493. All Rye Everything: Short Barrel, New Riff, Frey Ranch & More

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 four and join us.

Hey there Bourbon Roadies, it's Diane Strong with Bourbon on the Banks Festival. We've got another amazing event coming your way this year. Be sure to join us at the half and I'll give you an update on our ticket availability for the event taking place on October 3rd, 2026.

All right, listeners, welcome back to another episode of the Bourbon Road podcast. Jim and I are here at the Bourbon Road bar tonight. We've got five pours we're going to go through and they are all rye.

Rye night.

Yeah.

I didn't say all rye, I said all rye. All rye. It's a, it's not Friday though. So we can't say, yeah. Rye day. Yeah. But we'll make do.

All right. So our first one is going to be the short barrel. This is the after swarm. And this is actually the second iteration of the after swarm because they have two different ones and we'll get into that when we dive in. So with this one, what they do is they call it the conditioning process and they take a Kelvin Cooperage barrel, fill it with raw honey. In this case, it is, um, Oregon Oregon meadow foam honey.

Okay.

Which I didn't do a deep dive on that. That's right. Any apiarist out there were like, Oh, I know what that is. Uh, they let the honey soak into those staves for months. Usually like, um, 10, 11 months, something like that. And then the rides then put into those honey soaked wood for about 11 to 12 months.

So do they, is it like, do they just put honey in the barrel and then like moving around so it hits all the sides or do they fill it up with 53 gallons of honey?

I'm guessing it gets filled because I mean, you know, You know, those folks would probably that are giving them that honey are probably going to take it and, you know, everyone probably likes a bourbon barrel.

That's true. I mean, yeah, there's a, there's a, there's a good market for barrel aged honey. So I can see that.

So like I said, uh, there are two different versions. The after swarm one, which is the original, uh, it uses Georgia wildflower. honey, which of course short barrels out of Atlanta, Georgia. Um, so it's a blend of 95 five MGP and 95 five green river rye. Okay. In both cases. So the biggest difference between the two is just the type of honey that goes in the barrels. Got it. Um, so this is kind of the, uh, this is the rye version of the, their, their bourbon is called bees knees. After swarm, after swarm. Love it.

So let's nose. I'm hitting the nose and it has a nice sweet. And I'm being honest here, had I not known it, it had honey. I still would have said it had honey on the nose.

So this retails for about 115.

It's kind of neat though. You still get this, this nice rye, um, freshness popping out from beneath the honey.

And it does say it's age six plus years. So I'm guessing there's probably some, a blend of older barrels with six being the youngest. I want to say the honey's a soft touch on this.

Yeah.

Are you getting a little coconut?

You know, I think I am. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. I haven't got that since the, uh, knob Creek 21.

So that's been a minute every now and then you get coconut and it really takes you by surprise. I'm trying to remember all the places I've had coconut, but a lot of vanilla in there too. Yeah, this is nice. This is a, a tamed rye. This is tamed. This has been tamed a little bit with the honey. Yeah. Honey aging or honey barrel.

And this will be the only, the only finished one. All right. I'm going to taste it. Same. Cheers. Oh, my. Hello. Hello. That's not nearly as sweet as I was expecting. There's some sweetness, but but it's thick.

Mm hmm. It's very syrupy. It's syrupy. It's thick. It's got a nice texture to it. It's like the perfect balance between a light sweetness and that that ninety five five rye that you get out of out of M.G.P. Mm hmm.

That's a good balance. It's almost like you took a, like a rye muffin and then took a big slab of butter and then, yeah, some honey.

I got it. Here's what it is. Rye muffin. I'll give you that. Like honey butter. Toasted pine nuts. Ooh, pine nuts. And honey drizzle. I like that. So good. So well balanced. That is great on the palette. Here comes the hug. What was the proof again? Uh, 108.6.

Yeah. Yeah. It's got a nice, uh, after swarm, the, I guess version one is actually a little higher proof, which is kind of interesting. It's only 110.6. So, Yeah. Hunting can be a little over the top. Sometimes we've had some pretty good ones recently. We had the, uh, the one from a Southern star, which was nice.

Yeah. This would confuse me with a cigar. So I don't think it's a, would be a good match, but, um, I think it would be an excellent after dinner pour out on the porch with, uh, some sort of dessert. Ooh, that would be good. Like, um, I wonder how well it would go with like apple pie. I bet it would go good with chocolate even. Maybe. Like a minty chocolate? Oh yeah. Like a, oh thin mint maybe. Thin mints or Andes, that's what they are. They're called Andes.

Our good friend Delia from the chocolate, Delicia? Is that the name of it? She could probably pair up something really good with this. Delicia. Delicia Chocolatiers.

Yep.

Yeah, that's, that's very nice. Very pleasant.

Kind of lets the rye shine through too, a little bit, even though it sat in there for 11, 12 months. It doesn't hide the rye. It enhances it. No, it softens it. It does soften it. But it definitely is a nice companion to the rye. It's balanced. It just has a great, it's great on the palate.

It's really good. The coconut's kind of gone away.

Now, if you had a honey finished rye before,

Or have they all been bourbons? I'd have to go back in the memory banks, but I feel like most of them have been bourbons.

All we got to do is go on the bourbon road and type honey and it'll tell us.

Like I said, honey's not one of those I search for very often, but this one would be kind of fun to have on the bar. It's a little pricey, but. There's something really interesting on that finish. Kind of gets like chocolate, like almost like a chocolate covered chili. Yeah.

It's almost like a Mexican chocolate. Yeah. All the honey searches came up with bourbons on the site.

Okay. Oh, I knew that, uh, Southern star or Southern distilling. I knew that was a bourbon. Yeah.

All right. Well, great Todd. That was a great pour.

Yes. Agreed. Uh, and now we're ready to move on to pour two. All right. You should be excited about this one. So new riff is now doing some surprise like. in-house distillery drops, like kind of experimental stuff, or they put them out in like 375s with like handwritten labels kind of thing. Oh, I wouldn't want to be that guy. I know. If I lived in, right, right. Or something, they might be like, it might just be the font or something. But anyway, this is their 10 year malted rye. Oh my goodness. Folks, his eyes just lit up like, like stars. So like I said, this was a special release there at new riff came out in a 375 milliliter bottle. I think it was like 45 99, which double that. It's about 90 bucks. Yeah. Our good friend, Jeff Wack in Cincinnati at the Hello Again Whiskey Friends crew was kind enough. He actually sent two of the pours we were going to try tonight. Thank you, Jeff. Yeah. Thank you, Jeff. I've been kind of sharing some of the stuff they send to us because I'm like, Hey, review this on your YouTube channel. And it's kind of a nice wheeling and dealing.

Yeah.

So it's a blend of two, three barrels, a hundred percent malted rye. And yeah, I mean, new riff is one of those that's really, uh, coming to the forefront, I think.

Okay. I'm getting a little bit of a, like an earthy chalky stony note, like a mineral stone, scratch two stones together, that kind of smell and earthiness.

Proof on this is 118.8. Wow. We're getting up there.

Great. And those underlying a little bit of fruit, uh, some, uh, a little bit of aromatic spice. It's definitely toned down a little bit from the freshness we got off that first pour. Yeah, not quite as expressive as that first one, for sure. Right. I think the malting the rye takes away a little bit of its spicy oomph. It delivers a little more earthiness.

It softens it just a bit. Yeah. All right. And like I said, that fruit definitely shines a little bit. Can we taste it? Cheers. Cheers.

Ooh, softened a little bit, got a little bit, it's a little more grain forward. Despite its 10 years. Yeah, but it does carry forward those nose, those notes we got, I got on the nose with a, you know, the kind of the mineral stone note plus the earthy note, but it is a softer rye. Not as floral, but it does have that fruit note. Yeah. It's like fruit. I'm getting some dark chocolate though. Some mint. Yeah, so the chocolate's kind of like a dry dark chocolate, right? Not a sweet dark chocolate.

Not sweet at all, no. Yeah. Almost like that, like your thin mints. You know, we've been talking about Girl Scout cookies, I think, a few shows lately.

I want a Burberry that tastes like, or right, tastes like Samoas. Samoas. That's coconut, right? Yep.

There's a nice spicy tingle on the tongue too. This is nice.

It is, uh, it does carry over nose to palette. The finish on it though, goes a different direction. The finish is kind of a little more, um, a little green, bitter green, bitter green design greens, not a taste, but it's, I mean, I can think like, like experiment experiment or, um, Um, like I'm going, we're going from like a more of an earthy tone to more of like a, um, um, forest growth. Like, uh, I got you a little more green living, living plant matter rather than dead plant matter. How's that?

I was thinking like, you know, like those Aspen Northern forest type thing, coniferous forest. So Jim, we've often talked about how you kind of like, wow, Turkey 101 was kind of your intro into becoming, well, I guess it was your bourbon intro, but it's kind of your thing. But what was the ride that really spoke to you and said, do you recall?

I was thinking about that on the drive here. I think, what was the first ride that really got my attention? Boy, that's a, that's a good one. Yeah. I should have warned you. Sorry.

I was thinking about that on the way up. Probably the Pikesville. I was going to say, I think that might be the one that, you know.

Wow. High, high proof. What was it?

One to 15 or something like that.

Yeah. A reasonable price, decent age on it out of a well-known big boy distiller. Um, solid, solid, solid. I haven't had it in a minute. It's been a while. I've still got one somewhere. I've got one over on the bar too, but I just haven't visited in a while. So, uh, beyond that, I don't know. Maybe, uh, going back, uh, maybe the early Kentucky Owls.

Okay. Um, about Russell's Ry or anything like that?

Uh, yeah. Was it? I don't know. I've never been a huge like Russell's rye guy. Okay. Not that I don't like them. I mean, I like the rare breed rye. I like the, you know, I like the Russell's rye. It's just not something that I typically go to.

Um, it's cause I had the rare breed rye might be another one that like made me think I like rye.

Yeah. Rare breed rye is solid. It's really good. Um, and you know, I'll be honest with you, just this, when old Forrester came out with their, They're a hundred proof rye for going in a well at a bar. I mean, that was pretty awesome. It was a pretty solid rye at well prices. Yeah. I thought that was great.

Okay. I was just curious because I, you know, I have about a 30 minute drive to get here. So I'm listening to music and things like that. And I'm thought, you know, Jim's never said what rye kind of, you know, steered him down the rye road, if you will. So that's cool to know.

I know that three chamber I got my attention though. Sure did. All right.

Um, nice expression. Yeah. Shall we move on to the third one? Let's do it. All right. I'm very excited about this one. So this is from Frey Ranch, Kobe and Ashley, right? Yeah, I think it's Ashley. Ashley Frey, Frey? Frey. Yeah, Frey Ranch. So this is their Frey Ranch Farm Strength Uncut Rye. So, you know, one of the real cool things about them is they are a true farm to glass American whiskey distillery and a proud member of University of Kentucky's State Whiskey Alliance. Wow, that's pretty cool. We talked to someone about that recently a little bit. Oh, the gentleman from Peter E. Hart. Right. Yeah, because he did the UK thing. So this is exclusively sold only on their online whiskey shop. It retails for $79.99. It is a year-round offering. This one is $124.52 proof. I do like how they give you that extra digit of proof. They do that.

I mean, it comes up on the meter, might as well write it down, right?

That's right. Aged for a minimum of six years, it's a true expression of the rye grown at 2500-acre farm. The brand's new flagship whiskey is made from a mash bill of 100% Canadian winter rye. A hearty variety of rye built for growing in cold weather environments such as Northern Nevada, where temperatures can drop to a single digits during the winter. So they're, they're farmers first, just fillers second. Yeah. And it sounds like such a cool place to go with.

Oh yeah.

Now it's not too far from Reno, right? I thought it was closer to Vegas. I know it's pretty close to Minden Mill.

Is it? I feel like. I think Vegas is down south, right? In the desert. They're up north. Reno's up north.

Yeah, I guess so.

Yeah.

Okay.

I think they're in Northern Nevada. There's a, There's a, I don't know, there's a range of land there that's great for growing stuff. So. All right. Let's nose it.

Oh, I like this nose.

Solid. Yes. Oh, I'll tell you what. Western whiskeys, they just, these, they really pay homage to the grains. Don't they? Yeah. That is so good.

I almost feel like you could like walk, you know, walk through his fields of rye. This is what it would smell like. I like to think that.

That's amazing. That is so good. I could nose this all day long.

Yeah. So I wonder since this is Canadian winter rye, if that's the rye a lot of the Canadian distillers use because. Stuff that finds its way into Whistlepig. Yeah. I mean, Canadians make some really fine rye whiskey. Sure.

And it's got a little bit of a, like a cream sweetness in there. There's something going on. This is, this is probably around six years. Am I right? Oh, is it? Oh, wow. Okay. All right. Well, let's taste it. I'm still nosing it. I know.

The whole show, I could nose this the whole show. I keep getting a little something different every time I go back. Cause I just got like a little bit of like strawberries, like. Oh yeah. Um, light, a lighter fruit. Not even like, I think I called a strawberry jam recently on something, but this is more just kind of like fresh picked strawberries.

All right. All right. Cheers. So nice. It is so, Oh, it just sort of sneaks past the front of your tongue. It just goes, it really flows in easy.

Oh man.

Yeah. That does not drink 125.

It does not.

This is really very unassuming whiskey. I mean, this, you can give this to a new drinker and they would, And you know, if they're not a rye person, they would probably not be big fans, but if they, if they like to drink rye, they would never guess this to be in the one twenties at all. It's all about the grain here. So amazing. And they said this is farm strength. Farm strength. I like it. I love it. I know, I do too.

There's a nice little candy, candy cinnamon thing going on. I kind of get my strawberries still a little bit. I think you like this one. I do like it. What's it going to say? Better I poured you like so that you're just getting close to empty. Yeah, it's really good. Of course I'm at home so I can drink more.

That's true. Wow. That's a great one, Todd. Now, did they send us that bottle too?

Yes, they did. That one was from one of our PR folks and thanks to them.

Wow. I know. Good first half. Excellent. Yeah.

We've been getting some just amazing stuff lately.

We have been getting some really good whiskeys lately. I mean, and you know, all this stuff, what was the price on this bottle? $79? Yeah, $79. $79 for 124 proof farm strength rye out of Nevada.

Frey Ranch always kills it.

This is, if you're somebody who really likes, uh, grain-forward western whiskeys. This would be on my list for sure. And he plants it, cultivates it.

Operation they have, you know, there's 2,500 acres. I mean, that's a lot.

That's just for that crop too. Yeah. I think a square mile is 600 acres, right? I think that's right. I think so. So that is four square miles of grain. You can make a lot of whiskey out of that.

And that's just for, yeah, this particular bottle. That doesn't include all the, I'm sure, I mean the corn and everything else. Cause you know, he dabbles in some like other, I mean, Triticale probably does a little bit of that, you know? Yeah, we should go out there. We really should.

Oh, love it.

Love it. Love it.

Okay, Todd. Well, let's, uh, let's think on these three as we go into the break. And then, uh, when we come back, we've got two more and then winter, winter chicken dinner. Sounds great. All right. We'll be right back.

Hey there bourbon roadies, it's Diane Strong with Bourbon on the Banks Festival, and I want to give you a quick update on Bourbon on the Banks. General admission is officially sold out. But don't worry, we've still got Twilight tickets, and they're absolutely worth it. You'll catch the final two hours of the festival. The energy is high, the crowd is buzzing, the music's going, and the bourbon is flowing. With over 70 distilleries to sample from, you don't want to miss it. It's all happening October 3rd in Frankfurt. Grab those Twilight tickets before they're gone. I can't wait to see you on the banks.

Hello there, Drew Hanisch, Whiskey Lore, and I am excited to announce that I have a brand new book called Experiencing American Whiskey. Now, if you have checked out my travel guide to Experiencing Kentucky Bourbon, you'll know that I go deep into the details of Kentucky Bourbon. Well, imagine that I've spread this out across the entire United States now, and I'm covering a thousand distilleries, coast to coast, and even Alaska and Hawaii. I have 227 detailed profiles in there from the distilleries that I've had firsthand contact with. I give you all the details that you need to know, like when they have tours, if they do tastings, cocktails, and everything is in a state-by-state format so that you can roll through, find your particular state that you're traveling to, and have all that information at your fingertips. and so on. So it is actually available at whiskylore.org slash shop. That's Whiskey Lore's travel guide to experiencing American whiskey.

All right. Welcome back to the second half of the show. In the first half, we dove into three different rides. We had the After Swarm 2 from Short Barrel, which was a honey finished, I believe it was Oregon, Foam or something. Foam honey. Fomo. Really good. That was like not overly sweet, which I kind of enjoyed. Yep. Our second pour was a 10 year new riff malted rye. They're 100% rye. Really enjoyable. And then lastly was the Frey Ranch farm strength rye, which let's be honest, that one kind of stood out just a little. A little bit. Spoilers. But we're ready to dive into pour four, and this is Pursuit United's triple mash rye. So the reason it's called triple mash is because it contains three different mash bills. It has a high corn rye from Sagamore Spirits out of Maryland. They're 52% rye, 43% corn, and 5% malted barley. Then it also contains Sagamore Spirits 95.5 rye. And then it also has Bardstown, Kentucky, 95.5 Rye. So this one is non age stated, but I think it's like, you say like four to eight years blended. It's got a great color to it. Retails for 79.99. And this one clocked in at 124.8. Okay. So this is higher than the Fray Ranch?

Yes. But just like by a point. Yes. By a 0.005 or something.

Well, whatever. And there's a batch code that, I mean, you may see different batches out there, but they weren't kind of doing that 108 proof for quite some time. That was kind of their jam. But, you know, they've kind of watched the market and seen where it's gone. And now they have, I think they have like an 88 proof one. And then, yeah, they're doing another at barrel proof. I actually got this when I stopped in there. It's probably been maybe a month and a half ago at their new place in Louisville. And it's one to check out. Definitely, definitely check it out. Yeah. Their bar under, like you go down in the basement is, is really, really cool. And that's where the, their podcast studio is too. What do you think of getting together with those guys? I know. We need to do it. But they are very busy. If I listen to their show and they're like hitting on the road and, you know, kind of doing like their own ambassador stuff a lot of times and trying to get into markets, I mean, they stay busy. Oh man.

If I were younger, maybe. I love the nose on this. It's got like a toasty like, yeah, like toasted, but also like, uh,

A little bit holidays. Holidays, like your spicy gumdrop?

Well, I don't know if it's spicy gumdrop or just like a nutmeg and cinnamon and all the spices. Maybe fruitcake kinda a little bit. Yeah. Something's reminding me of the holidays here. Yeah.

It's like a darker sweetness kind of thing. Yeah. There's a little bit of just a hair of citrus from that 95. Yeah, I'm getting that. Yeah. Yeah. I'm ready to dive in. Cheers. Cheers. Mmm.

Buttery. Immediate impression. Warm, soft, velvety, buttery.

That's a rye drinkers rye though.

A little dry on the back. But man, it's, I'd swear this was pot still, but maybe not.

No, I know Sagamore doesn't. No. And we obviously know Bardstown doesn't. Yeah, so. But it does have a very soft mouth feel.

Yep.

But very thick, very viscous.

Yep. Kind of lost that holiday spice on the palate, a little more, a little drier. Um, a little more mature, like, um, like the oak is, is contributed a little bit more, a little, a little older maybe. Okay. I don't know.

I'd say that barge sound they have is probably like the older, the second more might be a little younger, but like it says four to eight, I'm getting like a blueberry. Yeah. Like a blueberries and like a little bit of lemon sorbet kind of thing. Wow. Yeah. My pellets an extra gear tonight.

Yeah, you're doing good. Um, yeah, for me, the butteriness of it, it just stands out. And now I think I'm getting a little bit of like the, like the tree foils, foils cookies. Cause we're talking girl's got cookies. So I'm getting a little bit of that, uh, Danish butter cookie kind of. That finishes amazingly long too. It's really good. This is a good whiskey. Yeah. And I know Kitty's involved, but Ryan's like the master, right? Yeah.

He's doing the magic. He's learned. He's doing the magic, huh? I'm very excited. We're supposed to do another pick with him. So you're going to have to go to that one this time. You missed out on that last time. I did. I did. How many picks this year? More? 13, 14? Something like that. I know. Maybe he's got like a mental list. Leapers Forks kind of jumped into the fray, so that one there. Well, see, all we need to do with Leap of Fork is we need to get down there and see if they still have the Bourbon Road barrel.

Oh yeah? Yeah. We got a barrel down there. Okay. One whole end of it's painted black with the Bourbon Road logo on it. Very cool. But who knows? They might've already popped that one up and served it up to their guests.

All right. Yeah, that's really good. It's going to be another tough call tonight.

This is really good. No, this is a great whiskey.

Um, I saved a little in all my, in the first three. So I have a feeling I might have to go through them one more time.

I think the finish on this is a big winner. This is a very lengthy, very pleasant finish. Um, it makes you want to take another sip. but you don't have to because the flavor sticks around so long, but it's really good. Yeah, I gotta keep track of it in my brain, because I don't wanna be figuring this out at the end after five rye whiskies.

I think I'm gonna have to go through, just do a little quick sip through one more time. All right, but here's our last one. All right. Number five. So this one again, this one's came from our good buddy. I actually, I think I said I grabbed that triple mash rye up there, you know, support when you go to these places. I always try to get something while I'm there. So this came from our good friend, Jeff Wack, again from Hello Again Whiskey Friends YouTube channel, and it's called Archer Eland. So this was launched in late 2025 by Wendy Pevich. She used to work at Penelope Bourbon. So she, in collaboration with Middle West Spirits, decided to come out with, I think she's got two other expressions, but this one's known as the cashmere expression. So this is 126 proof. It's 100% Ohio grown rye, a combination of just says rye, not what type, and malted rye. And roughly seven years and approximately $84.99 is MSRP.

I'll tell you what, if you go back and you listen to our interview at Middle West, they talked about Ohio. Ohio is a great agricultural state. But there's this amazing thing that happened many years ago with the glaciers that created two different growing environments. Cause the glaciers basically scraped Northern Ohio, created moraines and then you got Southern Ohio. So there's two different growing areas up there that are totally different and they get the grains from both the North and South. So it really depends. Everything changes up there based on whether which region you get your grains from.

So kind of a huge distillery, by the way.

I think I called them the quiet giant.

Okay. Yeah. I like that. Yeah. I didn't get a chance. We were, we were there not too long ago, but I'm, you know, doing the kid thing.

So I'm loving the nose on this. Yeah. This is a little fruitier.

Like we're back to like almost like a dried apricot kind of vibe. Yeah.

Apricot or a peach. Yeah. This is a little more, um, what you would expect from more of a, um, a malt whiskey nose.

But it's the highest proof so far. Yeah. Just a hair 126. Still highest. I mean, wow. I mean, our range of proofs this time is only 108 to 126, which is pretty, all pretty close.

Yeah. This doesn't have a, like a, uh, a deep oak bite to it. It doesn't have a leathery note is this is more lighter fruitier. Uh, the grains there. Yeah.

I'm ready to dive in. Cheers. Cheers. Okay. What was the match bill again? Uh, it is, uh, just said a blend of rye and malted, malted rye.

I feel like there's quite a bit of malted rye cause that fruitiness is more prevalent. Yeah. I'm getting kind of a mixture of earthiness fruitiness and I'm, I'm, I'm getting a little bit of a rye bite too. Yeah. Little disjointed between the nose and the palette. I like it. It's delicious, but, um, it's one of those that, that the palette doesn't really follow the nose. What do you think? I mean, be honest. Am I, am I off base there?

I mean, still got the fruit. I mean, we've got that dried apricot kind of going on and yeah, it's still kind of like. It's a nice combination of like everything a ride can be though. Like I'm getting the fruit. I'm getting a little spicy mint pepperiness, pepperiness. I mean, um, it's enjoyable.

I mean, I think it's good. It's a good sipper. I like it. I think the, it kind of transitions on the finish a little bit. And, um, the hook sticks with you. But the flavor dissipates about medium. Okay. I must get like a peach soda. Oh, wow. Um, I am getting like the lighter, like fruit notes on it.

But like someone dropped like a big sprig of mint in there too though.

It's different. I like it. Yeah, it is different. There's, there's nothing like it out there.

What was the price on this bottle? 85 99. Okay. Fair enough. Yeah. All of them, all of them tonight were kind of right in that, right in that 75 to a hundred and I think 110 for that short barrel. All right. I'm going to sip.

Are you going back through? Yeah. Just real quick. I got to have some water though. I did too.

The rye leaves a spicy tingle. All right. So, Oh wow. Going back to the honey one is kind of wild. Oh, did you go back to number one too? I did. Yep. I just wanted to see.

The honey definitely shines through once you've gone through this. Yeah, it does. In comparison, it's funny. Order does matter. Order really does make a difference.

Oh wow. And the malted rye got chocolatey. Even more chocolatey. They did.

They did. Quite a bit more.

Yeah. Okay. This can affect things. We have to be careful about this. I know. So the honey got more honey. The malted rye got more chocolate.

What was it in a Willy Wonka movie? The schnozberries tastes like schnozberries.

All right. Number three, the Fray Ranch. I know this is going to be boring for the listeners and we're just going back through them. Oh wow. That Fray Ranch is just solid. What a great whiskey. You can leave that bottle here if you want. I'm just kidding.

Well, I can split that one up. Oh, the pursuit is good too. Oh, you already hit the pursuit. Yup. I'm moving through.

Folks, are you keeping up with us here? That's right. Oh, we're just going through them one more time because we want to give them a fair shake.

I mean, five great pours as always. I mean, five great pours. Five great rise. Oh my goodness. All right. I think I'm ready. You ready? We're just going to chop through you, right?

I think top three will survive. That's fine. But before we do it, let's go through them again and tell the listeners what they were. Okay.

Our first pour of the night was the short barrel after swarm two, after, after swarm two. Yeah. That was their honey finished rye, which was a swarm.

I did say swarm.

I was like shawarma, shawarma, which is Indian like, uh, after swarm, um, which is their honey finished rye. That was an MGP slash green river blend. Our second pour was the new riff malted rye. That was the 10 year. And that was a special 375 milliliter release that they're doing like small batches of. Our third release was the Frey Ranch farm strength rye, which is stellar. Our fourth four was the Pursuit United triple mash rye, which was a blend of Bardstown rye. And then two different mashbills of Sagamore Rye out of Maryland. And then lastly was the Archer Eland, which was blended and aged at Middle West Spirits in Columbus, Ohio. All right. Winner, winner, chicken dinner.

Yep. So should I do my third? Sure. Okay. So my third is going to be, it's tough. It's really super close. Three and four are probably the closest two.

Yeah.

I'm going to weigh in the balance here and I'm going to go with, uh, I need to jump in here. You need, no, you might need to jump. I really am having a hard time because it's really tight between these two. Um, Do you want to do three A and three B? No, that's okay. I'm going to go with the swarm. Oh yeah. I'm going to go with it, but honestly I could have flip-flopped. I won't say which one I'd flip-flop with.

Okay. Well, I think I'm going to say my third place is probably going to be your flip-flop. I'm going to go with the new Rift 10-year multi-drive.

That was it. I probably could have taken the new Rift. It was really good because I love multi-drives. But I guess there's a few points to be thrown their way for doing a Honeyfinish dry, which we hadn't had on the show before.

Yeah. And I kind of enjoyed it.

It was good. But yeah, New Riff was fantastic.

Yeah. I would even say that's one of the better Honeyfinishes I've had, period. Yeah. For sure. All right. I'll do my second place. Yeah. All right. That's going to be the Pursuit United. Yeah. Triple match Ry.

OK. You and I are going to differ a little bit tonight. Oh. I'm actually going to give the Frey Ranch the number two spot. Are you really? It was fantastic. It was really good. The Frey Ranch. Yeah.

No doubt. I think we are flip-flopping, because my number one's going to be the Frey Ranch. OK. Yeah.

So I'm Pursuit number one. Frey ranch number two, and then the honey ride number three from, um, who's the honey right from? Sorry. Oh, short barrel. Short barrel. That's right. And you are number one.

Number one's Frey Ranch. And very close. Yeah. Very, very close. Yeah. Is the Pursuit United.

Now I will give points to Frey Ranch for this. It's just, It's just farming and making whiskey. There's no funny business there, right? That's pure Western whiskey. I mean, it's, it's true craft.

You just kill it. You really do. Agreed.

Yep. But, uh, I don't know for me, I thought that, uh, Ryan did an excellent job this time on his blend. Yeah, Ryan and Kenny. Let's give it to them both.

I hope he isn't upset I gave him second place, but you gave him first. That's right.

I did. So we didn't agree at all this time, but you know what, folks? You're always the winners here, right? Because now you've got three Fantastic picks. Actually, we gave you four names, but four fantastic whiskeys to choose from. Yeah, for sure. And there's two that are flip flop for the top spot.

Man, you can't go wrong with either one. And if you want some out of the box at Arger Eland. Yeah. Like I said, they've got one a little lower proof. I kind of wonder maybe if that was toned down a little bit. cut a little bit, maybe. I don't know.

Yeah. I don't know. It just, I mean, it was good. It was really good, but it didn't like, it wasn't like the whole package for me.

I did like the fruitiness. That was kind of in the peach soda.

Yeah. Well, fantastic, Todd. Great show. Thank you for putting this together. It's been a while since we had a Rye show.

Yeah, it was fun. I've been sitting on a couple of those for a while. You know, I always try to You always want to make it kind of balanced too. You know, you don't want to bring craft stuff up against the big boys and things like that. So this is going to work out. But the craft stuff can hold its own with the big boys.

I was going to say, in some cases it can, it can.

But I just thought this was a, it worked well and it happened to be five rise. So a lot of fun. And thanks to once again, Jeff Wack for sending us a couple of those and our PR folks and Kenny and Ryan, I actually talked to Kenny that day when I was in there, so that was cool. 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. Jim and I will drop an episode every Wednesday, so make sure you hit that subscribe button so that you don't miss an episode. We'll help you get down the road on your commute to work or whatever it is you're doing when you listen to The Bourbon Road. We'd also appreciate it if you took the time to leave us a review on the podcast platform that you use. The more reviews we get, the more our podcast gets out there to other folks. Sometimes we'll have a guest on, sometimes we're just kicking around and drinking some rye whiskey. The one thing we're always doing is having a good time and drinking great whiskey. Check out our Facebook group, The Bourbon Roadies. It's a lot of great people, about 3,200 or so bourbon enthusiasts that love to drink whiskey, share stories, share pictures, share paintings in the case of some. That's right. share experiences, share birthdays. And I think one of our roadies, Chris Custer is coming into Frankfurt soon. So I'm going to try to see if I can meet up with them and have a drink or something. But it's just good people all the way around. Be sure to check out the new and improved website to the bourbonroad.com. Jim's been playing around there. And burning the candle at both ends. I was going to say, it's getting pretty neat. But until the next time, we'll see you down the Bourbon Road.

you