473. Revenge of the Maltmigos

Hello friends and welcome back to another episode of the Bourbon Road Podcast. I'm your host, Jim Shannon.

And I'm your host, Todd Ritter. We've got a great show for you today. So grab your favorite pour and join us.

All right. Welcome back folks for another episode of the Montmigos. We promised it. What do you think Todd? Yeah. Are we delivering?

We've been warning folks and it's here now. The revenge of the Montmigos. Amzie, Rob, welcome back to the show.

Yep. Thank you.

Always great to be back with this esteemed group of Montmigos.

We've definitely got some good ones today, don't we?

Yeah. Actually, we're going to kind of follow suit. The last time we got together, we did, I believe, a couple Irish whiskeys as well, and then a couple scotches. That's kind of the same thing today. I'm very excited. We've had these for a while, but it's okay.

Well, we always get around to it eventually. I know the listeners are saying, I thought it would never happen, but here they are. They finally made it all to the same room on the same day. That's right. Good deal. All right, Todd, so what do you have planned for us tonight?

So the very first pour we have is two stacks, the first cut, a signature blend. Two Stacks is the equivalent of a Scottish NDP, so they source from various places. What's unique about this is it's composed of 40% single-grain whiskey, aged in virgin American oak. Kind of like bourbon. But the crazy thing is about the single grain for this Irish whisky, it's corn. Then they use 40% of a single grain whisky aged in ex bourbon cask, also corn. They use a 8% pot still whisky aged in Oloroso sherry butts, which I found out was like, I never knew what a butt was. I kind of knew what a butt was, but how much does a butt hold? We're talking about butts here. 132 gallons, even more in some cases. And I also found out that bota is but in Spanish. So there you go. There's your bota. Don't sling that around too much if you're eating at the Mexican restaurant. 2% peat and malt whiskey aged in ex-bourbon cask. Oh, and then 10% double distilled malt whiskey aged in ex-barman cows. So I think I've heard 100%. There's a lot of components to that. There's a lot of stuff in this. Yeah.

Did you take good notes, Rob? Heck yeah. They should have thrown a couple extra percent in just to make us feel special.

I was going to say, the 2% of peated, I feel like that's almost like an eyedropper in the ocean. Exactly. Or maybe a pond. And it's really light colored.

Yeah. With all that gyration, is this out of my price range?

No, actually this $44.99. This one comes in 86 proof. It is 700 milliliters because it comes from across the pond. I meant to bring them to show you guys, and we'll probably give those away on the roadie page, is they have these little 100 milliliter cans. But they have, I mean, it's basically like, I guess, a wee dram in a can. Yeah. So pretty unique. Wow. Cool. So let's nose this bad boy. Let's check it out. Yeah.

Ah, wow. So I feel like I went into a hay barn.

Straw. Straw. I'm getting some fruits though. Oh yeah, they're there. Yeah, almost maybe like a little peach, some kind of stone fruit. Yep. Little earthy.

And that peat sometimes, even though I like it, you know, it can almost be like a rotten fruit.

Are you picking up that 2% Rob?

Is that what you're saying? I think so.

He's just calibrating his nose on the 2%. Super nose.

That's pretty funny because we actually got to spend some time with Ashley Barnes at her new place yesterday. She invited some of the board members of the Frankfurt Bourbon Society. So she does have a super palette. That's pretty amazing.

That's out there about maybe three miles from our family farm where I grew up.

That's a really impressive place they've got out there.

We're going to probably talk to her soon, I believe. Yeah. All right. I'm ready to sip. All right. Cheers, Montmigos. Cheers, Montmigos.

That's nice. Kind of snuck past the front of my palate though.

Second sip will give you something though.

Yeah. It is my first actual sip of the day though. Same here. I think we all came from work.

I came from Toyota. Did a little work on my truck.

I missed my morning shot so.

light, refreshing, fruity.

Definitely light and refreshing. It's light on the front of the palette, very light on the front of the palette, but it sits with a little bit of heft on the back. I agree.

Probably that new oak that's probably, it's kind of got that caramel vibe to it a little bit.

But you know, it's really making me, um, salivate. It's good. I mean, it's like waking up my palate. You were just really thirsty. I was really thirsty and it's been a long day and I've been looking forward to my first weed ram.

I mean, it's kind of like, you know, it's not an overwhelming flavor of any sort, but it's, it's pleasant.

I would say it's partially delicate and floral and fruity, but then it's got this oaky bounce to it. At that tail end. Yeah. That is nice. Now, Robert, you're getting that, um, What did you call it? Rotten fruit? Are you getting that on the palate? Smoked fruit?

I really didn't, now that you mention it.

I was getting an earthy note on the nose, but I'm not getting it on the palate. Now, maybe that was that same thing you were picking up. And it might be just that little bit of smoke in there.

I know what you're saying on the peat, and sometimes you get a little of that almost iodine, the burning rubber smell. as a parent of a younger child, it's getting a little better. But you know, occasionally that piece of fruit gets dropped in the car, rolls under the seat. And there's that, sometimes it's that fermenting kind of fruit smell. I kind of see what you're saying there. But only the super noser would get that.

I don't know about that. Each of the Maltmigos has their superpower. Rob's is his nose.

you know, it's extremely light on the front and then it almost, it does get a little heavier. They're kind of mid palette, almost like a, like a, a honey, but I don't know what that honey is. Maybe like a buckwheat honey or something. It's a more, a little bit of like a honey, but a little more earthy, I guess, or a little more umami almost. Um,

It's got a nice viscosity to it.

I like it because it's got a little heft for 86 proof.

I think the price is right. It's a good drinker. It's nice across the palette. I think overall, it's a good pour. It's interesting. I guess I got surprised by it. It's not like something I expected. Of course, after hearing the laundry list of what went into it, I'm not sure what I expected.

Take good notes. We're going to have to rank them at the end, as we normally do. Put them in. Log them in that steel trap of a mine you've got, Rob.

All right. All right. I'm going to come back with something I got on the nose on this real quick. OK. A freshly opened can of motor oil. I get a little bit of that on there somehow.

Wow. Oh, I'm trying to think of the motor oil. I mean, yeah, I do know that smell, but.

Hard to argue.

Is that 10W-30, or? Yeah, maybe. Definitely no synthetic oil here. This is straight out of the oven.

OK, now what's the refinery?

Instead of distillery, what's the refinery? I like it. Yeah, very enjoyable. All right, we're ready to move on, gents.

Let's move on. Let's do it.

All right, we're going to stick with two stacks. This is their double barrel single grain. So the mash bill is 94% corn, 6% malted barley. It's double barreled due to its two-part maturation process. The first maturation is it's aged three to five years in traditional ex bourbon barrels. And then the second maturation, it's finished for one to three years in ex Eloroso, Sherry, cask, or butts again. We're all about some butts today.

So you said 135 gallons.

I mean, you're talking something that's like 2.5 times your normal barrel. They said some are even larger. So you're thinking like three. I just didn't know that was a thing. I saw one in Hard Truth when I was up there. We did a pick and they showed us one.

It's a big old barrel. So you know that is not making this up. I don't think I could be. But I think that's actually where the term buttload comes from.

I hope that's true.

I'm going to Google that after we're done. I mean, I saw it on the internet.

And that's AMZ superpower.

That's awesome.

I hate to contradict, but you know, this is where, you know, a lot of our current sayings, they, you know, they just slay me how we've, we've, we've gone. you know, off the wrong direction on them. But I always thought it started out as a boatload. So I don't know. It just got slangy. It got slangy to itself. Yeah, who knows.

Well, that's before the internet either told us the truth or born to lie.

So now we got to look it up and find out for sure.

Now we got AI just telling you what you want to hear. That's right.

Yeah. It's like when people say it's off the chain. Like, what? Off the chain? No, that's not even a thing. It's off the hook. That makes sense. It's visual.

Look at it. All right, go on. I'm wasting time. Well, the dog could get off the chain, so, right?

I guess. I know. I'm just trying to weigh in for the other side.

You're messing with me.

I know. You're messing with me.

So this one, again, really reasonable, 700 ML, 86 proof, $44.99 off the door. So about the same price. Great. Yeah. Color wise. Yeah.

Good bit. Yeah. This one does have some more color to it. So, and a little more in the glass too.

Thank you.

You're welcome. This is a big different nose though. Way different. Yeah. This one's got a little bit of spice.

It's got a, it's like a honey bread kind of thing going on too.

The, uh, there's fruit there, but it's sort of a little bit of a spicy fruit. Like, uh, maybe like, you know, how pears are a little more. Spicing. I got a little bit more of a, I was going to say maybe plum or plum.

Can we say Damson's? It's a lighter plum.

I had to look that one up.

Any, any motor oil on this one, Hamsy?

No. No. But I almost think I get in coffee.

There's a little bit of a roasting note. I can see that. Yeah, a roasted note. I think that's probably a good point.

Yeah.

All right, I'm going to try this.

Cheers, guys. Cheers, guys.

Yeah, the coffee is there, no doubt.

Oh, wow.

That's a good bow. That is like a cold brew. Yeah, it is. It tastes like a cold brew a little bit. That's a good call out, Todd.

Still some nice like fruits going on, the breadiness. You know, and at first I was going to say some maple syrup, but I think it's actually more like a sorghum, sorghum or molasses or something. I may give you that one. Yeah.

Yeah. I'm a big sorghum fan. So now you got my brain thinking that.

Ooh, I like this one. This would go good with a molasses cookie, wouldn't it? It definitely would.

Yeah, this has got some nice flavors to it.

Yeah, I like this one. It's really good. And it does impress upon the entire palate, not just like one part. I mean, it's all there.

And the same flavors that hit you when you take that initial sip. kind of coats the tongue and stays the same, whereas that first one was kind of like fruity. And then you got that, like we said, that little like oaky caramel spice on the end.

Little like grape skin tannic. Yeah. It's got a lot going on for us. It does. $45 bottle. It really does.

Moment of silence. I know. We're really enjoying this one, I think.

I think so. Now you messed it up, Todd. I can't cut out that moment of silence because you're talking about it.

I just think this is pretty complex. You've got to think about this one a little bit and try and figure out what those flavors are. Exactly.

Yeah, it does have this little nice dry tannic finish on it. I like it a lot. It's got those fruit notes up front. We talked about a little bit of spicy fruit, coffee, cold brew, like you said, Todd. Well, what a call out.

And smooth, all the while smooth.

It's got the smoother approval from Rob.

Which, having said that, is not really my thing. Kind of like it to slap him in the face and, you know, tell me to go home. But no, it's a good, a good pour, a good drinker. Most people would like it.

So it's funny, like trying these scotches, you know, I like scotch. I don't drink a ton of it. Makes me want to run over in the corner. I think we've got a copy of the whiskey Bible over there. See if Jim Murray liked it too. Or if we know what we're talking about.

This is fairly new though. I don't think they've had a whole lot of releases.

You know, I actually, uh, I messaged Jim Murray last week and, uh, because I saw the new edition, it's going to be a combined, I think 25, 26, uh, edition of the whiskey Bible will be coming out soon. And for fans of the Frankfurt bourbon society, I think some of our bottles will be, uh, reviewed in that edition. So right out and buy a copy of the whiskey Bible.

Part-time resident here sometime. Yeah.

Yeah. When he's reviewing in the United States, he usually stays here in Frankfurt. Cool.

Wow.

And he can tell me how to pronounce the scotches. I usually don't remember, but.

Winner, winner. I was going to say, this one really stays on the palate a long time for an 86 proof whiskey.

For some reason, I don't know. It seems. more to the bitter side to me than sweet, which again, it's a nice flavor.

I think it starts out kind of sweet and then kind of transitions that way.

It definitely finishes on the back of the palate with a little bit of dryness and a little bit of sharpness.

It almost is in waves as it sits in your palate. It'll kind of be, you know, intense, a little bitter, peppery, then some sweetness will come out, then it'll go back the other way a little.

Interesting.

All right, folks. Well, what do you say we finish up what's in our glass here? tally our notes, go back and sniff the empty glass, because I've got nothing left of the glass number one.

Just a thought before you end. You did say Olorosa Sherry, and that kind of got lost in the mix, I think. I don't know.

Unless you all- You know, usually that imparts a little nuttiness, but I mean, it might be there kind of like a- I kind of got the grape skin a little bit.

So maybe it was there for some of you.

You know, in a little bit of that, what I was saying was maybe molasses or something could have been that sherry. Sure. And then I think sometimes that the tannins, that little dry kind of bitter finish can come from the sherrys.

Was it three years in the Sherry or was that what we talked about something else? I might've lost track.

One to three. One to three. So they're blending. So some were one, some were three, some were two.

Isn't it often, you know, 30, 60, 90 days kind of stuff in some of these casts? I just thought that was surprising and I was expecting more.

It's kind of all across the board. I mean, typically over here, you see these age a little shorter, but I showed you that single barrel of my friends that's been in Madera cast for three years. And that thing is,

Yeah, I would expect so.

Dark and stormy looking.

Well, and I may have, my ADD one, or I was concentrating on the glass. Did it say if it was a first fill or? It didn't. Yeah.

No mention of that.

So that's it sometimes too, Rob. That barrel may have been used. Multiple. Three or four times as a finishing barrel already. Yeah.

So even the elongated period doesn't do it justice or doesn't do as much as it might have in an earlier fill. Right.

Because I know like some of the ex-Burton Brails, they'll use those numerous, numerous times.

A lot of times if it's first fill, they will say it's first fill.

Yeah. It's kind of a talking point now for Scotch, I guess.

It seems like the Kentucky bourbons we deal with are to the exacting specifications. If you're pouring stuff into something one, two, or three times, are they not concerned about being a profile that they're recreating? That's unusual. I hadn't heard that before, so I didn't know.

A lot of times, they're going for very extended aging in that colder climate and then it doesn't get over-oked that way. I heard someone talking about barrels once on another podcast. I don't recall what it was. Scotch tends to go in at a higher proof than bourbon does and other things. Apparently, as you reuse a barrel, the next time you put something in there should be a higher proof than what was in there before so that it can still extract a little bit more from the barrel.

Wow. Wow, interesting. Didn't know that. That's Andy Supire also. He's a bit of a Wikipedia. He is full of information.

A buttload of information. No, that would be a buttload.

He's off the chain. He's off the chain. All right, folks, we'll stick around. We're going to tally our notes and we will be back in the second half. We've got two or more, probably three. Anyway, stick around. We'll be right back.

All right, listeners, welcome back to the Montemigos Revenge, or Revenge of the Montemigos, or whatever we title it. But in the first half, we tried the Two Stacks, the First Cut Signature Blend. Very impressive, a little lighter on the flavors. Oh, yeah. And then follow that up with the Two Stacks Double Barrel Single Grain. And I think that one, if you listen that first half, you can tell that kind of impresses.

Yeah, hit a lot of notes. Yeah.

So we've got three more. Yep. We've got three more to go through on this second half. And we're going to start off with the Glen Scotia 15 year. 15 years. Yeah. Almost legal to drive almost. So it's a 92 proof. We're upping the proof just a hair. 99.99 on the price. This actually comes in 750 milliliter bottles. I don't know if that's just for the American export type thing. It's in the Cabletown region. You know, actually I never knew how many regions were. So as you say, I Googled it and there are five. So there's Highlands, Lowlands, Cabletown, Isla, and...forgetting them one more. Space site. Space site. I almost forgot space site. Yes. So, yeah. Aged in first fill, ex bourbon barrels. Does say on that. And they've been producing scotches there since 1832, which is quite a while.

Pushing 200. They have any 200 year old stuff?

I've seen like some 50 year scotches and things like that. Those have some big, big prices though.

Like four digits, five digits. Yeah.

It's pretty reasonable for 18.

All right. So yeah, you said 99.99 on this and it comes in a US 750 and you can probably get it quite a few places. We've had Lac Lamon. Yeah.

The last time we got together, we had the, they were the two younger, I think it was a 10 and 12 with the 10 Glen Scotia and the 12 Lac Lamon. All right. Let's check it out. Okay. There's a little Pete. There is a little Pete. So Camel Town is kind of a maritime, you know, we just had that Nantucket, uh, Nantucket single malt from that area. Oh, this has a great nose.

It smells clean, clean, fresh, fresh. There you go.

I'm torn between whether or not it's floral or fruity, or if it's both.

I think it's a little of both. It's got a little rubber baby buggy bumpers in it. You remember that? Yeah.

Wow. Yeah. I mean, that's really got a pretty crazy nose to it.

I love it. I love it. Yeah, there's a lot going on with this one. You getting the band-aid, Rob?

Man.

Now they do peated, unpeated, lightly peated. So they've got a wide array. So I'd say this one's probably lightly peated. Very lightly.

Yeah. This is a light touch.

Not as light as the two stacks, the first one we had. That was 2%. I'm going to say this is a little more than that.

That's where Rob picked up just a little bit of rotten fruit. Just a little bit.

Yeah. All right. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers.

Oh, I like that. If you wanted to dip your toe into the peat and scotch world, this would be lukewarm water.

Yes, great starter for sure. It's there, but it's not the star of the show.

A little buttery. Yeah. Yep. MC, I am getting fruit and floral on it.

I definitely think this is one that makes you salivate as well.

Yeah, it does.

Sometimes we'll say grilled fruits, but this is like literally like you put some fruits in a smoker rather than a grill. Yeah, smoked fruit. Yeah, like just literally set them in there for maybe a few minutes to give it just that hint.

Talk to Mike and see if he can't smoke us some fruits. Yeah, there you go.

Some smoked pears.

Smoked apples. Clean, fresh. It does have a waft of just nice peat smoke.

In all fairness, I like that flavor, but You really need to like that flavor or you don't want to go to something else for sure.

Yeah, it is polarizing.

Probably acquired taste or something to that nature.

But it could be addictive too. It could be like a little both. It's like one of those things you're like, oh, I don't know if I like that. And then it's like later you're like, I need more of that.

I think that's where I am with it.

But it go well with a nice light, maybe medium stick. There you go. Oh yeah. Cigar.

I feel like I've come up with some weird things so far. One thing I got on the nose right before we tasted it, I finally figured out what it makes me think of a little bit. Like I said, it's floral, it's fruit. Somebody said clean. I started thinking about it's some kind of a cleaning product or something. I think it's Gojo hand cleaner, like mechanics would use and stuff. On the nose, I get a little bit of that in a good way.

I can actually see that because I know what you're talking about.

A little petrol almost, but then there's some other pleasing sense they add in.

You missed your colon, MC. You should write your tasting notes.

You know, Scotch can sometimes have some descriptors that sound terrible, but somehow they taste great.

Exactly. Well, I mean, even Pete.

Yeah.

I mean, that's off-putting for some people.

Well, you're talking about that burnt tire. We actually had a couple of American single mounts and I think I pulled the burnt tire on the nose.

Yeah, I mean, some of the notes that come out, I mean, you know, when you talk about like band-aids or ashtrays or burnt tires and yeah, I mean, I get it. I understand. But, you know, you're trying to relate to something that you've experienced in your life. And the closest thing you can come up with is those little things your grandma would put in your jaw when you had a toothache when you were a kid and it had that, has a flavor, you know, this, or, or, you know, Mercurochrome.

I almost said that there's a underlying juicy fruit in here also to me.

Yeah. This is really nice. That's probably where, yeah, that, that fruit that you're getting there, you're kind of on it there. I get that.

It's really, really good. Yeah. This is, this is not a Pete monster. Nope.

But you know, the flavor kind of doesn't go away when it does just kind of lay there and, you know, I'm taking a drink for a little bit and it's just still there.

I'd say the finish is a little shorter than that second one for me. For some reason, that just seemed to linger forever. Yeah, a little bit.

I like the buttery. I think this has got the good texture to it. And part of that, I think, when I talk about the butteriness, is part of that is texture, I think.

Yeah.

And there's pot-stilled whiskey in here.

I don't think it said if they were pot-stilled there, but it is Scotland. There's probably a 50-50 chance.

Or 60-40, right? Right.

But very impressive. Yeah, really good. All right, we ready to move on? Lock it in, boys. I tell you what, I think we're going to be all over the place today when we rank these. Yeah, that's OK. That's all right. That's what it's about. All right, so this, we're moving up in age. This is the Lac Lamond. The Lac Lamond, 18 year, 92 proof, $110, also 750 milliliters. And this one's from the Highland regions. The odd thing about Lac Le Mans is they use a straight neck still, which allows them to have a lot of control over the still there. They are known for their unpeated, lightly peated, and heavily peated expressions. And this has aged in a combination of three different American cast types, which I mean, you think American New Oak, obviously ex-Burban, but you think maybe they've done something, some whiskey maybe? Like a rye cask? Maybe rye, yeah, that's true. But yeah.

All right. Let's noser. Check it out. Okay. So this one does have that cooked fruit and it's buttery. Like a, like a, um, uh, what are those pies with the fruit and the crossed?

Like a mince meat?

Well, the, the lattice on top. I can't remember the name. Maybe a little blackberry.

Okay.

Blackberry butter.

I'm still trying to think of that lattice pie you're talking about.

You know, you let your nose get a little farther away, almost some apple in there too.

Yeah.

Almost like a little green apple.

Yeah. A little more fruit. Not so much Pete for me.

Right. Pete will stick with you for a while though. Yeah.

All right. I'm ready to sip. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers.

Wow. I expected more sweetness.

If there's peat on that, it's really light. Yeah. Oh, actually, yeah. Just at the tail end.

You sure it's not from the last class?

Oh, I'm going to take a second sip.

You made me think now. With that peat, you never know. Yeah, you never know. I get home, Destiny's going to think I've been out burning tires again.

I think that apple's still there, that green apple.

I want to say on the finish on this, I get peach. I can see that.

Orchard fruits. Yeah, it's a little more cobblery now, I think. I was getting a little blackberry up front, but now I'm sort of getting that peach you're talking about. But I do get the sort of the bready, crusty, buttery crust.

There's a little bit of similarity in these two. I just went back and sipped the Clint Scotia.

I keep going back and forth just trying to see where I stand. I don't know, this one's, I was going to say a little more medicinal. I don't know why I'm getting that.

On the Laclimon? So you're pretty sure the peat notes we're getting on this one are from this one?

It's just at the very tail end. Maybe it's like remnants from that, but I feel like I would have washed away. It's just a, maybe a hair. I'm just not getting it on the nose. No, not getting it on the palate.

So it's like, that's odd. What about you, Emsi?

Yeah, I don't know that I get any peed on this.

I just think it's a layover for me from the previous pour. Maybe so. I didn't rinse my palate enough.

Well, or that Glen Scotia maybe was intense enough. We just can't pick it up on this one. Yeah.

I like those. It does like sweetness for me. It's kind of a more of a buttery crust. Um, I'll go with the peach. I think the peach overwhelms the little bit of blackberry note I got on it. Um,

Once the peach comes out a little more as you get past mid palette and kind of towards the finish a little.

OK, I was intrigued because we're kind of all over the place with this. So here's what AI says about the palette. Stewed or caramelized apple, poached pear, pineapple.

I'm not getting the pineapple.

Toffee, fudge, cream, caramel, your black currant. Little oak spice, which yeah, that's definitely there. Cigar box, gingerbread, little clove, a gentle lacing, a soft campfire. So I guess it does. Yeah. Jamie.

Well, I think with the previous one, we stood in the campfire for a little bit.

Yeah. It was kind of hard. I figured I just went with age on these two. So, you know, it didn't, there is a peak, like, you know, like, what do you call it? A rating, right? I forget what it's called. There's Scoville ratings for peppers, but there is a Pete rating.

I don't think the Glen Scotia is some kind of a...

I mean, it's not a monster. Neither of these are monsters. No, it's definitely not. Yeah. I would say there might be a hair more on that Glen Scotia. Yeah.

Okay. AI sounded like a palm reader on that one. It was all over the board.

They're stealing notes from all of us.

Listen to us say this. So it's just brought back our notes. Yeah.

So every time we do a podcast, we put out our transcripts on the internet. So they're getting scanned by all the AI's. So yeah, you can bet we're contributing to that mess.

They're like, AI's like, this one's out in left field, but it's okay. All right, Amzie, I think you got our...

Fifth port today, right? You want to tell us a little bit? Yeah. So, last week I saw this on the internet that it came out and I had to have it. So, ordered it. Brudladi. Brudladi, I think. You're supposed to roll that R a little. Brudladi. A rye. So, it's called the laddie rye. Seven-year-old Scotch whiskey made from 55% rye and 45% malted barley. Apparently, they were trying to do some crop rotation to improve the soil a little bit. Then I guess they were trying to figure out what to do with the rye. It's going to cost a lot of money to sell it to someone else because they'd have to ship it off the island. And so they decided to use it. I guess at first they wanted to malt the rye, but none of the maltsters would actually do it because they didn't want to contaminate their malt houses with rye. They just want to keep barley in there. Wow.

They just don't know. They just don't understand.

Well, I think even without malted rye, I think it's pretty good. Let's see what y'all think about it. Let's check it out. What's this retail for? Oh, it was maybe, I know you told me I should have that. I'm going to say $40. Oh, wow. Really? Yeah. And this is 100 proof too, right? It could have been 50.

And this is a 750 local bottle? I think it may.

Might be a 700. Could be, but I think they said it was for sale in the US only. Okay. At least at this point, so.

The laddie rye. And it's got a seven on it. That's seven years? Mm-hmm. It is seven years old. Got it.

And I believe they indicated there may be future releases. They may age longer. So, so there will be future.

Right. But they need to find a maltster to, to malt some of it. Don't you agree Rob? Absolutely. You're the Mr. Malted Rye guy. Exactly. You have two superpowers. Oh my gosh.

Tell Pam, right?

Yeah, yeah. Tell Pam.

OK. It was $60. $60. OK. Still. Fair price. Yeah.

Well, I haven't tasted it yet, but when I hear $60 for a bottle of whiskey, I'm already thinking, OK. That's still in Pam's price range.

Since we did Irish and Scotch whiskey, I wish I still had some. But you know, Powers Irish whiskey did a rye a few years ago.

I think two stacks might be Scotch, I think. Right? I'm a little confused now. All right.

I'm all in the nose. It does smell rightish.

Yeah. It's a little like anise.

Yeah. And it's malty. The funny thing is it kind of smells like a malted rye, doesn't it, Rob?

You think so? Yeah, absolutely. So I'll tell you, all right, something crazy. When I had this the other day, I hadn't had a few scotches first, right? Right. And to me it smelled like a scotch, but now I pick up so much more of the rye. Yeah.

Yeah.

This kind of reminds me a little bit of like, uh, trying to think of, was there, there was a malted rye from, uh, up in Cincinnati there. We had the, New riff.

Oh, new riff, new riff. Maysville's up there.

Maysville's up there too. Yeah. Maysville was a little like softer and lighter and more delicate than this.

What's that Pennsylvania rye? Not stole a Liberty pole. It's a little similar to me like that. It's a little bit of like, yeah, like you're walking through a farm a little bit and like, yeah.

Oh, this is... I did.

I went ahead.

Oh, all right. Here we go. Cheers.

Let's catch up with Jim.

I'm going to zip my lips here. You guys get to talk first.

Oh, that's something as expressive as I thought it was going to be since it's a riot. That's really nice and soft. There's a graininess to it though. Like that rice bite, little rice spices there, but there's like, you can, it gets a little herbally like a tea. Yeah, it's herbal. Like a, almost like a black tea or something, a little bit.

What do you think, Rob? Is this in the malted rye wheelhouse a little bit?

Yeah, definitely. I like the nose, flavor's good. I don't know, my first thought was a floral, a bit of a floral for some reason. I don't know, I had a little bit of a cold. I feel like I'm having trouble picking up fruit. Some of the fruits you guys have been talking about could be just, you know.

And that second sip got a little darker to me. Like I'm getting a little like fudgy, dark fudgy note. And it got a little spicier on the second tip too. Like some pepper, black pepper kind of. Yep.

Well, with that much roasted barley, what did you say, 45? I mean, that's pretty strong in it. I mean, yeah, I could, it's kind of in my wheelhouse. I mean, I didn't know this kind of stuff existed, frankly.

I feel like for me today, it's very different than when I tried it a couple of days ago. I almost get, so on the nose for me, it was a little bit piney, like pine salt kind of. And I feel like on the palate, I get a little like, almost like a sweet lemon, like lemon meringue pie type thing on it, which I didn't get the other day. The other day I felt like I got a lot more of the malt. with, with, still had a good rye note. So I think after trying these, it's kind of changed my palette a little bit today.

Isn't that amazing? Yeah. I always think it's fascinating when like, you're like, you go in to that, like maybe four or five days later on something, then you're like, wait, there's something new there or something different. Right.

So the other thing I will say is the other day, I actually looked up to see if this had peated malt in it. So like I said, on, on a fresh palette without the peated stuff beforehand. And I almost wonder if it's just, because of where it's made. If it doesn't actually get a little bit of exposure from the air or whatever else, you know, that's, that's unavoidable.

Well, you know, when you say pine salt, I mean, that might be a little of what I get in all the, you know, these scotches, these single malts, whatever.

All right. Well, we've got to compile and think and we've got a winter, winter chicken dinner voting session to do here, guys.

Yep.

And I'm all over the place in my own brain. I can't imagine what we're going to be as a group.

That's not, not going to be easy.

No, or we can just make up some shit.

No, no, no.

Artists expect exact professional. Feel free to cut that out.

No, no, it's okay.

Pause, pause, pause.

You know, I think when you get to Scotch's, you know, Irish whiskeys, things are kind of all over the place versus, you know, a lot of bourbons are fairly similar. And so, you know, I think preference, personal preference comes in quite a bit. These are all very different. Yeah.

My eyes are opened up to just what you said and what we're tasting and some different things. Maybe you're doing that for the listeners. It's kind of unique to have these different flavors. can be, you know, kind of right down the middle. Yeah.

Bourbon's kind of a very narrow, very regulated kind of very central kind of thing and where Scotch is, man, they can do all kinds of free stuff. They get crazy. And I appreciate that. I do too.

I was going to say, this is 18 years old. If it's like Bourbon, I mean, there's There could be some 25 shows, you know, in some of these blends.

And if you've listened to our recent shows of American Single Malts, you can see that the same kind of thing is going on there. There's just such a, it's like you open up the flood gates and what you're able to do and what you can get away with. And it changes things. For sure. It does.

And if you like sipping and just enjoying a conversation and thought, then this is good for you to delve into. Yeah.

I mean, there are those who will potentially buy all five bottles they hear about on the show. And then there are others who will say, which one should I invest in? Because, you know, I only want to get one of those. That's why I think it's great that we do the winner-winner chicken dinner thing. It lets us try to agree on something. We don't always agree, do we, Todd?

No. We also don't give it a value. A lot of podcasters out there give it a rating. I don't know.

Ours is really, on this show, this is what we thought. There's no way to take that and translate it into what they have on the last show. Is it better than that?

Yeah.

And we often say, you know, on a different day, it could go a different way. I mean, like Amzie said, that it changed.

And if I rank something last and yet I come to your house and you pour that, guess what? I'm drinking it. I mean, you know, it's not like it's putrid. It's just a, it's a different thing. We're evaluating five things head to head and let the chips fall.

All right, so let's take a few minutes and sort of compile our notes, and then we'll let everybody know what we think.

All right. Tough today.

Those were five really nice pours, I thought, today. All very different.

Yeah. With some similarities, too, though. Yeah. So my third place today is going to be the Two-Stacks Double Barrel, single grain.

OK.

I really enjoyed that. It's a really, I mean, $45. Yeah, that's a nice pour and a nice introduction to folks who haven't had Irish whiskey.

I'll go next. My number three was the Glen Scotia, the more pitted of the ones that we had. And for me, it kind of came in third place.

So good pour. Enjoyed it. Yeah. I'll just throw in the Lachloman. Back, Baghdad, Kentucky, 1967. I don't know if I'm pronouncing that right or not. But I'm not singing it to you right now. You have to sing it. You sang it earlier. I know, but you got to come to my, the rare Eagle bar and I'll sing it to you. I actually know like four verses. So that's your third? Yeah.

Okay. Amzie? I'm going to say, um, I'm going to agree with that. Lac Lamon would be my number three as well. Wow.

Okay. So we've got number three. Let's just recap. Cause this could get confusing for the listeners. So for the third place, Todd had the two stacks, double barrel, single grain. I had the Glenn Scotiia 15, right? And, uh, both Rob and Amzie had the Lac Lamon. Yep. All right.

I'd say we'll just keep it simple and we'll keep same order this time.

Okay.

So my second place is going to be the Brook Lottie, the Rye.

Got it.

Yup. That's a nice pork. Good, good, good snag on that one, Amzie. And thanks for sharing.

Yeah. So my number two was the double bear from two stacks. So we just, you and I just flipped on that one a little bit, but basically I think we're all saying the same thing, you know? Rob?

Yeah, I'm going to go with the same one you had. Two stacks? Yeah, two stacks. Okay. Double barrel. Yep. Yep.

So I think what I would have to say here is probably, I'm going to go Glen Scotia on this one. I really enjoyed that.

So we've got the same group of bottles that are all centering around this second and third place a little bit.

There were some narrow margins today, for sure. Yeah, there's some narrow margins. All right, Todd. My first place is actually going to be the Glen Scotia. I love that little kiss of smoke. Like you said, it would be a great introduction if you want to dabble your toe in a little peat. Yeah, it's a nice pour.

All right. I'm going with the Brook Lytle.

The rye.

It just hit home for me. It was really good. And I enjoyed it. I enjoyed it a lot. And hats off to a Scotch whiskey company putting out a rye like that. Fantastic. Yeah.

It's very creative, for sure. I mean, that definitely takes a little bit of courage. Hopefully, maybe some others will follow soon. I was going to say, depending on sales, for sure.

All right.

Oh, am I up?

Rob, what's your number one?

Well, Glen Scotiab, I saved a little bit and still sipping on. Oh, you're a peat monster, huh?

Yeah, yeah.

It's kind of bad. Cheers to that, Rob. And again, you know, it's like we're picking our favorite flavor of ice cream. Come on, it's ice cream. It's ice cream.

So I think I don't know. I was probably a little hard on my laddie rye. So I really enjoyed it, but it was so different that I probably sort of mentally excluded it from my judging this evening. I do really like it. But yeah, somehow it was so different. I kind of didn't want to compare it on these. And so I am going to say the two stacks double barrel. I really, really enjoyed that one.

I'm just trying to put this in my head and try to do math.

I was going to say this is a very close race, I would think, if you did some sort of point system.

So do you have it kind of figured out in your head?

I think we are the winners. We finally got together, we got to drink some Irish whiskey and single malt.

I think I can't figure out which one's one and two, but I think the top two are the Lac Lamon and the Double Barrel.

Rob and I voted the Glen Scotia first.

So maybe, yeah.

So if you give it points based on that, like I said, I think it's really close. It is. All right. I may listen to this and we'll, we'll, I'll do the, like the point system where you get more points for first place and you know, less for second. And maybe on the bourbon roadies page, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll tally it up and see what comes up.

That's what, that's what I get for doing drunk math.

But you know, we can all do math like nobody's business.

Maybe if there's a theoretical mathematician listening, they can help us out here.

But you're going to do that, Todd, and then you're going to post it in the road.

Yeah, I'm going to take a good picture of the bottles we have. And like I said, I've got those two little mini cans of the two stacks, which I make give away.

It's like send a, oh yeah, I want to just see a picture of that. I don't even know what, that seems weird. But let me say real quick. You know, as much as I always like heavy Pete, I like high proof, I like, you know, all the crazy stuff. Slap you in the face. Slap me in the face. But let's, let's don't ever forget that, you know, the, maybe the, the two that didn't get a lot of votes from us, I bet my wife would like both of those better than the other three that we chose. So, you know, that just always my thought. I want to go back to the, There's people out there with different reasons for drinking or different thoughts, different whatever, so you get a lower proof, a little floral, a little easy sipping, and they're going to like that better than what we chose. We're going to come in last.

I've got a couple of final comments here, and the first one has to do with Rob. It has to do with Rob. I don't know how many times you've been on this show, you and Amzie both. Over two. Many, many times.

Over five, because we made you bring us in that one time.

I heard you sing the La Clermont song. And honestly, we need to make sure you get a bottle of that. I'm going to make sure you get a bottle of that to put on your bar. So when people do come to town and they visit your bar... You know what will happen. You have to sing.

You know what will happen. My wife is going to hate this. And the second thing is... So you all got to come and sing with me.

Oh, I just want to say it was like the voice of an angel having heard it.

You're drunk.

The second thing is, you know how sometimes we, well, most times we like to, I like to throw together everything we tried on the show into one glass and try it. This time we anticipated that and pre-prepared a mixture of all five whiskies that came on the show today. And we're all sitting here with it. We're going to close the show with a few tasting notes on this monstrosity, this Frankenstein that we put together.

And so a new thing for me, I mean, I didn't know this like a year ago. You guys call this like an infinity, right? Yeah. This is the definition, purest definition of an infinity. If you get bottles that eat down to what, an inch?

Yep.

a fair inch range.

Usually about a pour or two, yeah.

Yeah, a pour or two. And it gets there and it stays there. It can, what's the word? Oxidize. Oxidize. I don't even know what the hell that is. But you pour them all up and you create something cool, maybe. Maybe, yeah. Or something you can clean your windows with.

This is what was left in our five glasses. So let's try it out and see what we think. The nose is great. I've already been nosing it. Oh, yeah. The nose is nice. I like that.

Yeah. I smell it.

I kind of figured it would be all peat, but it's not. No, it comes off a lot more fruitier.

Whatever I said I smelled before, I smell all five of it. Cheers.

That's actually good. It's nice.

Yeah, that's really nice. Locke La Kentucky River.

Yeah, that's actually really good. Wow. That has a nice...

It would be locked to four, right?

Yeah. I think the word that comes to my mind is dank.

Dank.

You know that's a word, right? What does dank mean? I don't know, but it's got a buttload of it.

butt-loaded day. I love it.

Yeah. And it ends with a K, not a G. Well, cheers, Maltmigos.

We had a great show today. Yes. Thanks for coming, guys. Cheers. We'll try to do this a couple times a year anyway. It's always fun. We always have a great time. It seems like anymore we get more opportunities to taste single malts. American single malts are really on the rise. Todd and I have had a couple of shows where we had just American single malts. And there's some amazing stuff out there.

Sadly, we would have done that, but the samples they sent were just like little small two ounce pours. And that doesn't go very far for people.

But Todd, thank you for putting together a great show, bringing in a few bottles. Amzie, thank you for bringing that laddie rye. That was amazing. I mean, it was my number one, but everybody has their own palate.

Lots of fun to get together, guys.

We just, we've got to really work on thinking up the titles for these shows. We're getting, we're getting kind of crazy with the, the Montmigos ride again, the Montmitos rise again.

We can just be boring and do like Montmigos three, Montmigos four, extended cut.

Yeah, I know it's kind of off a little bit, but I sometimes want to call us the Four Roses or something.

Aren't you sweet?

That's our wives. That's a good one. Thanks, Jim. I'm going to stick with that.

I was going to say, we're Four Thorns.

All right. Well, you can find the bourbon road on all social media outlets. You can find us on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, Facebook threads. We do all those things every single week. Todd and I get together. We do a show. Sometimes it's a whole bunch of us in a room drinking, you know, malt whiskey. Sometimes, you know, it's just rises. Sometimes it's just Todd and I with a guest. We have such a great time, but every week we drink whiskeys. We tell you what we like. It lets you know what you ought to keep your eye out for on the shelf. Make sure you tune into us. The best way not to miss a show, scroll to the top of that app you're on, hit that subscribe button. That way you'll get that notification letting you know that Jim and Todd have put out another episode of The Bourbon Road. And you know, it's funny, we call it The Bourbon Road, but we've been drinking a lot of single malt lately, haven't we?

There you go.

All right. We love you to pop into the Bourbon Roadies, our Facebook group. It's a great group of people. We always have fun. We share information and pictures and life events. It's just a great group of people, about 3,500 of us. Wow. We hope you'll come check it out. But, you know, until the next time, we'll see you down the Bourbon Road.

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