.

Well, I don't get to hear that too often. So thank you very much. I appreciate that. I've always thought it was good looking, but I don't get told that too much.

So, no, I appreciate it. And I could hear Mike, I could listen to him say made sell for the rest of my life and not get tired of it. That's a deep Southern voice, right?

So is Texas deep South? I know you got the South and you got the deep South.

Is Texas deep South? It's like a mixture of Southwest and South together. So you get that best of everything down there. Um, I think so, but I got that mixture of Kentucky, Virginia, Tennessee, Missouri, Texas, all that military travels in that voice. And, uh, I don't know, as I get older, that voice keeps getting deeper. I don't know what's going on.

Mike's got that good solid, uh, redneck voice, what I like to call it that. Hold my beer.

Well, Chris, it's certainly a pleasure to have you on the show. It's great to drink a little bit of whiskey with you, especially, uh, especially Tennessee whiskey today. So we've got a little bit of, uh, of your leapers for Tennessee whiskey pick in our class right now. And, uh, Mike and I always get a little anxious. We get some leapers fork in our glass.

Yeah, man. Well, you guys were kind enough to make the trip down and. and kind of help me and some buddies pick that barrel out. So I'm excited to hear kind of what you think about it.

Yeah, this little barrel number 79 right here. It was pretty great pick. I think you had like five or six guys up in there with us and it was a pretty tough decision on two of the barrels we had. I think we had six barrels all together to pick and Wow. Pick the damn winner is what we did. Whoever doesn't get to go to this Southern Whiskey Society event, you're going to miss out on this great barrel, I think. And on the second half, we got an even better barrel to talk about because you didn't just buy one, you bought two, right?

Man, I mean, you were there that day. It was a little bit of a surprise and Lee has been known to do that kind of thing. He was kind enough to kind of, you know, unveil a very special whiskey that they've been working on and let us try it. And I think as we tried it, it just kind of started taking shape in my mind, like, man, we might ought to walk away from here with two barrels today. And so we kind of twisted his arm a little bit, I think. But he was kind enough to let us walk away with two of them that day.

Yeah. He kind of extended it out there for you to twist though. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, it didn't take a whole lot of twisting, but, but, um, but man, I think once, once we get a chance to talk about that second barrel in the second half of the show, it's man, it's special. And I'm looking forward to people trying it because, and as you know, it, it's not one we plan on picking. So we didn't include it in the ticket options for people to purchase. And, and I feel a little bit bad about that, but man, we didn't know what we didn't know at the time. And so, but now that we do have that second barrel and now that we do know how special it is, uh, we are going to make a way for a few lucky people to be able to acquire that bottle at the event. That'll be fun.

That'd be pretty awesome. So let's talk a little bit about Chris Thomas. And I want to say there's a few listeners out there that haven't heard the last episode that you were on. You came on an episode, I guess it was around a year ago, maybe.

Yeah, maybe September, October last year, probably.

So we had our still house sessions down at Leapers Fork Distillery and you're kind enough to join us one afternoon for, uh, or some good whiskey and to talk a little bit about Made South. And I'd like to give an opportunity for listeners to learn a bit, a little bit more about, you know, Chris Thomas, you know, why you do what you do, what it is that you do and why we, why we're all looking forward to this great event called the Southern Whiskey Society.

Well, I appreciate the opportunity and the kind words and, um, You know, I think I like to do things that promote what I consider to be the really good things that are going on in the South. And so it started out years ago. I kind of left my corporate gig and I wanted to go do something for myself, try to build a little family business. And I was trying to figure out what am I even going to do? And the things that I was really excited about and passionate about were the South and Southern culture and small business makers and artists and chefs and distillers and things like that. People who I feel like are creating really high quality products and even experiences in the South. And then the things that I'm fairly good at, I'm not good at a whole lot, but those few things I feel like I'm kind of good at are helping make connections, helping tell a story. I can kind of I'm pretty good at throwing a party and I didn't really count on that going into it, but I'm pretty good at hospitality and trying to make people feel warm and welcome. And so we ended up creating a business that started as a subscription box business, but it kind of evolved pretty quickly into an event production business where We don't produce other people's events. We don't. It's not like we're over here putting on weddings and stuff like that, but we create our own events that we ticket them. We come up with the concept. We invite the people into the event that we feel like are good fit for that event. And all of those events promote and celebrate Southern makers and artists and chefs and distillers and things like that. So one of those events that we do is called Southern Whiskey Society. And We were talking a little bit here ago before we started recording that society is kind of a pointless word to even be in there. It's not like you got to pay dues or anything like that. It's not like there's a membership. But it's just an annual event that we think celebrates the best food and whiskey in the South. And all you got to do to join the society is just buy a ticket and show up and have a good time.

And while they're there, now this event's being held at the factory in Franklin.

Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Our hometown is in Franklin, Tennessee. And so anything we try to do, we want to use Franklin as a backdrop because we also want people to come visit Franklin and kind of experience everything that Franklin has to offer. You guys have spent quite a bit of time here. And I would hope you would say it's an awesome little town, man. We got a lot going for us. And so we want people to come hang out and visit and kind of experience what we got going on in Franklin.

Yeah, it's a, it's a pretty nice little town. It's a, what would you say 20 to 30 minutes outside of Nashville?

It is almost exactly 20 minutes south of Nashville. That's correct.

It's got a pretty good compliment of restaurants and shops, hotels, um, event centers. Uh, there's certainly a lot to do in Franklin. It's very quaint and at the same time it's big enough to, to allow, you know, a good number of people in there to have a good time.

Oh, yeah. And I would say our history is pretty deep here. I mean, Franklin has a ton of history here. So for history buffs or people who are just into kind of that quintessential Main Street USA Americana, classic Americana, Franklin is a great place to visit.

Well, Chris, let's talk about the event itself. So you've, you had to skip a year of the event, right? Jim actually got to go in 2019. Um, and you skipped 2000, was it 21 or 20?

In, uh, in 2020, our plan was to do two events that year. And so we did our first one. We got it in right underneath the wire, February 29th, 2020. We did our winter edition. And then, but we did end up having to cancel our Southern or not our Southern, our summer edition in 2020. And then we did skip a year last year as well, but now we're back. And I think from now on, it's only going to be a once a year event.

So that event, it's not just whiskey. You brought in a bunch of chefs as well. Um, fine dining and, uh, some of our favorite foods like Hattie B's. Is that correct?

Oh, absolutely. Yeah, I'm a big food fan. I love to eat. It's one of my favorite things to do is a great dining experience and just I'm blown away when I sit down at a table, specifically at a restaurant I've never been to if I've never been there before. But I've heard so many good things like I'm so excited about that meal and sitting there for an hour and a half, two hours, three hours. I'm just that's one of my favorite things to do. Uh, and so I wanted to work food into the event. So from day one, chefs and food have been a very big focus of the event. Yes, you have 30 awesome distillers and man, those distillers, they bring, you know, my guess is anywhere between 70 and 80 different whiskies will be available to try that night. But, um, in my heart, I feel like the food is kind of the centerpiece even. Um, and it's. It may be an overlooked part of the event, even though I want it to shine brightly, but I feel like a lot of times just by the nature of the name of the event, people focus on the whiskey and kind of overlook the chefs. And so, man, I'm tickled when we get these chefs in there and they make these things that are just mind-blowingly delicious. That's one of my favorite things ever.

Now these chefs, they're coming in, they're setting up shop and they're making small bites. Right.

That is correct. So these are, these are, um, you know, snacks, small bites, things like that. Uh, these are two and three bite kind of things, but man, you can eat your fill. You run around the 10 different chefs and try everything and then go back and try everything again. And something you may really love. You might have three, four, five of those. I've never had anybody say that they left feeling like, oh, I need to, I need to go hit up Waffle House now, even though some may do that. It's some people have been known to leave the event and go hit up Waffle House, but for entirely different reasons. If you can imagine. But you don't know who they are. They're just some. Oh no, no, no, no, no. Some people, I wouldn't know any of those people, but some people may. That's actually one of my dreams is to get Uh, like one of the culinary leaders of waffle house at the event, you know, it was Hardee's, you know, we start talking about chefs if you want, but obviously Hardee's and their team is there led by my friend Owen Klein, who's one of the lead chefs there on the, on the culinary team at Hardee's. Um, and Hardee's is, I mean, man, I grew up eating their sausage biscuits with my dad on the weekends. And I've just been a Hardee's fan for a long time. I was tickled when we were able to get them involved in the event. And I love doing stuff like that where Hardee's this fast food brand. I mean, I don't think Owen would be offended by me saying a fairly low brow food experience, you know, delicious, but low brow. It's not, it's not fancy, but man, when they come in, when no one comes in and does something like duck, fried duck, you know, on a, on a miniature Hardee's biscuit, it just, It's so good and it's a curve ball from what you would know from parties. And so I love that kind of thing. And one of my goals slash dreams is to get the team at Waffle House involved at some point.

So Chris, I want to segue, and I'm going to make you love Hardee's that much more real fast. So me and Jim are fixing to wear some tuxedos. Jim's going to wear a tuxedo. They couldn't find a tuxedo big enough for me, so I'm just wearing a black suit, like I'm going to a funeral. But we're going to USA Cares gala next week. And Hardee's actually partnered with USA Cares. And for every purchase at Hardee's, a dollar goes to USA Cares for that purchase. And USA Cares is for veteran and family support system. Very near and dear to our heart as veterans. So man, hats off to Hardee's for that.

I love it. And you're right. It's going to be hard for me to love them more than I already do. But that is a fantastic thing that they're doing with USA Cares. And that'll be fun. That's right up y'all's alley. And I'm excited for y'all.

Yeah. And, and, and Mike and I will both agree that Hardy says probably the best quick order biscuit on the planet.

Shamefully. So it is so good. You put some of that Kentucky ham on there from Finchville, Kentucky. Oh man. You shaved real thin. I could be, Oh man, you making me hungry over here now. So let's go through some of those chef names, Chris.

Yeah. Uh, I'm pretty excited about this year's list. We've got some really fun people who are going to be coming to cook food. Um, I'll go alphabetically because man, I always hate, I hate playing favorites. I don't want, I don't want to speak out of turn, but, um, Ben Norton, who's an amazing chef here in Nashville at husk, uh, is going to be there. We have Brian Morris who is with Hattie B's. I know you mentioned them earlier, man. I'm a big Hattie B's fan and, uh, I'm tickled to have them there. My buddy Kane and Greg, Kaden is a character man. He is a he's an oyster farmer from down in Spring Creek, Florida, but he's with Pelican. His company is called Pelican Oyster Company. And so he's he's coming and he's been working on he's been texting me showing me some fun little ways that he's going to be serving up oysters at the event. Chad Newton and Gracie Nguyen, who are with Eastside Fuh here in Nashville. Super talented husband, wife, chef team. I'm excited about having them. Mark Theron, who is the executive chef at Keeneland. Keeneland is one of my favorite experiences of all time. Going to Lexington, going to Keeneland, putting my jacket on, my bow tie, taking my wife, having some Keeneland breezes, betting on the ponies. Man, I love Keeneland and I'm excited they're going to be there. My buddy Matthew Statham is with Saul's Barbecue in Birmingham, Alabama, one of the best barbecue guys in the business and just a great human being. So Matthew's going to be there. Owen Klein, we mentioned him earlier with the team at Hardee's is going to be there and he's going to do something that he always brings his a game like that guy always just shows up ready to blow people's minds. And I'm pretty I'm pretty tickled by that. This is a new guy I've gotten to know this year, and I really like him. His name is Thomas Tuggle. Thomas is the executive chef at 1799 and the Harpeth Hotel here in Franklin. So Thomas is going to come over and make something that I'm sure is going to be amazing. And then my buddy Tracy Acha, who is the chef at Black Rabbit, one of my favorite restaurants in Nashville. He also has a restaurant called the Farmhouse that is also excellent, but I got a soft spot in my heart from Black Rabbit. Uh, their, their, their whole deal is like small plates and strong drinks. And so they got some great cocktails and they got some small plates, like some rabbit rolls. They got like a, we call them funeral rolls. Have y'all ever had those like steamed, um, they're almost like steamed buns, but then they got ham and some, uh, cheese and some honey mustard and poppy seeds. You know what I'm talking about?

Jim knows what they're talking about.

Yeah, I know what they, I know what they are. I don't know what you call them, but yeah, I know exactly what they are.

I grew up calling them funeral rolls because you know, every funeral I ever went to as a kid, there was a plate or two of these back in the back, you know, for the family to eat on. But the tray makes this thing called a rabbit roll. And it's like a bigger version of that. But you know, they make their own buns and they make it using a house made rabbit sausage. And I'm gonna tell you, it's one of the best things you've ever eaten in your entire life. But that's on the menu of black rabbit. So I'm excited to have tray there too.

That sounds all really great. And I have to say, shamefully say that I haven't been to a lot of those places. I need to, I need to get out and do a little bit more dining.

Yeah. Well, and here, here's one of the, like, one of the things that I love doing with this event is there might not, you might be aware of some of these places or you might not be.

And even if you are aware of them, you may not have been to Birmingham in a long time.

You may not have been to sauce barbecue. You may not have been to Keeneland and experience what they've got on the menu there. Uh, just the fun kind of special events that they do at Keeneland. So I love that we can kind of bring these things together in one place. And if you're, if you're here in town, great, you have access to all this in your backyard. But even if you're traveling from somewhere, it's not like you got to go to Birmingham and Lexington and here and there, you can just come right here, spend a fun weekend and get to try all these people's food and all this different whiskey right in one place.

So that's what I love about this event. You get all this great whiskey that we're going to talk about in the second half, plus all this great food. This is like a fat man's dream right here. I mean, you can't get no better than this. It's Southern hospitality at its best right here. Southern cuisine. You could just have Hattie B's chicken there and I'd be in heaven. all that together with whiskey drinkers and some great barrel picks is just a great event. What all does a ticket holder get? So you got two tiers, right? You got early entry and then you got regular general admission. So what do they get with that ticket?

Yeah, that's a great question. So our general admission ticket gains you access beginning at 6 PM. So you get the full event from 6 PM to 9 PM. So you're going to be able to try all the different whiskeys that are out on the tables. You're going to be able to try all the different food. You will get two drink tickets, good for Eli Mason cocktails. Eli Mason is going to be there slinging some delicious craft cocktails. And then you get plenty of water. So Mountain Valley Spring Water is our water partner. They ship in a pallet of water. And so we want to make sure people are hydrated. So you get access to all of that. If you want, you can upgrade your ticket and add on a barrel pick. So we've got four different barrel picks that we did this year from Woodford Reserve, Jack Daniels, Single Barrel Rye, a Leapers Fork, Cask Strength, Tennessee Whiskey. And then we did a rare character barrel proof bourbon. It's an MGP produced product, but it's got a funky history to it. And it's neat. Like I'm not normally into the the tater type, you know, labels and things like that. But we waxed this one. We thought, hey, let's wax dip this one. And it turned out pretty great. I'm pretty excited about that bottle. And they're all delicious. And then so you can upgrade and add on one of these barrel picks. And we don't make a single dollar on our barrel picks. All of that goes straight to the retail partner, which is Red Dog here in Franklin. We're excited about that. And we do them all for straight up retail. So we've done will it picks in the past and well or bear well or foolproof not bear proof, but and every barrel pick we've ever done has been straight up retail we don't charge anything extra. And then if you did want to go the next step further, which I almost hesitate to even say it because we've already sold out of the early access, but early access guests do have access to the event one hour early so they can get in there. It's a smaller crowd for one hour and they kind of have first dibs on things. And in some cases, that's good because, man, people have been known to show up with some really interesting things to try that might not be around very long. Uh, and so those early access patrons, they have a good time and those early access guests also receive a, this year will be a 2022 Southern whiskey society, Glen care that they'll walk away with.

Awesome. So I know nothing's guaranteed, but can you give us an idea in 2019 what some of the early access people got to experience?

Oh man. Let's see. Well, let's talk about 2020. 2020 was the last event that we did the, um, the winter event of 2020, but man, we had four roses, limited edition. Um, we had all of the BTAC collection, the Buffalo trace antique collection, uh, George T. Stagg, William Lurie Weller, uh, you know, I'm, I'm trying to think. No, there was a Sazerac, uh, I'm blanking. Is it 17 or 18? That's right.

That's 18.

That's 18. Yeah. Uh, Eagle rare 17, um, had all of those, uh, and then, or Thomas 18 and he rise well. And then, uh, let's see, will it was, was very kind to bring a couple of bottles of like, will it family state 18 year or maybe 17 year? Um, but it, it, it will get crazy sometimes now. And we never know. It's funny. Like I never. ask these people, hey, will you bring something really amazing? But they're just they've always been kind enough to do that. And so I don't know. I never know exactly what's going to show up. And even in a lot of these cases, they don't even tell me they're going to bring this. They just show up and they go, hey, look, look what I got. And I'm just always blown away by that. But so those early access patrons always generally have a pretty good time.

All right. Well, Mike, I think it's probably a good time for us to break before the second half and, and just let our listeners ponder on what Chris just said a little bit. Think about what he just said.

Yeah. And again, I hesitate to almost even talk about that because if you go to the website right now, you can't buy that ticket anymore. It is, it's been sold out for a while, but. uh we are those that tickets very limited and so there's a good chance that that even general admission guests are going to have access to some things that you just don't normally get to try. And even if those things are gone by the early access hour, man, there's a ton of amazing, delicious whiskey that's going to be in that room that night.

Well, that's a good thing for me and Jim because we're going to be on hand and you never know what we're going to have in a backpack with us. You never can tell.

Are you that right, Jim? And guys, I got y'all set up. I got you, I got you a special, I got you two club chairs. I got you a fancy coffee table and a fancy rug and it will put you up there. Uh, Jim, when you were there in 2019 was Reed Turkey there playing music.

I remember, uh, the podcast recording up there with, uh, with the Nixon Deadman. I don't, I think you did have some music up there for a bit.

Yeah. So my buddy Reed Turkey, if you look him up, man, he is a, he is an amazing blues musician, blues rock and roll musician. And so, and Reed loves whiskey, man. He is passionate about whiskey. He knows his stuff. And so I've got him, he's going to be playing there that night and obviously he'll, he'll tone it down and unplug there for a little while and give y'all plenty of time to record and talk to people. But it's going to be a fun night. We're going to have the bourbon road and Reed Turkey up there on stage.

Awesome. Sounds like a fun time. All right, Mike, well, let's take a short break. And when we come back, we've got more whiskey and more talk about distilleries that are going to be coming to the event. Yes, sir.

Man, Jimmy, you know what I've really been enjoying lately? Oh, you're going to tell me. some of that seldom seen farms maple syrup that's been aged in bourbon barrels. It is absolutely delicious. Not only in a cocktail, but you can cook with it, right?

You can, you absolutely can. Now Mike, Kevin just sent me a new shipment. So I got a little bit more and I've been making some beef jerky lately. Really? Yeah. Now I know you're the meat master, but I tried my hand at it. I said, you know, I want to make some beef jerky and I've got a pretty decent beef jerky recipe and it's got a little bit of soy sauce, a little bit of Worcestershire, a little bit of, you know, onion powder, garlic powder, those kinds of things. But I always put brown sugar in it. Well, this time Kevin sent me a bottle of his granulated maple sugar. Wow. And I decided that I was going to substitute the maple sugar for the brown sugar. Oh, game changer. Let me tell you. Total game changer. Total game changer. Some of the best beef jerky you've ever had. So I'm going to make another batch here in about a week and I'll be sure to get you some.

Man, that sounds delicious. Vivian took and we just got an air fryer like most people got these days, right? And she took and soaked fresh pineapple in that maple syrup and then put it in the air fryer and it kind of crisp up a little bit. Oh, sounds good. It was just magically delicious. And people probably wonder why we love it so much. Kevin competed in the Maple Festival last year, 2021, and he was named grand champion. That's saying something.

So Salem Seam Farms. grand champion of the 2021 Maple Syrup Festival.

Yeah. Wow. That's saying something. Yeah. You're going up against some heavy hitters in Maple Syrup. And I know we're talking about just the syrup, but you know, that's something to be proud of. Hats off to you, Kevin. Kevin's also competing in a couple other competitions. Make sure you check out his website. Check out his social media on Instagram and Facebook. You won't be disappointed. If you want to buy something from him, where can they go, Jim?

You can go to seldomseenmaple.com. and kevin and his crew they've got a great website very easy to navigate they've got all their products on there you can buy their maple syrup by the bottle you can buy by the case you can buy that sugar oh my goodness mike that stuff is so good and they've got some other gift sets there too so you definitely want to check it out

Well, he's also going to be in some distilleries pretty shortly here. Some distilleries that I love that I know you love. He's going to be down Leapers Fork. You could find his syrup down there, aged in their barrels. Trudy Oak down in Dripping Springs, Texas. I was just out there. His syrup's going to be there. Awesome. And at Garrison Brothers in Texas. If you think you love some maple syrup, make sure you go to Garrison Brothers and pick up a bottle from them also. Kevin appreciated it. I know he loves people. You're supporting a local farmer, a local product, a small family. This is no factory place that's putting out maple syrup, right, Jim? This is a good man, do a good work. Yeah, gotta love it. Well, make sure you check out his site. Like Jim said, seldom see maple.com. Pick up a bottle today.

All right, listeners, we are back. We got Chris Thomas on from Made South. We're talking a little bit about the Southern Whiskey Society event. We drank a great, great Tennessee whiskey in the first half from Leapers Fork. Man, I can't wait to taste this one. We've gotten a second half. I have had it, but I haven't had it in a minute and I'm ready to drink it again. But I'm going to let Chris introduce this one, if it's okay with you, Mike, since he bought this barrel.

Hey, it's fine by me. I'll talk about it. You know, you guys were there. It was a fun day and I appreciate y'all being there. But I mean, you know, we were over there. Maybe maybe we had eight, 10 guys over there total and tried through the handful of barrels that Lee had selected for us to try. And I believe, correct me if I'm wrong, was the first one that we picked, was it unanimous or was there one person who went with a different barrel?

I actually think me and Jim and Lee, uh, Lee was in there with us, the owner of a leapers fork. I think all three of us kind of lean towards, um, uh, one barrel and, but it was a, it was super tough between two of them. I mean, it was really, really tough. Everybody else voted on this other barrel was number one. I think this barrel was our number two. Um,

But I'm thinking about, I'm thinking about just the first group of barrels that we tried. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. Yeah. Mike and I love them both, but the, but the number we wrote down at the top of our list was not the one that got chosen, but that's okay. Okay.

All right. Hey, that's all right. That's all right. Uh, but then, you know, as you guys remember after we picked that first barrel, Lee said, Hey, I'm going to have y'all step out. And we're going to reset this room and we're going to try something fun. And so we were like, well, what is going on here? So we walked out and did a little shopping in the gift shop and all that good stuff. And when we came back in, you know, he had two blind samples, A and B. And he said, now, listen, the barrel that you guys just picked is one of these, but the other one is an experimental barrel that we've been working on. And so we just want you to try these and let us know. if you would prefer to keep the barrel that you've already picked, or do you want to switch and take this new one? And, you know, there were a lot of differing opinions, but ultimately, we decided that we were going to take both of those barrels and Lee was kind enough to let us have both. And that second barrel, I tell you, everybody's taste buds are different, but I can't get enough of it. I was blown away that day and how unique and interesting it is. And I'm still blown away by trying it right now. It is the first experimental release of leprosy, Hillary, and it is finished in an X maple syrup cask. So, and you guys will know more about it, but you've got this, this farm and I'm not even sure where the farm is located. Seldom seen farm, where are they located?

So they're up in a central Ohio, north central Ohio, just above about an hour north of Columbus. Uh, he's actually one of our sponsors. Uh, great, great guy. It is a real maple syrup farm with a real maple syrup barn. He's got about 2,500 maple trees now, and he's out there. He's got all these lines ran to every tree, and he's harvesting the syrup himself. Then what he does is he pours it into a bourbon barrel from different distilleries. Obviously, we have some good friends at Leapers Fork, so we connected those two people because we love to make those connections. They sent him up a couple barrels. He poured it in there and he lets it age for six to eight months in that bourbon barrel. And it just sucks all that extra bourbon out of there. He makes a syrup and then he ships those barrels along with that syrup back to leapers fork and leapers fork took and poured their whiskey back in that barrel.

Yeah. It's fun. Lee Lee said he took, uh, he took equal parts from 10 of their favorite single barrels. created this 10 single barrel blend and filled that X maple syrup task up with their whiskey. And when we tried it, it had been sitting there for 45 days. Uh, I've got a sample from that first day at 45 days. I've got another sample that's a little bit north of 70 days, I think. And so I've been going back to visit it from time to time, just checking on it. And by checking on it, I mean, I'll have a little bit, um, And it's been fun, but it's going to be their very first experimental release in an ex maple syrup barrel or ex maple syrup cast. Um, and Lee sent me the label today to sign off on. And so that's, that's been approved and all that good stuff, but it's going to be fun. You know, Lee said all of their future experimental releases, they're going to go through the distillery only. So they're going to be distillery releases only, but he was kind enough to let us buy their first barrel, their first experimental barrel. And I'm just, I'm blown away by this whiskey gas.

Well, you missed out Chris, cause we did a review actually of that other, um, barrel that me and Jim labeled as our number one barrel, right? They went ahead and bottled that sucker. We did a review on it and they sold out a little over four hours. There are 200 bottles of it. I think they had 180 or something. They sold out in a little over four hours. The first time they'd ever sold out a single barrel. And I was so happy for Leapers Fork. Their whiskey is that good people. If you're listening right now, you're going to miss out. If you don't buy that Southern Whiskey Society ticket, show up and you got a chance, not only to get one bottle, of that Tennessee whiskey, which is made with rye, but you also have a chance to get this maple right here. Um, and I've had several different maple, uh, whiskies, but this one is special. I mean, it is, it is something else.

Yeah, it really is. And I'll tell you the way we're going to kind of do this is at the event we're going to have bottles of this at the leap of sport table. Where everybody can come by and try this so that the very first experimental release this maple syrup cask finished Tennessee whiskey is going to be there for everyone to try at the event. There will be a handful of bottles that we're reserving. You know, you guys were there. We had some other buddies there. We all kind of said, if we're like I had people texting me afterwards, I'll take six bottles. I'll take 12 bottles. I'll take three bottles. So I think that small group of guys is going to eat up most of those bottles. But I did tell them, like, hey, guys, I got to keep a good little chunk. And I think it's going to end up being about 48 bottles that are going to be reserved for guests at the event. So essentially what you're going to do is we perform their table. They have a little ticket. And if you come up and say, hey, I want one of those maple finished bottles, they're going to give you a claim ticket. They're only going to have 48 of those claim tickets. And then you're going to be able to take that claim ticket over to Red Dog the day after the event or, you know, anytime the next week after. And you're going to be able to purchase one of those bottles. They'll be hiding them in the back for us.

Nice, nice. That's an awesome way to handle that.

Yeah. We wanted to be able to spread the love a little bit. So I felt like that was a, that's a pretty good way. I hated that we weren't able to include it on the front end for somebody to buy a ticket with it. But so it doesn't feel fair to me to make that ticket available now, because I think a lot of other people might go, well, I would have bought that ticket. Um, but I think this is a good way to do it. When they get in there, if they come up to the table and say, Hey, I'd like, I'd like to purchase one. They'll be able to do that with a claim ticket.

That's pretty awesome. Well, I'm sipping on this here and it's bringing back fond memories of that day. It was a great day in that old, uh, steel house at Leapers Fork. Good, good bunch of guys and some good whiskey tasting and the crew there at Leapers Fork. They pulled out all the stops and they made sure we had a great experience and they always do that. There's such, such great hosts there.

They do such a good, great group of guys. I absolutely love those guys and they're awesome. And Lee's at the top of that list. He's, he's been very kind to us.

Let's talk about the other whiskey brands that are going to be there, Chris, because it's not just all about Leapers Fork there, even though that's your kind of home distillery there, right? But you got, man, the list you got here is just amazing. Let's go through that list. What do you got for us?

I mean, if we just want to, again, go alphabetical, we'll talk about the people. And I will say there are a few that I can't talk about yet just because I like to wait until somebody is official, official before, you know, they need to fill out a little bit of paperwork just to make themselves official. So we've got probably another five that are verbally. They've said, yes, we're definitely going to be there, but I just don't have that piece of paperwork yet. So I'm not Comfortable saying they're going to be there yet. If they do end up being there, that'll be a nice surprise. Uh, but right now confirmed angels, envy, Bardstown bourbon company, cat head distillery, Chattanooga whiskey company distilling. I'm really excited about that group. I think they're going to make some special stuff. Elijah Craig, Franklin distillery, another home distillery here in Franklin that, uh, Jim, you said you were in the gin right now. They make a gin that will absolutely knock your socks off. It's delicious. Garrison Brothers Distillery out of Texas. Ghost Rail. This is another one of those things I told you. I'm into gin right now. I just thought, well, heck, it's a whiskey event, but I'm going to invite a couple of people to pour their gin because that's something I'm just really into. Ghost Rail is a new brand from the company Distilling Guys. That's their brand of gin. And so, and it's delicious. H. Clark, Heath Clark is the guy behind that gin. I've always been a fan of his gin. I think it's delicious. The Ghost Rail is going to be there. Jack Daniels is going to be pouring gentlemen jack in their single barrel select series. They might. That's one of those that they may show up with some fun stuff. I don't know. We'll just have to see knob Creek, larceny bourbon, leapers fork. Obviously we've been talking about them a lot. Makers mark mythology, a new brand that fairly new distillery. I'm pretty excited about Greenbrier. Nelson's Greenbrier is going to bring their new Nelson's brother or Nelson Brothers line as well as their, uh, their other lines. New riff, old Dominic, old Forrester, rare character. That's one of our single barrels that we picked. And man, I'm just. I'm telling you, this is another one that, um, it's a five, five and a half year old M G P bourbon, high rye bourbon. Um, it is not very old, but it's got a funky history. It was, uh, distilled by M G P. It's spent the first four years of its life in a funky little warehouse in Tennessee. Then it got moved to Kentucky where it lives now and it is absolutely delicious. Um, Red Line Whiskey Company, Rittenhouse, Willett, and Woodford Reserve are the, to kind of round out everything right now.

Man, Jim, that's a hell of a list right there. I tell you what. Pretty good list, ain't it boys? Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, we're talking about the three to four hours, depending on when you're getting there and you got to try to drink as many of those tastes, as many of those whiskeys as possible. I'm assuming you're putting out spit buckets, even though I hate to use them.

We will have them. It's something that we did add for the last event. We will have them there. We hate to use them too, but you know, I think it's a good thing to offer somebody just in case I'm sitting here sipping on this maple syrup, a sample I got.

I was lucky to go down to Leapers Fork and I said, Hey, can you give me a couple of those samples of those barrels? And they were like, yeah, I'll sneak you some. So they snuck us some. So we could try this out. Folks, you know, there's those unique Finnish whiskies out there. Some people love them. Some people don't, but I'm going to tell you something. If you like a nice dessert whiskey, something after dinner, this is that perfect bottle for you right here. Um, And it's from a good friend of ours. I mean, seldom seen farms. It helps that farmer out when he sells this stuff. It helps out Leapers Fork, but man, you're going to miss out on this great event. All this great food, right? Jim, I mean, this is a hell of an event. And then you're going to hear us up there on stage just talking away. My big old booming voice, Jim's smooth as butter voice. I mean, you can't miss out on this right here. You want to come hang out with us? Hang out with Chris? see the shakers and the movers in the bourbon industry. Cause Chris has put together a list of, uh, distilleries. Um, that, that's a nice, that's a nice group of people and some great chefs. It's gonna be one hell of an event. Where would people stay in Franklin, Tennessee if they were coming? Uh, Chris?

Yeah, I'll tell you, um, I am a big, big fan of the Harpett hotel here in downtown Franklin. And it is, Man, I would say it's a five minute walk from where the event is going to be. So that would probably be my number one pick. Um, it's a, it is a great hotel. And if you're staying at the hotel, man, their restaurant, 17 99. Well, we talked about one of the chefs from the heart of the hotel is going to be at the event. So their food is amazing. Their, their drink program is amazing. I love the heart of the hotel and they're good people, good friends. Uh, but. I will say we have a new little thing that we've added. If you go to our website on the southern whiskey society dot com, we've got a new little widget in there. We partnered with our friends that visit Franklin. That's kind of the tourism bureau here at Franklin. And we've got a little hotel widget there. You can type in your dates, click on it, and it will show you all the hotels that are available for that whenever you want to stay. So that's a really good little fun tool that we've added in for people to be able to book their hotels.

Yeah. I was already looking at that today because it's getting, it's getting close. It's time to get taken care of. So it is time to go. Yeah. My wife was asking the other day, do we get our hotel rooms yet?

I'm like, no, not yet, but let's do it. Me and Jim are always last minute on this stuff. And our wives are both like, Hey, uh, you got that hotel reserve yet? You got, you got a place for us to stay. You can't just take your wife to the best Western without outside rooms. You know, you can't be done. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Hey, I'll tell you what, though, too. Have you guys ever hooked up with Dan Garrison?

We have.

We have great. And I've never actually met him before. He seems like a really interesting guy, but he and his wife are actually going to come to the event. I'm pretty excited about it.

Yeah, Dan, uh, his master distiller, Donna's tide, uh, air force veterans and Donna, Donna's thanks for your service guy. Um, he actually gave me two garrison brothers, uh, barrels, many barrels that they, they finished some whiskies off in. And, uh, I had those made into, um, Texas flags. Oh, that's good. by our other sponsor, Chris Cruz from Cruz Customs Flags, did an amazing job at them. So I'm a big fan of Garrison Brothers Whiskey because, you know, it's got that old weed in it. You know, I'm a little partial to that, ain't I, Jim? You sure are. And they got that honey whiskey too, don't they? Yes, sir. A little bit of honeydew made by those little Texas bees down there, just buzzing away, making whiskey with it.

You know, you mentioned, you mentioned honey. Have you guys had the honey cask finished from Bill Mead over at Nelson's Green Bear?

I haven't been lucky enough yet, but I'd like to try it. I have had some.

One of our listeners down there in Nashville had a little sample bottle and I don't know, it went down too fast. It went down really fast. So

Yeah, I'll tell you, it's absolutely delicious. And when I drink this maple barrel from Leper sport, it kind of, I mean, obviously they taste night and day different, but it reminds me of that type of release. Just a fun thing where the boys at Nelson's Greenbrier, they worked with a company called true B honey, a local honey maker here in the middle Tennessee area to use their honey casts. So they did a very similar thing. But the way they did that is they sit their bourbon cask, Truby, Truby filled it up with honey, aged it, released their, you know, whiskey aged or barrel aged honey, and then sent that barrel back to Belle Meade and they filled it up again with great bourbon. Man, those honey releases are absolutely delicious. And this reminds me of that type of energy though. And so I'm really excited about it.

Yeah, I've seen the lines. At least I've seen pictures of the lions down there going all the way down the block whenever they release their honey. And, uh, well, I quit standing in lines a few years ago, but man, that's one that I almost I'm tempted to, I'm tempted to go stand in line.

Man, it is, it is, I'll tell you what I'll try to do. Uh, I'll, I'll do my best to have a little sample of bell meat honey for y'all at the event.

Oh, that's awesome. Thanks so much, Chris. I wanted to mention to you, I was flipping through my podcast the other day and I was, I thought, Oh, there's made South. Let me open it up and see if he's got anything else in there. And there's two new podcasts in there. So what happened?

You know, it's funny, I love doing them. But I don't feel like I have time to sit down and like go, okay, who do I want to have on and let me go try to pursue this guest and get it knocked out. So I've just I've had to just come up in the last few months, it just kind of fell in my lap a little bit. They were real easy. The person was going to be in town, I didn't have to go to them. One of them was Clay Risen, who I'm not sure if you are familiar with Clay, but Clay is an awesome guy, writes for the New York Times, writes a lot about whiskey, extremely knowledgeable. But then also just interestingly, he writes really high profile obituaries and kind of obscure obituaries for the New York Times. So that's kind of his two wheelhouse. It's really fun. I was going to say a fun obituary, but I'm not sure you can call it a fun obituary. But really interesting obscure obituaries and then whiskey. Those are two things. And so he has a new book out called bourbon. Actually, it's right here. I'm gonna tell you, this thing is amazing. It is like y'all need to talk to clay. It's look at this. It's like a tray. And I know this ain't a video podcast, but I mean, they got all kinds of interesting things in here. Plus the book itself, which is just beautiful. The story of Kentucky whiskey. And so Clay was kind enough to kind of come on the show and we talked about whiskey and writing for the New York Times and fun stuff like that. And then another guy, Zeb Ross. Zeb is an internet phenomenon who I ran across him on a Degum Instagram feed. He's a clogger out of North Carolina. But he's just setting the Internet on fire with his clogging video. And it's one of my favorite things. If you go look up a feed called eggs Tyrone on Instagram, he's got some funny people, funny videos of people dancing. One of them that I saw a long time ago was of Zeb clogging. And so Zeb's from North Carolina, but he was going to be in Nashville. And I wanted to talk to him about clogging and just what it's like to be a machine shop guy who's all of a sudden kind of Internet famous because I think his, his clogging videos have been watched like 200 million times. You said, you said Zayab or Zed Zed ZEB, Zabros. Yeah. If you go look him up, man, uh, Zab is a, Zab is an interesting guy. That's really neat.

Zebulon for Zebulon. That's you listen.

That's right. What is Zebulon? Well, I mean, I think he said it was maybe his grandfather's name or an old family name, but super, super interesting guy.

I've kind of been a fan of the made south, uh, southerner podcast for some time. I've listened to it. You got only about 40, what about 40 episodes on there? I'm just guessing.

It's not a lot. It's not a lot at all, but, uh, but I think they're all fun. I only do, you know, ones that I get really excited about. Um, you know, a guy I'm trying to get on right now is the guy who owns the Savannah bananas. I'm kind of fascinated with that minor league baseball team right now. So I want to talk to that guy. Uh, I'd love to get Rodney Scott on and talk about barbecue for a little while. Um, I'm trying to get Frank's did on at some point this year, but, uh, yeah, they're just, there's some people out there that I would love to talk to, just sit down and talk to. And, and, and I'm trying to make a few of those happen, but it's gotta just kind of come organically to me right now. I'm just having a hard time to dedicate time to try to go focus on it, but it's fun when I get to do it.

Well, I've always enjoyed it and, uh, I have, I've mentioned it to a few folks, but you know, I love, I love the content. I love the, uh, you're, you're a skilled interviewer. So it comes across good and I enjoy it. And, uh, I will certainly be one of your listeners for a very long time. So keep them coming.

Well, those are very kind words coming from you, who is a, who I consider to be a consummate professional in this business. But, um, And man, it's weird to hear somebody say that I'm a good interviewer. I think I'm a horrible interviewer. But I do prepare. I do. I take my time. I do try to prepare. And I'm genuinely curious about the person I'm talking with. So I only talk to people that I really, really want to talk to them and ask them questions. I'm interested in what they do and how they do it. And so if that comes across, that's great.

And I think that's why, uh, Chris, because you can sort of sense it across the microphone that you really care about their subject. Many cases you care about their food. Uh, so it's always a great show. And I highly recommend Southerner for anybody who's listening to the bourbon road, check it out, listen to it. Maybe you can encourage Chris to make a few more shows. Yeah.

And if anybody, I'll say this, if anybody out there has a connection to Rick Bragg, I have tried like crazy to try to get in touch with that guy. I'll go anywhere he wants me to go. If he wants me to come to New Orleans, Birmingham, wherever he wants me to go, if I get an hour to sit down with Rick Bragg, that's either Rick Bragg or Dolly Parton. Those are kind of my two unicorns that I'm after out there.

Yeah. I think we all have those, those unicorn guests that we want to get and have on our, our shows as podcasters and stuff. You're talking about Clay.

You guys have had one of your unicorns twice now.

Yeah. Yeah. You're that, that Saturday night live guest. You've got two shows under your belt. Uh, we got somebody's got four shows on her belt. So she's, she's at the top of the list. Maybe you'll get there once on one day. Hey Chris, y'all keep asking me. I'll keep saying yes.

How about that? It just takes two more barrel picks. You'll be there.

We could, we could probably work that out. We could probably work that out.

So you were talking about clay rising and I, I, you know, me and Jim are always wondering, Hey, where do we stand as far as a podcast goes? And, uh, last year at the Kentucky bourbon festival, they'd asked me and Jim to come and talk on a main stage. Jim unfortunately, I think was out of town, uh, for the bourbon festival last year. I think you were down in Puerto Rico, Jim, living that hard life down there on a beach. But I actually got to talk on stage with Clay Risen and talk about old country boy on the main stage with Clay Risen, a New York Times writer. I was like, man, you know, I felt, I felt very prideful about that. I'm not very proud about a whole lot of things, but for just a small Texas boy that, you know, the English teacher said, you'll never be anything. I sat on the main stage and him to actually acknowledge me and know who we were, that meant a lot to me. And that showed me the kind of person that Clay was. We'd love to have him on our podcast. I think he'd be a great guest, but we'll get back to this event. So, August 6, folks, in Franklin, Tennessee, if you haven't been down there, beautiful little quaint town, a couple of distilleries around you can go to. Nashville's right up the road, like Jim said, 20 to 25 minutes. You don't want to miss out on this event. You can go to maidsouth.com and get your tickets right now as you listen. Just hit that pause button. If you're driving on the road, just pull over in the median. Don't worry. Put your hazards on. Go ahead and purchase your tickets right now. If a state trooper pulls up behind you and say, hey, listen, I got business I'm working on right now. I'm making a South great again. I'm getting myself some Southern whiskey society tickets. I bet you that state trooper let you right go. You got to talk to that big chief voice though and act like you know what you're doing. I'll just show them. Just put the phone out the window and say, here, I just bought my tickets. But seriously, don't miss out on this event. Don't miss seeing me and Jim. Chris, you got something for a special listener out there. What do you got for him?

Yeah, I tell you what, I'm gonna leave it up to you guys to figure out how to do it. But we'd love to give away two tickets to the event, the two of your listeners. And whether you want to say, hey, we're gonna give one pair away to one winner so they can bring a guest, or we're gonna give two people a single ticket, it's up to you guys to figure out how to do that. But we'd love to give away two tickets. And then for anybody else who doesn't win the tickets, If you still want to come, we'd love to give you a little bit of a break on the tickets. So we're going to do a 10% discount code on those tickets. And I think we'll call that discount code BR 10 for bourbon or you want to do TBR, which one you like.

Let's keep it simple. BR 10.

BR 10 will be the code. So you'll be able to go to made south.com. You'll see a little thing there for Southern whiskey society. Click on, get your tickets. And there's an area to put your little promo code in there. And you put in BR 10 will knock 10% off those tickets. And that includes barrel pick tickets, by the way.

Wow. Awesome. That's what I'm saying. Good Lord. That's a great giveaway. So one lucky listener so you can bring a spouse to the event with you. I like that. I think that's important. here's what we're gonna do. From the first time I post this in the morning, and we're gonna go ahead and go to 10 o'clock at night, and we'll go ahead and say Eastern Standard Time, because that's nine o'clock in the Central Standard Time, right? What you need to do is you need to go ahead and follow the Southern Whiskey Society, follow Made South, follow us. And then what I want you to do is hashtag southern whiskey society in the comments and tag three people. That's pretty simple. Make that comment. Hashtag southern whiskey society. Tag three people. I'll pick the winner at 10 o'clock Eastern standard time. You got to be 21. You've got to reside in the United States. That's how it's going to roll. And I'll tell you what we're going to do, Jim. For those first six people that can prove to us, Hey, I bought tickets right after this episode. All you can do is take a screenshot of your photo. I've got six samples of some Doc Swenson samples right here. They're all They're all two ounce little bottles, but they're all super limited. You can't get your hands on these. Something that the distillery did had us, but we might also have some other little samples in our bag with us. You never can tell. We might have some of those bourbon bullshit or t-shirts with us. Jim told me I needed to order more last night. So you never can tell what the bourbon road is going to have with us. So come to this event, come up and see us, say hi to us. Don't give me a hug. Just put your hand out, I'll shake your hand or fist bump you. Give Jim a hug though.

You don't like hugs?

How did I know this? I didn't hug my father until I think I was 29 years old and he was in the hospital and they said, hey, he's probably going to die from pneumonia. And, um, my mom said, Hey, you better give him a hug. Um, so yeah, I'm not a big hugger. I just never been in that kind of family. It's, it's a socially awkward thing for me. Um, even though my wife would say everybody comes up and does give me a hug, I'm not going to push you away. If you try to hug me, I'm not that kind of a guy, but I just, you know, I'm a big guy and you know, big guys sweat a little bit. I don't want somebody getting my sweat all over.

That's all right, Mike. They can hug me twice. It's all right. I shake your hand with this dinner plant.

Man, I think it's a big old bear paw, but, uh, I might have to. I might have to come give you a hug, big chief. I have to come over and do that.

You know, now I've given some hugs in my life. You know, if I feel like you need a hug, I might grab a hold of you and squeeze you pretty tight. You know that. But it's just it's just a thing and I've gotten better with it over time. You know, if my daughter come on, gives me a hug, you know, or my son gives me a hug, that's that's a different thing for my wife or I'd even give Jim a hug. Hell, Even Jim. Well, Chris, man, it has been great having you on here. You did a great giveaway. You got a great event. Uh, you know, you're promoting a South, uh, I mean, you're just great American. I love it. You're just a great guy.

Oh, I know you don't like giving hugs, but I feel like I'm getting like a verbal hug right now because those are very, those are kind words. And, um, You know, uh, man, great American. I, it does something, it does something funny to my soul right there. I, because I do, I love this country and I do value the men and women who serve it. And, uh, I've always appreciated that about YouTube being, being veterans. And, um, I appreciate, I genuinely appreciate you inviting me on. And I can tell you with certainty, if you ever text me, email me, say, Hey, you won't come on show. Absolutely. I will always say yes to that.

Good to hear. We love having you on, Chris. We love drinking whiskey with you. You're a true friend. You're a true patriot. And you're doing a great event in August and we all look forward to it. And I can't wait to be down there with you and hanging out with the rest of the Southern Whiskey Society folks that are members for four hours every year. That's right. You get to be a member for four hours every year.

Yeah, I genuinely appreciate it. And it's one of my highlights. I get to come on here and talk to y'all.

So Chris, where can our listeners, besides Maid South and Southern Whiskey Society, where can our members find you guys throughout social media?

Oh, man. I think I have too many social media feeds. I'll say that. Maid South, at Maid South, at Southern Whiskey Society are kind of the two main ones. I mean, the other things we do, my goodness, at Drink Eli Mason. I think it's at Drink Eli Mason for our cocktail mixer brand, Eli Mason. If you want to check out our fun little stickers that we do that have fun southern sayings, you can check out at Good Southerner. My wife and I just bought a couple of Airbnb cottages in the Tracy City, kind of Mont Eagle, Sawani area in Tennessee. If you want to check those out at Made South Cottages. on Instagram. So those are kind of fun and people are staying in those like crazy and they love them. So we're tickled with that. But those are kind of all the different things that we do.

Well, folks, you definitely want to check out our Instagram posts the day of the release of this episode. Uh, make sure you get in on that post and you make your, uh, your comments like Mike has already described, get in on the contest, get yourself a free set of tickets down to the May South event. And, uh, if you don't win that event, make sure that, uh, you at least get your discounted tickets. by typing in the BR 10 discount code on made south.com and we'll see you there. Mike and I'll be there. We'll be having a great time. Uh, Mike, where else can people find us on the internet?

Man, you know what I'm gonna say? You can find us on tick tock, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter. Um, man, we're all over the place. YouTube check us out on YouTube. Give us some reviews on there. Give us some likes, follow us on there. Subscribe to our channel on there. Not a whole lot of videos because we're just ugly faces made for radio. But hey, that's what God gave us was these beautiful voices. So check us out on those places. The main place you can find us is on Facebook at the bourbon roadies. It's our private Facebook group. There's almost 3000 people in there drinking whiskey together and sharing whiskey. You got to be 21. You got to like bourbon. Hell, who doesn't like bourbon? And you also gotta play nice. I mean, we don't tolerate any rudeness in there. If you drink from the very bottom of the shelf, like that old tin high like I used to drink, or like Jim Iced Drink at the very top of the shelf, that George T Stag, we don't care. We want you to come in there, celebrate life, celebrate birthday, celebrate anniversaries, even celebrate death of a family member, celebrate that life they lived, maybe their passion for whiskey. We want you to celebrate it without anybody cutting you off at the knees.

Absolutely, Mike. Well said. We do two shows every week. Every Monday, we do a craft distillery episode. We'll focus in on some craft distillery doing good work. We'll shine a little bit of light on them. We'll look at one expression. We'll tell you whether or not we think you ought to add it to your bar. Every Wednesday, we do a full-length episode like today's. We'll have somebody on like Chris from Made South. We'll explore a subject. We'll drink a couple of whiskeys. We'll give you the full blown show, 30 minutes in, 30 minutes out. We'll get you to work and get you back every week. We hope you tune into both of those episodes. And Mike, how can they be sure not to miss a single episode?

Well, you know what I'm going to say. You need to scroll on up to the top of that app you're listening to us on. Hit that check sign, that plus sign, that subscribe sign, whatever you listen to. Go ahead and hit it. then you need to scroll on down at that five star review. Leave us some comments because you know what I'm about to say. If you don't, the big bad booty daddy of bourbon is going to come to your house with some of this Tennessee whiskey from Leapers Fork distillery and some of this maple syrup whiskey from Leapers Fork. We're going to drink it all night long. By the end of the night, you'll have a smile on your face. You'll leave us that five star review and some comments. But seriously, those comments, those reviews, open up doors to distilleries, get great whiskey in our hands to review and tell you about it. Gets great guests on our show like Chris Thomas from Made South in the Southern Whiskey Society. We love it. That's really what it's all about. Hey, one lucky listener out there. the first person to leave a review right after this episode on Apple podcast. I'm going to send you two, two ounce bottles of the sample I have left of these two picks right here.

Oh my gosh. Oh my God. Wow.

So go ahead and lead that review. It really does pay to listen to bourbon roads. Our giveaways are real. The whiskey is real. Our passion for whiskey is real. Uh, and we want to deliver that to you.

All right. So Mike and I are very approachable. If you see us in a liquor store, if you see us at an event, if you see us at Southern Whiskey Society, you make sure you come on up and say, Hey to us. Uh, we'll, we'll be happy to tip a glass with you and have a drink, chit chat about whiskey a little bit. Uh, if you've got an idea for a show, if you have a local distillery that's hitting it out of the park, we'd love to know about it. Let us know who they are. We'll reach out to them. We'll get them on the show. You can always go to our website. We have a contact us page there. Send us a note. Me and Michael get back with it. You can always send us an email. I'm Jim at the bourbon road.com. He's Mike at the bourbon road.com. But like we always say, probably the best way slide into our DMS on Instagram. I'm Jay Shannon 63. I'm big bourbon chief and we'll see you down the bourbon road.