337. A Trip to Legends Distillery in Georgia

Welcome to another great episode of The Bourbon Road with your host, Jim O'Brien, where they talk bourbon and, of course, drink bourbon. Grab yourself a pour, kick back, and enjoy another trip down the Bourbon Road.

You know friends, it's never too early to start planning your trip to the Bourbon Trail for 2023. We hope you'll join the Bourbon Road crew as we pull out all the stops this year at Bourbon on the Banks. So mark your calendars for October 6th and 7th and we'll plan on seeing you in Frankfort, Kentucky. Be sure to listen in during the halftime break for all the details on Bourbon on the Banks. Welcome back listeners to another episode of the Bourbon Road podcast. I'm your host Jim Shannon and today we are broadcasting from Cummings, Georgia and I've got a great fellow in the house. Well, actually I'm in his house today. We're at Legends Distillery, Spirit USA out of Cummings, Georgia. You've heard them on a previous podcast. I think we had their 115 weeded bourbon on a couple of years ago in 2021. We had them on the show a few months, maybe a month or two later. But we wanted to revisit these guys. We wanted to take a trip and travel to the distillery. And today I have on the show Mike Girard. Mike, welcome to the Bourbon Road.

Jim, thank you for having me. It's a pleasure.

Yeah, it's great to be here. You've laid out four whiskeys for us today. Now, These are all bourbon expressions, but you guys have actually quite a bit more than that in your portfolio. What all do you have?

Well, you have a total of seven bourbons ranging from 87 up to the full barrel proof, 122, 123, an award-winning vodka, and our new Highway 19 gin.

All right, so we can't get to all of those in one show, so we've picked out the four we think interest our listeners. We are the bourbon road, so we're gonna have some bourbons today. Do you make a rye? We do, indeed. In fact, we're gonna start with our Legends Heritage series high rye bourbon. Okay, so this is the high rye bourbon. So we're gonna get straight to the whiskey today. We're gonna have a high rye bourbon. And why don't you tell us a little bit about this one? Because this is in our glass right now.

Yes. This has just been released. It's under our new Heritage series. It's a 100 high ride. It's a 21% ride. It is from MGP. We're 100% on our labels. We say distilled in Indiana. We've got nothing to hide about where we get our liquid. Our claim to fame is our technology.

So your technology is what you do to the whiskey before it goes into the bottle. That's correct. So is it a finishing process? Is it a purifying process?

It's both a finishing and purifying, but nothing can take away from bourbon lane on oak. So it's not an aging process. It's just a purifying and finishing.

Okay. Well, let's get straight to this whiskey. Let's go ahead and drink it and taste it and talk about it a little bit. And then we'll get to that purifying process here in a minute. Cheers.

Sounds like a plan. Cheers.

It's got a nice bourbon nose on it. It's a little bit spicy at the same time. Sweet. Very traditional. I would say center lane.

Very much so. Yeah. But no real burn on the throat, but you still get that beautiful Georgia hug.

Yeah. Georgia hug. I haven't heard that in a while. So that's pretty awesome. It's got a nice color to it. This, this is a, now what's the age on this?

This is a three and a half, just coming up to four years now.

Just coming up to four. Okay. It's got a nice, a deep amber color, almost a, almost a copper color.

And the proof again? It's a 100 proof.

100 proof.

Yeah, we believe that the bourbon drinkers now are more mature, so they've gone away from the 80s and 90s, and we believe the 100 is where a good bourbon should be for day-to-day consumption.

How long have you been producing a high-ride bourbon?

We've been producing it off and on since we opened the doors three days before COVID hit back in 2020.

Tell our listeners a little bit about coming Georgia, because inevitably some of them are going to come visit you down here. And they're going to pop in and say, I heard about you on the Bourbon Road. We would love to have them. Yeah, what can you expect in Cumming, Georgia?

This is red dirt roads, right? That's right. It's the gateway to the mountains out of Atlanta, the wine country. We're really the waterfront of Atlanta. Lake Lanier is just nearby. It's a beautiful community. And the council is very pro small business. So that's one of the reasons why we came here.

So this is not, correct me if I'm wrong, this is about 30 to 40 minutes northeast of Atlanta?

Yes, and 30 to 40 minutes is totally reliant on peak hour traffic.

Traffic, of course, of course, because Atlanta traffic can be a bit oppressive sometimes.

Atlanta's on its way to being the new LA when it comes to traffic, yes.

Yeah, I've been there just a few times and we're passing through actually. It was awful nice of you to host us today. We really appreciate you opening your doors for us and sharing your whiskey with us. It's a privilege to have you, Jim. I like the little bit of, it's a little bit of rye bite, but you're right. It doesn't really, I'm not feeling the hug so much, a little bit, but not too much. So a lot of times when we have like sweet mash whiskeys, you'll, you'll be absent that hug just a little bit, but the sour mash will give you a little bit of that hug. This reminds me a lot of a sweet mash high rye whiskey.

Sweet and mellow, but still with a little bit of a bite.

It does have a little bit of a bite. It kind of sits on the back of the pallet though. It has a nice refreshing upfront, I think. This for me would be kind of a year round whiskey. It would be nice in the colder weather because of that little bit of rye bite that it's got. But at the same time, it's got that refreshing note upfront. I think it would be great in summer months as well.

Well, we try to produce bourbons that are good for drinking year round. You know, once the bottle's been opened, From my philosophy, let's finish it.

What's the name of this expression again? This is the Legends Heritage Series Hi-Rai. Hi-Rai. And people can find this on the retail shelves. What price point do you have on it?

Around the $45 mark. Okay. Fair enough.

Now your bottles are beautiful. I think all your whiskey bottles now are kind of the same design. The labeling's good. The bottles are nice. And the fill level is really good on them. I like that. Thank you so much. When did it come to your mind to start a whiskey distillery?

And I hear a little bit of an accent there.

So you've got to be from somewhere.

As it says on all of our bottles, it's 100% American owned, some with accents.

Yeah.

I'm originally from Australia, lived in England and came over to Atlanta, Georgia back in 1992.

Well, we actually have a pretty decent following in Australia, so some of your old pals back there may be listening to this.

Well, if you are, to my friends in Australia, I hope you are starting to learn Chinese. Is that so?

So what caused you to, you arrived in 1992, some years later you started as a stiller. What caused you to think to do this?

Well, I came over in 92 to open up George's first micro brewery, Marfasville Brewing Company. The Olympics basically put a dent in us that we couldn't recover from. So we closed down and my wife and I opened up the Brewhouse Cafe in Little Five Points and became number one international soccer bar in the southeast of America.

Wow. Fantastic. So that somehow led to

Well, back in the late 90s, early 2000s, all the spirits were foreign, absolute, you know, a lot of Canadian and Irish whiskeys coming in, the Scotch was flooded. And I thought, well, as a new American, I thought, well, We're Americans. We can outdo everybody else. And that started me on the journey of finding a technology that would set us apart.

Yeah. So let's talk a little bit about that technology. People have tried many ways to improve the aging process of whiskey, but that's not you.

Yeah, I think that's the wrong way. We're not trying to reestablish what is a tradition that has worked for hundreds of years. I mean, our technology is more of a filtration and purification, and we've proven it to the point of winning major awards against some of the best bourbons in the world.

Well, you guys first popped up on our radar back in May of 2021. And honestly, at this point, I can't remember if you sent us a bottle or somebody in the area down here got their hands on and sent it to us. But we got our hands on your two-year-old 115 weeded bourbon back then. And this was May of 2021. And my co-host and I tasted it and looked at each other and said, oh my God, this is like really, really good. And we wrote up a review on it. We did a podcast episode. I was one of our early, uh, what we call our craft distillery Monday episodes we did on it. And I think it was episode one 67. So folks dial back in the episodes there. I think you'll go back and find this, listen to our tasting notes on it. I think we were pretty much taken by surprise that this could even be two years old. It was such a smooth drinker. It had such a great flavor profile. Anyway, we posted a review on it. The notes are out there. Folks go check it out. But that puts you on our radar. And I think it was about a month later, Fred Bennett got a bottle. And, uh, he thought you guys were fantastic.

Well, Fred's been a scholar and a gentleman and has helped us out. And, uh, you know, we've entered the Ascot Awards with numerous of our products and, and, uh, thankfully we've won some of his top awards.

Yeah. So that tells you something, right? I mean, you were onto something.

Well, that wasn't the first time we've entered. Back in 2020, I released our Legends 100 series, which was a two-year-old MGP product again. And I entered the CIPs and I put it in the 10 years of Younger Bourbon. We won the double platinum best in class for 10 years and younger with our two year old 100. So we knew the technology worked.

So there's a lot of distilleries out there that do procure their, their whiskey from MGP and through blending and additional aging or barrel finishing or whatever it is, they're able to achieve some awards. Yep. You didn't do all that. You simply applied your technology to it. That's correct.

But now we're now, we've got, you know, a hundred plus barrels that we're aging and we're buying more barrels from different distilleries around the country now.

But at the time you set yourself apart through your technology.

Yes. And we will continue to do so.

Sure. So all your products, It doesn't matter whether they're whiskeys or clear spirits. They all go through your purification process. We call it quantum purity. So can you explain that a little bit so that our listeners will understand what quantum purity is? Because a lot of times, bourbon drinkers are like, I like non-chill filtered, right? So you're not chill filtering. No. No, this is something altogether different.

We believe chill filtering really destroys the taste profile of what you're trying to achieve in a bourbon. Yeah. Our quantum purity is not an aging. Obviously, the tradition of aging bourbon really adds the richness to the bourbon. What we're trying to do is reduce the congeners, the toxins in the alcohol, and we have achieved this through quantum purity. It's basically a seven-stage process that we reduce the alcohol to a molecule structure and put it back together with 50% to 70% of a congeners reduce while keeping enough of the fusel oils and that to retain the full taste profile that we're trying to achieve. And that's why it took us 10 years of research and development.

Now, most distilleries reduce those to a point through being very careful about when they make their cuts off the still, right? But it's kind of a gradual process, right? I mean, you got to make a line somewhere. You got to draw your line in the sand when you're making your cuts. And there's always going to be a little bit that gets through. And you guys are taking that little bit out of the bad stuff, the methanol.

Yes. I mean, we're definitely taking that out through the technology, which is patented by the way.

And you know, methanol, for example, what alcohol, whatever you want to call it is something that causes headaches and it's what gives you hangovers, right? Very much so. So would you say that, um, your product has less likelihood of giving hangovers or headaches?

It's very, I believe, and this is trying to be legally so I don't get sued too much. I believe 98.5% of the human race, if they drink our products responsibly, will never suffer from a hangover. Now, if you're drinking vodka and an energy drink, our vodka is the equivalent of 40 to 60 times distilled through this technology. But if you add a product with taurine in it, all bets are off. Yeah, taurine. So this would be like Monster Energy. I'm not going to mention brands, but I can.

So these are the energy drinks that are out there. The Red Bulls of the world, basically. Red Bulls and Rockstars and all that kind of stuff.

Well, it's basically you're mixing an upper and a downer together. So yeah, Outlook is never good.

Yeah. Well, some people drink those and they like them.

Oh, yes. Until the next morning, usually.

We like sipping whiskey.

Yeah. Well, our tagline is take back the morning. And we believe that if you drink what we believe is the purest alcohol known to the human race, your body will thank you for it after 10 or 20 years of being drinking.

Well, I have to admit this show is not about vodka, but before we started, you were kind enough to pour my wife and I a vodka and we tasted it side by side with Tito's and I'm going to mention Tito's cause I can do that. Night and day, absolute night and day. I'm not a huge vodka drinker and I would imagine that a lot of our listeners are probably not either, but it makes a point. The point is that that vodka that you gave me was so clean and so pure. and so free from astringency or anything like that. It was just a wonderful, nice, clean pour. My wife drank it and said, I would never have drank vodka straight before, but I could drink this straight. Thank you. That's a big difference. Huge. Huge difference. So that same process is being applied to your whiskeys as well.

All our alcohol brands, we're releasing a tequila later in the year. We'll go through our technology. I mean, that is our claim to fame is our technology.

All right. Okay, so what do we have in our next class?

Our next class, we're very proud to release our first eight-year-old bourbon. This is our Legends Heritage Series small batch, eight-year-old bourbon.

Eight-year-old bourbon. So that's kind of the sweet spot, right? We always hear that, you know, that eight to 12 year range is that saddle, you know, that sweet spot for, for bourbons where they reach that level of maturity that sets them apart from I hate to say it, younger whiskeys. I don't really consider a six-year-old whisky a younger whisky, but some people do. But that eight to 12 is kind of that happy place.

Well, I mean, at eight-year-old, the ward has really done all it can do to smooth out the bourbon. I believe anything past eight-year-olds more about marketing than the actual taste profile of the bourbon. But with an eight-year-old smooth bourbon plus our technology, Jim, have a taste and tell me what you think.

Oh, I'm going to do it. Oh my goodness. Toffee, butterscotch. Um, not so much sweet caramel, but kind of more of a, um, a darkened caramel. The vanilla has kind of waned off a little bit. Still full bodied. Still full bodied. Now what's the match bill on this? This is a 95% corn. Okay. So this is a high corn. Yes.

Which is surprising. Most people would taste it, don't, won't pick up on that high corn rate.

You know, I, I do get a little bit of this, um, chocolate graham cracker, right in the back of the back. So the wood has done a job on it. No doubt about it.

We're very proud of it. In fact, we're entering it into the competitions this year. In fact, we've sent all our products off. Being an Australian and American, or now an American Australian, I've sent it off to the London International because to me, let's fly the American flag over in England as well.

There you go. There you go. So what category will this compete in?

Small batch, under 10 year old. Okay. Small batch under 10.

I mean, back in 2021, when we had you guys on the show, this would have been June of 2021. You had accumulated 27 awards already on your whiskey. Where are you at now? Around 44. 44. Yeah. So you're still piling them on.

Well, we're having to be selective because obviously cashflow is everything to a small startup and the competitions are quite expensive. So we try and pick the best of the best in the country. And as we get bigger, obviously we'll broaden our approaches to what competitions we go into.

So what kind of changes have been taking place in your operation over the last, let's just say three years that have, you know, addressed the issues with capacity and how far you can distribute and those kinds of things?

Well, after 10 years of research and development, I signed a lease on a 20,000 square foot building, signed with some distributors, and three days later, COVID hit. And then the distributors turned around and says, we're not launching any new products through COVID. So mentally, I've written off 2020 and 2021 from a financial point of view. Didn't exist.

Didn't exist.

Last year we hit what I thought we would hit in our first year. So we're still a loss, but growing. We're budgeting this year to go from the red to the black, and I hopefully never look back.

Yeah. Well, that's good. It's good to hear. I'm glad you were able to stick it out and make it through that tough period. A lot of people didn't. No, a lot of my friends didn't. So you're in this facility here. It's quite a grand facility. We managed to take a tour with you before we started the episode. Thank you. And you got a lot of space here. Yes. There's a lot of room to grow.

There is indeed.

And you plan to grow?

Well, to that point, we're launching in Chattanooga next month. And we're successful with a hand family of companies. And quite honestly, I love dealing with family-run distributors. It's a different mentality. And if we're successful, they're going to take us system-wide, which is across Tennessee, Kentucky, and Illinois. And I'm very much looking forward to going to Kentucky.

Yeah. Well, we'd love to have you there for sure. But you happen to be in a state that is the gateway to Florida, which means that all of our listeners who are going to manage their way to Florida this year have an opportunity to drive through here. And you have, at least from what I gathered from the website, over a thousand outlets with your whiskey here in the state of Georgia.

That's correct. I mean, both our distributors in Georgia, Atlanta Beverage and Northeast Sales have been doing a great job for us. And we've got good distribution throughout Georgia. That's fantastic.

Well, I have to say, this is a nice whiskey. I think that non-whiskey drinkers would tend to gravitate towards your whiskey just a little bit because you've taken a little bit of the bite out of it. It's a little bit more approachable. It's a little bit more sessionable.

Well, my wife was a big Jameson drinker.

Okay.

So she loves the Hi-Ry Heritage 100. A full body, but not that, as you say, that bite is gone.

Yeah. Yeah.

In fact, we lost with the Ascot with our two-year-old Weeted. We were in the final for best of show and it was two judges each and the fifth judge went with Stag Junior because she likes the bite. So I won't say what I was yelling at her on the TV, but If you like the big bites, maybe our bourbons aren't for you, but if you like to drink smooth, beautiful bourbons, give us a try.

Well, I mean, variety is the spice of life and everybody has that profile that they like. Some people like weeded bourbons because they're soft up front, a little bit sweeter. And some people like the ryes because they bite them on the back end a little bit and give them that spicy. But that's why we have variety. That's why you produce however many expressions you have. And that's why you have a high rye and a weeded, right? Because you're trying to address the fact that people have different palates.

Very much so. And this year with our four-year-old wager, we're very much looking forward to seeing what we can do against the best of the best.

We've got two more whiskies to get to in the second half. I have to say that both of these have been delightful. Well, thank you so much. I hope our roadies get a chance to try them. You know, we, we do a number of events every year and when we do, we have, we, we always set up a roadie bar. A roadie bar is, uh, so our, let's just call them our fans of the show. They'll attend events and they'll come to our, our tent and they'll belly up to the bourbon roadie bar. And that's where we have all the pours of the whiskeys we've had on the show throughout the year. And they get to actually try them. And that's, they're going to love this. You're going to love it a lot.

Well, to all the roadies, just mention Jim's name when you come in here and the first shot of bourbon is on the house.

There you go.

So please come on down to our tour facility. Thank you so much for that.

I'm sure you'll get a few visitors for sure. Well, Michael, it's been a pleasure this first half. I think we've got just a little more whiskey left on our glass. We're going to sit here and sip on this, take a short break. And when we come back, we have two more expressions of legends whiskey to get to. I look forward to presenting it to you. As we mentioned earlier in the show, we hope you'll join us this fall on October 6th and 7th for Bourbon on the Banks. The festival itself is from 2 to 6 PM on October the 7th, and you can pick those tickets up at bourbononthebanks.org for $65. They also have an early access ticket for $75. It'll get you in an hour early and definitely get you access to some special pores. But if you always liked that VIP access this year, they're bringing in the VIP access tickets. We'll give you access to their VIP tent and all the great things that go along with that for $175. Be sure to check out bourbononthebanks.org. They'll get all the details on this year's event. All right. Well, we are back from the break. We did finish off at 95. It's a 95.5, right? 95 corn, 5% malted barley. That's correct. Fantastic whiskey. Really, really good. And that's a hundred proof too. And what can they find that bottle for?

That's round the, because bourbon barrels were so expensive, that's round the $60 mark. $60 mark.

Okay. But now we are revisiting history. We are indeed. I'm not going to say we're going back in time because two years ago, well, not even two years ago, a year and a half ago when we had this on the show, it was a two-year-old weeded bourbon. Now it's a four-year-old weeded bourbon. That's correct. And this is your 115 weeded bourbon.

Correct. Double platinum award winning.

It's got so many awards. You can't put hang tags on it cause you wouldn't see the bottle. That's correct. I'm excited to try it now.

Well, please you tell me why you think you gave us a big push when it was two year old. Now try it now that it's a four year old.

All right. Cheers. Cheers. Wow. That is, I mean, it's just so soft, non-opposing up front. It just rolls right back on the palette without any impression at all. Just a nice, sweet, soft taste up front. It sits on the mid palette a little bit. It gives you that caramel wash with a little bit of vanilla. but the barrel's a lot more present now, I think it was, it is.

I believe it needed a little bit more oak to be fully rounded and the four year old gives it that.

But, you know, I've always said that younger whiskeys bring something to the table that the more aged whiskeys can't offer. And that's those younger notes that are sometimes, so a lot of times people will say, Hey, I'm getting those young notes in that whiskey. And some of the young notes, I agree, are off-putting, but some of them are pretty awesome.

And sometimes the yoke overpowers what the young notes do bring to a bourbon.

It's finding that balance. It's finding that nice balance. Now, your two-year-old weeded bourbon, under which your purification process was phenomenal, obviously, because It was off the charts for us. It was off the charts for Fred. You got to ask God awards. You got, who knows how many double platinum awards for it at four years old. It's a little more full bodied. It's got a little bit more of an oak presence on it.

Now, if you're a wheat, I think you would really enjoy this, this one.

Yeah. I mean, personally, I'm a spicy guy, right? I like spicy whiskeys, but this has got, it's got that barrel spice on it.

If you like the spice, you wait till you taste our single barrel.

I'm looking forward to it. I am. But this is good. This is really, really good. This is definitely a step up from your two year, but it's different. So if you have had their two year weeded bourbon or 115 weeded bourbon, Uh, you would have had something that was just off the charts, smooth and soft and sweet and just nice. This is a little bit more, um, it's got a little bit of gray in its beard. How's that?

Is that a good way to say it? It knows where it's been and it knows where it's going.

It does. It's really good.

And that's one of the things entering competitions do. If you read the tasting notes from judges, it gives you a roadmap of where to go next. And that's where not only about the medals when you enter, it's about the feedback from these guys that have the palate.

So competitions for you aren't just about the reward. It's about the feedback.

Very much so. I mean, you can tell if you're going down the right track or not. But yes, it's also nice to win those big awards.

Well, let me ask you about your personal palette, what you like to drink. I mean, a good distiller or a good owner of a bourbon brand doesn't just drink his own whiskey, he drinks other people's whiskeys as well.

Because I'm, I wouldn't say a heavy drinker, but I am an American Australian. So I do drink a lot. I'm at the point where I just don't like hangovers anymore. So I really don't drink too many others. I taste a lot of bourbons to see what's coming out of the marketplace. But if I'm sitting down with a couple of mates to do a session, I know I have to get up early in the morning to come back to work. So I kind of stick to legends. Yeah.

Well, you have to, you have to venture out and taste other people's whiskey. Otherwise you get that tunnel vision, right?

I mean, there's a lot of, I mean, the blue, there's some blue note bourbons that are coming out. Beautiful. I mean, what they've done. Balconies out of Texas were doing some good jobs. You know, so, I mean, there's a lot of up and coming. I try and, Kate, stay away from the cartels. But the young distillers around the country, I mean, we're producing some fantastic stuff around the country right now.

Well, I'm going to have to introduce you to our friends up at Lawrenceburg Burbank Company in Kentucky. So he's an Aussie as well. We just had him on the show a couple of weeks back. And he's new in the business. His business card says wannabe distiller.

Oh, we have a lot in common. Now, do you know if he's from Sydney or Melbourne?

I think he's from Sydney.

Oh, even better because Melbourne and Sydney is the north and the south. Yeah. And so much so that we pick farmland in the middle of the two cities and we made a camera. It's perfect. It's like Washington DC. You put all the, I was about to say something beginning with A, in one city so we don't interrupt the rest of the country.

Yeah. So, you know, we did a tasting of his whiskeys and he's done, so he's brand new. He just did a release of three separate bourbons and then he did a rye release and we did a show with him and we sat down and had some Vegemite. So.

There you go. Oh, that's my breakfast a lot of times.

Yeah, I do like Vegemite.

I enjoy it. It's pure vitamin B. So if you're a drinker, get into Vegemite.

Yeah.

It's vegetable yeast.

Yeah, yeah. So he explained where it came from. So he was a military man, a vet, and he explained that it was created for the troops and that Vegemite was something that was sent over to the troops in England.

Well, the shelf life is forever.

Yeah.

And, uh, and gives you those vitamin B six and B 12 that you need.

So let's talk a little bit about, uh, your whiskies and where people can find them. Cause we know you're primarily situated in Georgia. Uh, you distribute to about a thousand outlets in Georgia here. Correct. You can also find your products online.

A little bit of Drizzly. Drizzly? Yeah. We were with Spirit Hub, but that went haywire a little bit. Maybe I dropped the ball on that. Next month, obviously, Chattanooga. All going well. We've just signed a distribution agreement in the United Kingdom, and we're in negotiations to distribute in Korea. Well, fantastic. We believe we can expand quicker overseas than we can in this country.

Well, you've got a lot of fans here, so spread the wealth. We, uh, we love to have your whiskies up in Kentucky. We know they're coming. We're excited to get them. But in the meantime, people can look half the United States goes to Florida every year and they go through Georgia. So when they're going through Georgia, they need to do two things. First of all, they need either pick up a bottle of your whiskey at some liquor store in Georgia. Or two, they need to come over here to your distillery and get that free drink you talked about.

Please do. And follow us on legends underscore spirits or our website is spiritsusa.com. And please bring a designated driver. We pour heavy. You do pour heavy.

All right. So I'm ready to move on to the next whiskey, the fourth and final whiskey of the day. What do we have?

We're going to be tasting our award winning single barrel bourbon. This one we're tasting today is 123.08 proof.

Now I know all your whiskeys, not all of them, but many of your whiskeys have won awards. This one actually has a metal hanging around its neck.

That was, we entered the Georgia competition. We won the gold or I think that's a gold or platinum. Yes, I mean, Well, you like to push for local Georgia awards. I mean, for the bourbon industry probably doesn't mean much, but to win in our home state, we were very proud. Awesome.

So this is your single barrel. It is indeed. And what's the proof on this? 123. 100. Okay.

So this is basically out of the barrel through our technology into the bottle.

Okay. And which bourbon is this? This is the high rye or this is the weeded. This is the... This is basically a high rye. This is a high rye bourbon. That's barrel proof. That's barrel proof. Fantastic. Cheers.

Nothing added. Just straight through.

Oh, that's delightful. That's really good.

We cranked up some of the settings on this one. So for a foolproof foot, not a foolproof, a barrel proof bourbon, literally no bird on the back throat, but full flavor.

But the finish is like very nice, very nice finish on it. Very delightful kind of a, a soft and a little bit of a nice A little bit of an orange peel.

Well, I mean, personally, I would put out this single barrel against anybody's single barrel in the industry. So I'm very proud of it.

It does not drink like, what did you say the proof was again? 123. It does not drink like 123 proof. Until you try and stand up. Yeah. I would call this out in the 100 to 110 range, not in the 123. No. Yeah.

Again, that shows you the power of what our technology can do while not taking anything away from the flavor profile.

Yeah, the oak is very nice in that. Now, what's the age on this one?

Uh, this is because it was just under four years when we had to say three years, but it's literally, uh, three years, 11 months.

Yeah. Well, you can, you can specify in months, right? You can TTB label at months, right?

Maybe I should have read that paragraph.

I think you could say how many months. So you could say like 40 months or something like that, but.

So the next ones we'll be releasing, it will be a four year old.

Okay. That is a very nice single barrel whiskey. Now, how many different barrels did you have of this particular one?

This one we bottled up, A, we bottle it individually, so we get different labels for each barrel. We did 15 barrels.

15 barrels, okay.

When we say, when we do a small batch, we actually mean a small batch. Our small batch is five barrels.

There's nothing wrong with, so if you do 15 barrels at 200 bottles a barrel, that's a lot of bottles. Well, folks, if you're traveling down I-75, if you're traveling down I-95, if you're heading to Florida or other parts south and you're going through Georgia, I would highly recommend that you pick up a bottle of Legend's whiskey. This single barrel in that 115 are at the top of my list. But I'll be honest with you, your 200 proof versions there really good too.

Jim, thank you so much.

So they, they should stop in here. You've got a fantastic tasting room. How many people can you seat in here?

Um, without the fire marshal, uh, listening, uh, over a hundred.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, there's, I would think even if he was listening, this is a big place. I would say you get at least a hundred people in here. You've got an outside seating area too.

Yeah, it's designed. We had to have it outside because you need to have, I mean, there's no smoking inside, but we encourage people to have a bourbon and cigar outside. Family friendly, bring your dogs, keep your kids on a leash.

So you're 30 minutes plus outside of Atlanta. How many people do you get coming up here out of Atlanta to visit you guys?

It's growing every year. I mean, you know, on good nights we'll have 100, 200 people come up. We do comedy once a month. We have live music, Friday, Saturdays. Uh, jazz on Sunday, starting spring, we're doing battle of the rock for charity this year. So there's plenty of things. Please check out our website for all those details, spirits, USA.com and your social media accounts.

You've got Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, all that kind of stuff.

I'm gray head. So I've got other people handling that, but it's legends underscore spirits. Please follow us and spread the word.

Okay. So spirits, USA and legends, same one in the same.

Spirit USA is the overall umbrella company that owns the patent and Legends of Georgia is our trademarked product line.

So when somebody reads your bottle label and they see Spirit USA on there, they know that that's you.

That's me. And we're starting to do some white labels now, so that'll be distilled by Spirit USA.

Fantastic. Well, I highly recommend everyone check you out. They definitely should, if they're traveling down through the state, they should pop in here. If they, if they can, you're about 20 minutes off I-75. 20 maximum. Yeah. 20 minutes tops off I-75. If you're traveling down and you're going to Florida for the family vacation, just bring the kids here. They'll be fine. Just have a visit.

And if you want to take back the morning, drink legends.

Yeah. So the idea here is that your purification process is removing those things that cause that morning hangover, that cause that headache, that cause that bad part of the night you had before.

Very much so. I mean, that's why I think our technologies, to me, is the greatest advancement in distilling in over 200 years. taking nothing away from the traditional methods because you need that oak interaction to make a true bourbon.

Yeah, we've seen them try to shorten that process before and it just doesn't work, does it? It really doesn't.

I mean, it's silly to try and even try it because that's special. What the oak and the liquid does over the course of two to four, five years, to me six years is the primary time from our point of view.

Well, Michael, it's been fantastic to have you on the show today. We really appreciate you hosting us today. Jim, it's been a true pleasure. Sharing your whiskey with us. My goodness. Four great expressions. I know Melanie and I would love to sit here all day and just drink, uh, the gin. In fact, I think I'm going to have it a little bit of your gin before I go because gin's my other bourbon. Well, gin is the European tequila. It's a fracking drink. All right. Well, thank you again for hosting us today. We had a great time. We can't wait for our listeners to try your whiskeys and report back on what they think of them. We already know that you guys have had a tremendous reception in the marketplace. You certainly have had a number of awards for the expressions you put out and we hope all of our listeners can get a chance to try your products. If you're passing through Georgia, definitely pick up a bottle of Legends. If you get a chance, go to the distillery in Cumming, Georgia. He's already said, you guys get the first pour if you just say Jim Shannon sent me, right?

That's correct, Jim. Just come on in and say Jim sent me and you'll have a beautiful pour of bourbon in front of you.

All right. Well, you can find the bourbon road on all social media outlets. You can find us on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Facebook. You can even find us on the bourbon roadies, our private Facebook group. We've got about 3,500 core followers there that just love what we do. Thank you so much. listen every week to hear our episodes. They come out every Wednesday. We put an episode and we try to have a distillery on. We have a musician on. We'll have a music artist or an author or a chef. We always have some great content for you. Anybody who'll drink whiskey is welcome on the show. We always have a great time. If you've got an idea for a show, if you've got a distiller in your hometown that's doing it right, you want to shine a little light on them, let us know about it, we'll be sure to get them on the show. Every week, every Wednesday, you want to listen to us. In order to not miss it, make sure you hop onto that app you're listening to us on, subscribe, click that check sign, that plus sign, that subscribe button, whatever it is. so that every week you'll get a notification that we've put out a new episode. We'd hate for you to miss one. But until then, we'll see you down the Bourbon Road.

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