501. 50 States, One Glass: The Ultimate 250th Anniversary Tasting

It's been a week of Mondays, but the weekend's here. Dust on my boots and a smile with my beard. Neon salmon low where it knows our name. Same old bar stools, but it never feels the same. We raise a glass to the miles we've made. To the stories told and the dues we paid. Amber light and a crystal glow. On the bourbon road where the good times roll Passing bottles like a piece of soul Every pore's a memory, every sip a spark Lighting up the night in the Kentucky dirt Ain't no map, just the ties we've sewn On the long winding bourbon road

Hello again, long-time listeners of Roadies and new listeners alike. Welcome back to the Bourbon Road Podcast. We're glad to have you once again. Todd and I are hanging out at the Bourbon Road Bar, aka Tim's Basement. We've got a few really, really good pours today, but we also have a special guest.

How do we have? We've got Dan Manningley. You may have heard the name. He's a longtime roadie since we found out since 2020, which our awesome website was able to tell us how long you've been a roadie, which is pretty cool. He's also on the Frankfurt Barber Society Board. And yeah, just. You were at his house last night for a music.

Yeah, he had a great music event last night at his house back by the pool. He had Taylor Hughes in there playing some great country music. She's a country music star, right? She's out of the Nashville area.

Definitely.

Playing some good music. It was awesome. And the circle's complete because she's been on the show. She has been on the show. I thought about asking her if she wanted to come on again last night. I just, we had to get back to the little one week old baby Melody had to help out last night.

So we kind of bowed out after about two hours of fun. You guys kept going for a while, didn't you? We did. It was a long night or early morning or whatever.

Yeah, Dan, welcome to the show.

Thanks for- Pleased, very pleased to be here.

Thank you for the invitation. We've got a number of ports tonight, Todd. We do. Kind of got a theme, right?

There's a bit of a theme. This is an anniversary theme, which is kind of funny. We're following up episode 500 with an anniversary theme, but with this, We've got four pours that are basically 250th commemorative releases. But we also have this kind of oddball that we're kind of pre-gaming with. And I'll give the story on that because it's pretty fun. This is old fourth out of Georgia. This is their 40th anniversary of Dragon Con Bourbon release. So September 2026 marks the 40th year of the iconic pop culture institution, DragonCon, which I picture people getting dressed up, comics, the old Dungeons and Dragons things. So this is a great, I'm going to read this verbatim because it's just too fun. Attendees can wing their way into DragonCon lore with a bottle of DragonCon bourbon. It retails for $39.99 in a 750-milliliter bottle, a limited edition whiskey resulting from a collaboration between Atlanta-based Old Fort Distillery and Dragon Con's co-founders. This is the second annual edition of this flame-kissed whiskey, which was built to honor four decades of fandom, costumes, late-night panels, and the legendary parade through downtown Atlanta. Followed at 94 proof, this one breathes fire. and ice if you throw a few rocks in the glass. With only 3700 bottles available for purchase, cosplayers and connoisseurs can pre-order their bottle on the Dragon Con fan site. A sage word to the wise, slay before you sip. With this distinctive flavor profile, this whiskey is dragon worthy from the inside out. Old fourth distillery crafted a high rye mashbill, 75 corn, 21 rye, four malted barley, aged four to six years with a kind of spice and finish that has real claws. Wow.

That's pretty cool. This is a real big event. There's a lot of followers. I'm wondering 3,700 bottles, if there's any left. But I got an email about it too. And I'm just wondering, it's available online, right?

Yeah. I believe you can pre-order. Yeah. And like I said, $39.99, $750. And yeah, just kind of a fun one. And I used to be an old Dungeon. When I was a teenager, I was a bit of a D&D nerd. So I was like, yeah, we'll take a sample of that. I'd love to try that.

Well, like I mentioned before, we've had a few minutes with this already. So now we've got our notes together. We can come right at it swinging, right? Yes. I'm a little confused at the notes. Are you?

You were so clear five minutes ago. Well, that's why I'm confused.

It's coming out really fruity. It is.

That's right.

It doesn't quite match the description. Yeah, the fiery claws. I get it, that's why he's confused.

No scales, no claws, no fangs, no fire coming out. No dragon hide. It's very gentle, very nice. I'm surprised it's low barley.

Nice fruity, 90 proofer. Great nose. Great nose. And one of the things that I picked up earlier, and it's still there, is this kind of an overripe fruit. You mentioned, Dan, you mentioned strawberries.

I did. I'm more on the palate.

I picked up a little bit of apple, but in both cases, I think they've sat in the fruit basket too long. Yeah, it's like a fruit salad that, yeah, like you said, like the fruits were probably Ready to eat. There's apples.

I even said I got a little banana on the nose, which I know Irk Jim, because he just can't get that banana on the nose.

I would agree with you on the nose. That's got a little bit of an ethanol snag to it, but I mean, it's not fire.

No.

No, but I love the way they wrote that. Sounds so awesome.

It's pretty cool.

And we kind of threw this one in as an extra. It had the anniversary. Like I said, we're having an anniversary theme, but we decided not to put this in our rankings. We will pick out, since we have four other pours, we're going to, well, I guess today we'll do one, two, three, four today, you think? Let's do it. It's Father's Day, so why not? Yep. To all the fathers out there.

If you're not a father and you have a father, I think we all have fathers, make sure you give him a call today or if he's no longer with you, raise a glass to him. Raise a glass.

He carries that fruit over, adds a little caramel.

Definitely a strawberry cream. Yeah, I like that. Nice.

Yeah, I really like that. Full mouth experience, not just... Sweet, delicious. You said strawberry cream. I think it's light. It has a nice cool wash to it. This is another one of those summer zippers, I'd say.

There's a little spiciness on the tail end, just a little. Let you know it's got 94 proof rather than 90. Yeah, that's nice.

Makes me kind of want to like find some more Old Fourth, I know that. Yeah, it's really good. It's a good whiskey. This is more like it would put the fire out in the dragon.

Oh, great. Great whiskey.

Yeah, this would remove the heat. This has got a great refreshing palate to it. Very nice.

Dan, before we dive into our ranked pores here in a little bit, what led you to the Bourbon Road, if you will?

Well, excuse me. We moved to Frankfurt, my wife, Danetta and I, in about 2015. Of course, I grew up with a name like Mattingly. I grew up in Lebanon. Around my father worked for Bourbon Cooperage. I've ridden a truck to semi-hauling barrels to Owensboro when I was young. That's cool. But I was never a bourbon drinker until I moved to Frankfurt. We were sitting in the middle of Bourbon Mecca, and we started tasting a little bit. Of course, we all started with the crazy Blanton's, you know, chase the Blanton's, and we quickly moved on. And in 2020, COVID was sort of a curse, but a blessing. It led us to some interesting times and I worked in Louisville at the time and I had a 40 minute drive every day. So I started listening to podcasts or searching and I'm sure I found you through a search. And then I found out, you know, you were local to me. I mean, I drove right by. Rode by Jephthah Creed and Jephthah Farms and Simpsonville every day. And I just decided to listen to that and really enjoyed it. I learned a ton. And it's definitely the start of my bourbon journey.

That's awesome.

Bourbon road for sure.

Glad to be part of your bourbon education.

Absolutely. Huge part of it. You turned out all right. I'm still learning every day. That's the best part. It's the people. It's the people. The bourbon is awesome, but the people like you do is just an incredible bonus.

Yeah, there's a great deal of good people here. And you made it sound in the beginning like you were corrupted by Frankfurt, but actually I think you were blessed by Frankfurt.

My eyes were awakened or whatever. It just seeps into you. And my senses came to my past, you know?

Yeah, it's hard to be from Frankfurt and not at least have tasted some bourbon, right? It made that logical decision. You're either in or you're out. That's true. Absolutely.

All right. So any of our Georgian folks are going to DragonCon. I think you need to at least try this.

If I see one for that price point. Yeah. $39.95. That's incredible. I don't know what the shipping is, but if you can get your hands on a bottle of this for 40 bucks, Pretty good deal. Yeah, absolutely. Pretty good deal. It's a talking piece, you know. If you don't know anything about DragonCon, you can get educated on it. That's true. If you do know something about DragonCon or you've been to DragonCon, what a great bottle to have on your bar.

And I have a daughter who's big into the Dungeons and Dragons next year, and I need to have a bottle of that for the bar, for the wedding for sure.

So what do we decide? We're going to do winter winter chicken dinner tonight, but the Dragon Con bottle is not in the mix? Or is it? You want it in the mix, don't you?

It does say anniversary on it. It does. Okay. I say keep it in.

But we're only going to pick the top three.

Yeah, we'll drop it to three though. We're only going to vote on what we think are our top three. Okay.

All right. Well, I have to set that one down. I did save a little bit so that I can come back and revisit it. I did not. I did save.

It's so good and drinkable.

Yeah, it's crushable, right? Very much so.

Sessionable. Like the enemies that stand before you in a dungeon straight there, it's crushable.

Stuff writes itself, right? Well, we all left our water on the bar, so we're just going to have to deal with that.

I was going to say, at halftime, we'll... All right, so some new fun stuff. Like I said, the other four pours we'll be having tonight are all commemorative bottles for the 250th, and the first two, are both from 15 stars. The first one we're going to sip on is their Kentucky County. Kentucky in this time is spelled K-N-T-U-C-K-E, like it used to be. Oh, Kentucky. Yeah. So, Kentucky County, six years straight bourbon. This is released to commemorate the 250th anniversary of America. This is one of two releases to honor the historic 1776 Kentucky County, a part of Virginia's Western frontier from which modern day bourbon was formed. It is a blend of two Kentucky straight bourbons, aged a minimum of six years, bottled at 90 proof. And MSRP on this is 38 bucks. So those Johnsons love their history.

Not many people know that. Jefferson County, Kentucky used to be Jefferson County, Virginia.

And then Bourbon County was a big county back in those days too, I believe.

Yeah, they were only really, yeah, when you go way back, 1792ish, prior to 1792, there were only a couple of counties in Kentucky. You know, this nose on this is, uh, not as fruity, not as fruity, but I'm still getting like, it's odd. I'm getting a little like poached pears. Yeah. I'm sort of getting like a cream, creamy cream, sugar, sugar, cream, um, maybe a icing, like a sugar cookie.

Yeah. It's a little light on the nose. It is not as expressive on that, but it's nice.

Yeah, I'm having a hard time picking up. What was the proof on this again?

90. And actually the next one will be 90 as well. Okay. So we actually dropped down just a little.

I just need to warm my glass. You know, that's a trick we learned this weekend.

All right. I'm ready. Cheers. Yep. Cheers. Wow. There's no mid palette on it. It's all, it's all front. Yeah. Front sides and rear. Nothing in the middle.

Kind of a watery wash. You got to figure it's six years, probably Bardstown distill it. And I don't know, maybe a little Barton, but it doesn't come off as Barton-esque.

Yeah, I would say no on Barton, but maybe I'm wrong. Very light nose, very light palate. The finish on it is relatively short.

But to your note, a light brown sugar cookie or maybe as you're eating the cookie dough.

Yeah, like a light brown sugar or even Like if you cut, if you cut just a little bit of molasses into it, just a little bit.

Funny. That's the word I had, but you know, it's not quite heavy.

I mean, it's not a molasses cookie, but it's like a cookie with a little bit of molasses cut into it, maybe.

Yes, I would agree.

See, I'm getting some, I'm still getting like, uh, It's a different fruit, like I said, like pear, apricot a little bit, just a hint, honeysuckle, there's a little florality to it.

Yeah, I mean, I could go with a light, like a light white fruit, like that. I think it's a little bit of florality. There's not much sweetness there though, once it hits the sides and the back of the palate.

Do we know the mass bill on this one?

It's had a blend of two Kentucky, um, bourbons. So I said six to, I wouldn't say six to eight, I believe.

But you know, another for the price point.

And it may even been both Barks down to still it. They could have a six year of that and an eight year of that. What was the price again? Uh, this was 39 bucks. 39 same as the dragon con whiskey.

Maybe more 49, maybe.

We're keeping Todd on his toes here.

Well, I've got my notes on one thing when I was looking up some other stuff, you know, trying to stay on top. Yeah. $38. Yeah. Oh wow. Yeah.

Okay. And I'm a sucker for a neat bottle. I mean, that's just a neat. Oh, it is. It's a beautiful bottle. Looks good on the bar.

It could stay there too.

I know you can order, they're one of those places you can order directly from. So you can go to 15stars.com probably, or search up 15 stars.

I like it. It's light. It washes by real quick. It's got a sticky palette. It doesn't have a long finish, but it's enjoyable. It's not deep. It's not rich. It's not dark, like a typical 15-star whiskey, right? Right. But it's a quality whiskey. You can tell it's a quality whiskey. Yeah.

I also think, I feel like putting it out at 90 proof, this is for you know, the everyman kind of thing. I mean, whiskey snobs might enjoy it, but like, if you want something kind of cool to commemorate 250th, uh, you know, anniversary of America, this is, uh, it's a great idea.

Yeah. And at $30, $38, you can still do, do with it what you will. I mean, if you want to mix it or you want to make something out of it, you go right ahead. $115, $130 bottle. You're not doing that. You're drinking it neat or not at all. Right.

So just maybe with the 4th of July for years to come or something.

Okay. Good.

Yeah. Nice offering. All right. All right. Moving on. Like I said, we're going to keep it in the family. If you will. This is also from 15 stars. This is their Kentucky County 12 year American whiskey. So this is just building in Kentucky and Indiana. A blend of straight bourbon and American whiskey distilled from a bourbon mashbill and aged seven years in second use oak before an additional five years in new chard oak. Bought at 90 proof and MSRP is $58. So I'm guessing by calling it an American whiskey, light whiskey.

It was placed into a used barrel, so that already takes it out of the running. The fact that they put it back into New Oak again is kind of interesting. And they didn't say whether New Oak was toasted or not. Did not say that.

All right. Probably give it a little more complexity though, I would think.

Oh yeah. And you put this to your nose and immediately you can tell compared to the last one, you've got something with some more body to it.

Surprising though for the difference in the ages that it's not a more pronounced nose.

Yeah. It's got a little bit of funk to it. That second chart is probably throwing a little bit more smoke in there. Definitely a little more.

It's coming off a little sweeter nose to me than those first two.

Again, 90 proof, right? Uh huh. All right. Yeah, very tame on the ethanol front. I think I got more ethanol on the initial pour of the Dragon Con bourbon than I did on both of these. Agreed. Good knows. But still, it's got more depth. It's got more character to it. But it's still not like your typical 15-star whiskey that just lights up your night. Right, right. But you know, this is a different price point too. Yeah. Like I said, $58.

And this is unique. I mean, you know, taking a bourbon and a straight bourbon and then doing the, uh, five year light whiskey basically. And then aging that another, that was a seven year light whiskey and then throwing in a new oak for five years.

All right. Let's taste it. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers. Okay. A little bit more body to that. Definitely some more texture. It's nice and soft though. Yeah. That must be that light whiskey. It definitely makes an impression on the tip of the tongue and on the back of the palate. Both.

Yep. It's keeping with the fruit theme today though. I'm getting like the pears and

A little spice on the finish. Get a lot more spice on the finish.

Almost scotchy, like, like the, you know, non-peated ones, like a little pear orchard kind of thing.

Yeah. And again, we don't know exactly what the Nashville, it just said bourbon Nashville, right?

Okay.

Well, I would say this is a big step up from the six-year as far as flavor and intensity goes. It definitely has a longer finish on it. The hug is settling in. So with the same 90 proof, it's establishing itself a little more firmly on the back of my palate and in my chest.

A little sweeter to me. There's a nice little white pepper spice at the tail end.

Definitely.

I think, Dan, you even said you tried these at the House of Commons.

I did, and I enjoyed the six more than the 12, but today I flip-flop.

Oh, yeah? Okay. That's a spoiler.

So you had them side by side before? I did.

Which one did you have first?

I had the six-year first. Did you? Okay. Same order. Same order. But you know what? It just goes back to how your day went. Would you eat? Would you brush your teeth? Right. All those things. There's so many factors. I'm always amazed. Bourbon can sure make a fool out of you in more ways than one. I've been made a fool of so many times.

That's the words to live by. That'd be a great shirt. I like this one a lot. I'm not even a big light whiskey fan, but the fact that it's blended and there's like that smoky sweetness that's kind of like dumbed down a little bit.

Such an easy, just a simple, easy.

I just kind of feel like whiskey is almost like a one trick pony sometimes. It's like a smoky cotton candy sweetness to me.

Usually I hire a proof in the barrel.

Yeah, you go to 160 on those, right? I think so, or maybe, but they get higher in the barrel, right?

Yeah, sometimes. It definitely has, Matt. You can do a 170, 175 proof light whiskey, no problem. Particularly those Canadian light whiskies, they can really go high. I don't remember the exact definition of a light whiskey. Do you, Todd? Just to use barrel is all I recall.

I mean, that's what I remember. If you recall, we had the folks from West Fork and they use that 99.1 match bill from MGP, but the fact that they use new barrels made it bourbon.

I think you mentioned that they could go in at a higher proof too though.

Yeah. Like 160 you said, right?

That's what I, yeah.

Cause a lot of times you'll see light whiskey is usually a 99.1. Um, mash bill 99 corn, 1% malted barley. And that's usually what the light like that will go and use barrels. Just good old corn whiskey.

Yeah, that's nice.

And well for a 12 year, that's pretty good. I mean, 60 bucks, basically 60 bucks. Yeah. Yeah. I like that it like, I think you stated that first one kind of missed part of the palette.

This one, this one hits all spots.

This does hit all spots.

I like that. Yeah. There's both bottles priced to sell. I think that's a key thing here. You know, we're looking at two bottles here that are priced under 40 and under 60. So.

I think it's important that you focus to me in that price range sometime.

It's good. Yeah. Especially a company that has. Really grand whiskeys. 15 stars has always had. I love their expressions. The whiskeys are always amazing and the kind of whiskeys they have been able to put together as a part of their portfolio have not been cheap whiskeys to produce.

Right. I think they're adjusting to the market a little bit. I think we've been talking about trying to have them on because we've got a few other of their new releases too, so hopefully we'll have them on for a tasting show sometime soon.

One thing's for sure, they know how to attract attention to their bottles. Their bottles definitely stand out on a bar, on the shelf. I was going to say, it's a Kentucky and it makes me want to buy it.

And it's even got both colors because Dan and I are Louisville fans, so it's got the one of them is Louisville red and the other is UK blue.

Which one's the better one? What color is the better one, Todd?

You know, I think it's the blue one. Oh, man. I know. But hey, it's all red, white and blue, right? It is.

It's all good. That's what we're talking about.

What do you think? Take a break and we've got two more anniversary tastings of run through.

I'm looking forward to the second half. We're going to up the proof a little bit. Sounds good. It's going to be hard to match. We had a great start here for sure. All right, folks, stick around. We will be right back. All right, Roadies, we finally, finally released our brand new website. We hope you get a chance to check it out at TheBurbanRoad.com. It is a total rewrite, remake, revamped. We've done it for you. We have all 500 or so episodes on there with all the details, searchable, all the show notes, everything. You can search by it. You want to go find out what we talked about on an episode way back when you can do it. We've also got our tasting notes, our reviews of over 1,320 whiskies. They're all on there. Our tasting notes, our rating for the whiskey. We even queue up the episode on the tasting notes to where we tasted it on the show. So as you're reading our tasting notes, you can play it and listen to us talk about it. So I think we're the only podcast that does that. That's pretty cool. So another thing we have on there is our blog articles. We've got over 250 blog articles on there. We're putting new ones out all the time. And the all-new Roadie Bar is now on the Bourbon Road website. So if you're a Roadie, come on, sign up, get in there. We have a chat room. We've got a place where you can post what's going on in your Bourbon world. We have a calendar of all the events that are coming up. We'll be posting in there our drawings. So as we're giving things away, you'll be able to come in there and sign up for the randomizer to get picked. You'll also be able to sign up on list to come to something that we're sponsoring. Todd's got a great event that we're putting on in the fall and everybody can come in and sign up for that. And we've also got some coupons from our vendors for sort of percentages off on stuff. Definitely take the time to come to the website. Check it out. We do want you to come in and sign up and join in. It's a lot of fun. It's free. It doesn't cost you anything. You're certainly welcome to donate if you want to, but it's free for all roadies. So come check it out.

All right, roadies, welcome back to the second half of the show. We've been sipping on some anniversary edition whiskies today. We had an American whiskey that was 12 years old from the fine folks at 15 stars. This is under their Kentucky County brand. We also had a six year bourbon, Kentucky County as well. And then we started off with kind of the oddball of the anniversaries, because those other two were 250th anniversaries. And it was the 40th anniversary for DragonCon by Old Forth, the story in Atlanta. And that was their DragonCon bourbon. And it was a 94-proofer. Fun little starts and kind of a fruit medley.

Yeah, it was a fruit medley. All three of them had some- I did not expect that at all. And a group of whiskeys that were a little more on the lighter side.

Yeah, 90 to 94 proof, all three of them. Easy drinkers, like I said- Value, good value. Good values. But we're going to get into the heavier stuff now. So, as America prepares to celebrate its 250th anniversary, copper and cask is marking the occasion with the release of two ultra-limited whiskeys. The caveat here is we only got one, and I'll explain why. So one, a bourbon, one, a rye that paid tribute to American craftsmanship, heritage, and community. Both whiskeys showcase unique barrel finishes and are crafted under the guidance of award-winning barrel master Stephen Corrigan, who we had on the show recently. Yep. Very nice guy. So they sent two bottles, but they mistakenly sent their Will Horse rum barrel finish. And I will give a little shout out to the one they didn't send. And it's called the Boston Rum Party. It's an eight-year rye, and I'd assume that's probably their 95.5 rye from MGP, because that's kind of copper and cask tends to use those barrels. It's a eight-year rye whiskey finished in rum cask inspired by the rebellious spirit of the Boston Tea Party. This release finishes bold, spicy-driven rye whiskey in rum cask for over a year to create a sweeter, softer counterbalance. The result is a layered whiskey with warming cinnamon spice, rich sweetness, and an approachable profile. Only 2,000 bottles were produced. But we have the Wave That Flag. This is a nine-year double oak bourbon that undergoes a secondary finish in a custom American oak wave stave char. It's the first time I've heard that one. I've heard of spiral staves, but the wave stave. It's a charred number one barrel resulting in a dark robust whiskey layered Well, we'll do our own Tasty Notes, but there were $3,000 bottles that were produced and they felt like it was a fitting tribute to the country's milestone anniversary. As another nod to America, a dollar from Every Bottle Sew will support Arcadia Center, a veteran farmer training program. Barrelmaster Stephen Corrigan has worked with this organization for nearly 15 years, helping veterans transition into careers in sustainable agriculture. Awesome. That is pretty cool. Good work. Wish we'd known that before. That'd been a fun thing to talk about. Oh, absolutely. But maybe next time. So, both expressions are available at select copper and cast retailers around the country and nationally online starting, so it's Friday and I feel like we got this maybe a couple of weeks ago. So, I'm pretty sure you can go to copperandcastspirits.com and probably find bottles of both.

So, this show will release on the 24th and then it'll release on the 26th. Actually, I mean, we've had these bottles maybe two weeks.

Okay. So I mean, it's, it's probably available online right now. Okay. And it got it. Uh, SRP of 74 99 and the proof on the wave that flag that we have is 117.

Oh, let's check it out. Oh yeah.

Oh yeah. There's a step up.

I can, I can already. Oh, and we got darker. Yeah. The color is more ethanol.

I get a little apple cinnamon spice.

I like that. What was kind of cool is with this package, they also sent to like a little. I guess the lithograph of the back label on this, on that bottle, which has the eagle and the flag. So it's about maybe, I don't know, like 10 by eight. You want to frame it? Yeah. I mean, do something with it and maybe probably hang at the Bourbon, Bourbon corner Rick house for the frame of Bourbon side or something.

Rob will be jealous.

Ooh, he loves his eagles. Give it to him as a present or something. It is pretty cool. That's right. He would love that.

Still trying to wrap my head around the wave stave.

Wave stave. I guess what they do is they router out the inside of the barrel to create more service area. They char it.

Okay.

Then they char it and then there you go. Yeah. Like I said, I've heard the spiral cut is what they'll do. I know Kenny and Ryan at Pursuit do that. And so do the Hard Tooth folks. They do like a spiral cut on some of their single barrels. Great nose. Good nose.

Love it. Absolutely.

Shall we taste it? I mean, let's go. Cheers.

Oh yeah. Sweet. Oh yeah. Thick, rich, bold.

Full mouth.

Definitely a full mouth feel. Very nice. The oak on it is lovely. Really good.

You can feel it front to back.

Yeah, this is, I don't want to give away the winner winner chicken dinner, but guys. Yeah, I was going to say, sometimes when these themes come up. So far, we still have one left.

It's not a fair fight.

It looks like trump cards, if you will. Right. This is a really, really good whiskey.

Sometimes when you throw David at Goliath, he doesn't win, in the bourbon world at least. Where did you say Copper and Cascus from? They're out of Rhode Island. Wow. And they don't have any kind of tasting room, but I'm telling you. every release I've had from them and I have a friend in Rhode Island, Darrell Stewart, who gets to go over there and has actually done some single barrels and things like that. They've just all been fantastic. I think one of the really cool things is some of the MGP and they also source from Green River is they have places where Other distilleries let them age in those barrels. I know Florida, I think West Virginia, they may even have some Kentucky.

Well, they did. You said a nine-year? Boy, this is it.

Yeah. And they say their Florida barrels just fly off the shelf. They can't keep them. Yeah. I've got a couple to sing on browser. Well, I mean, the aging in Florida, because it's hot boxing, basically.

So it's quick.

Yeah.

Well, for a nine-year, I don't get a real strong oak.

You know those, and this is leading off of your notes there, You get those little inexpensive 99-cent cinnamon pinwheel.

I love pecan cinnamon.

That's what I'm getting here. That's a good shout. I love those 99 cent little packets. They're deadly though.

That's one of those things that's shrunk over the years though, isn't it?

Do you remember, I mean, when we were kids, like I remember like the oatmeal cream pies were, you know, you could use them as a tire. If your tire got flat, it was really hard, but now they're like, you know, about the size of a half dollar.

the packets of the pecan twirls were always smooshed a little bit, just added to the experience.

Had to go and tell us how many servings everything was and shrunk everything down.

Yeah, there were a few things from our childhood that I've not revisited, but I can remember dearly. And then, you know, the little swirls were something for sure. Yeah. The other thing are the hand pies from Hostess.

Oh my gosh, yes.

Yeah, this is impressive.

Really good. Yeah. It's a good whiskey. Now, Cooper's listening. He's writing. He's taking notes. And I'm trying to figure this out. And I'm saying this is definitely noteworthy. Yes.

There's also a way There's a little bit of a savoriness to the finish too, which I'm guessing is coming just from that part of the oak where it's a little less charred.

Yeah.

Which is really interesting. I'm almost getting like a little cedar minty evergreeny thing.

Hmm. Yeah. Kind of a, yeah. Sort of a Northern forest freshness. Yep. But man, yeah. Well done, Stephen.

Good stuff.

Really good whiskey.

Sadly, we need to move on.

Sadly, we need to move on.

Actually, you guys can sit there and sip, because this one's going to be quite a tail. So for our last pour this evening. You're not going to read all of them, are you? You know, I feel like I got to. OK, get ready, folks.

Get ready, folks.

So this is the Los Lantern, United States of Bourbon. You know, Jim and I are both huge fans of Los Lantern. And this may be the most unique 250th release out there, I think, unless you qualify there.

Alabama and Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas.

So 50 states, 50 distilleries, one bourbon. This has a two year age statement, but components range from two to 10 years old. Proof is up 122.9 and there were 3,300 bottles released. The United States of Bourbon is the first ever blend of straight bourbon whiskeys from all 50 states. Like all Los Lanterns whiskeys, it is fully transparent with every component distillery listed right on the label. Every one of those distilleries have been carefully vetted and personally visited by Los Lanterns co-founders Nora and Adam. The blend brings together some of the finest distilleries in the country into one truly special whisky. The United States of Bourbon is one bottle, proves that great bourbon comes from all across the United States. This is a release. That's the Castreth version. There's also a version that is a hundred proof. And then there's also a special 1776 release, which only contains bourbons from the original 13 states. So MSRP on this is actually only 99.99. So here we go, folks. I'm going to, I'm going to give you my every state. And so we have painted stay from Delaware. Oh, they're not even out about a quarter. Darn you Liberty pole, Pennsylvania. Sugar, no, Sireland Mountain Spirits out of New Jersey, ASW, Fiddler, that's your Georgia component, Litchfield Distillery out of Connecticut, Triple Eight Distillery, Massachusetts, Baltimore Spirits, Maryland, Cathedral Ledge Distillery, New Hampshire, Reservoir Distillery, Virginia Broad Branch Distillery, North Carolina South County Distilling, Rhode Island Stonecutter Spirits, Vermont New Rift Distilling, Kentucky Leapers Fork Distillery, Tennessee Tom's Foolery Distillery, Ohio Distillery, Acadian I don't speak French very well. Louisiana, so Starlight Distillery, Indiana, Rich Grain Distilling, Mississippi, Whiskey Acres Distilling, Illinois, Dread River Distilling, Alabama, Hardshore Distilling, Maine, Jay Rieger & Company, Missouri, Rocktown Distillery, Arkansas, halfway there. New Holland Distilling, Michigan, St. Augustine Distilling, Florida, Falconis, Texas, Cedar Ridge, Iowa, Wollersheim Distillery in Wisconsin, Corbin Cash, California, Far North, Minnesota, Oregon Spirit Distilleries out of Oregon obviously, Union Horse out of Kansas, Sawtooth Ambler Spirits out of West Virginia. Is that Ambler? No, it's Sawtooth. Okay.

Frey Ranch.

Nevada. I actually found that it is Nevada. It's not Nevada. Nevadans get mad when you say Nevada.

I thought it was more like Nevada.

I think it's Nevada. Cool. Yeah. Proof Artisan Distillers, North Dakota, Boulder Spirits, Colorado, Brickway, Nebraska. Black Fork Farms, South Dakota, Montgomery Distillery, Montana, Woodinville, Washington, Days Defile, Idaho, Backwards Distilling, Wyoming, High West, Utah, Hocha Town, Oklahoma, Safe House Distilling in New Mexico, Santan in Arizona, Denali Spirits in Alaska, and Oh, the Hawaiian coal coal, allow coal coal, allow easy for you. That was going to say the one oh why is K.O. apostrophe O.L.A.U. And there you go. All 50. Wow. Good job, Todd.

I need a drink. Let's have some 5.0 magnifiers on those glasses.

I should have read that off the website rather than the back of the bottle, but they're all listed there. What I actually told these guys before we got into this was if you go to the Lost Lantern website, you can see all the components, the match bills for all of those 50 states. It doesn't give you the proportions because It could be like 0.2 or 1.2 of this and things like that, but I thought that was the age for each of those.

Well, Adam, hats off to you guys for the work you do. I mean, this is epic. I know you can't really craft. a whiskey with 50 components, but I'm sure you did your best. And my goodness, I'm just so excited to try this.

Yeah, I'm curious.

I think when you put that many together, it's just about getting them all in there.

Dump and pray, as Martin would say.

Nevertheless, how awesome is that? How epic is that?

I mean, like I said, we've seen some really cool things for the 250th and that's awesome. But I think when I saw this, I was like, holy cow, that is just, what an undertaking. Yeah. You got to tip your hat to that. All right. Nose. Nose.

Oh, wow. Cosmic Brownie. Cosmic Brownie? What is that? Have you ever had the Cosmic Brownies? I'm not familiar.

Oh, the Hostess Cosmic Brownies, the little, we're definitely on the, like the little package.

The Cosmic, just sprinkles on top. Yeah, the sprinkles on top. I know, okay. I know what you're talking about. I do now. Okay, I see your chocolate for sure.

I'm not a big chocolate. I was never a big chocolate.

Yeah, but it's also the hard sugar candies that are on top of them. Okay. That makes sense. All right, Adam, you can put that on a bottle. Cosmic brownie. Cosmic brownie. Yeah, there's not the graininess you would expect. No, it's actually... quite nice. It's a good nose. I think it's a little on the sweet side. It does have a chocolate note. There's a little bit of spice cabinet in there.

Some fruit, but not overly fruity. I will say this. I did check the website today. This one is sold out. It did say for now. So I don't think maybe they just kind of initial lease. I actually got this with my monthly discovery club that I'm a part of. So that was a pleasant surprise. Um, maybe in some retailers, you may be able to get it in Vermont, but keep an eye out. If you're interested in something this cool, it, it did say it will be back on the website eventually. I'm ready to taste it. Cheers. Cheers. Here's the two 50.

Yeah.

That's good. It is good.

Really jumps in your mouth compared to...

It's got a little bit of red hots to it. Yup. A lot of wood spice, a lot of oak.

Definitely warms the whole mouth.

It's like a raspberry thing going on there.

Yeah.

Like a black raspberry, like really ripe black raspberry.

I mean, the initial hit I got was this atomic fireballs slash red hots burn.

I think your cosmic brownie is still there. I'm still getting a little bit of chocolate. And then despite that, there's some leather too. It's a nice leather.

I like that. I like that leather. This is good.

This is a good whiskey. I won't even imagine how many notes you could probably pull out of this if you spent enough time with it. But it definitely has a good race of baking spice in it. The cinnamon's there, the red hot, the cosmic brownie, the chocolate, the hard sugar candy, a little bit of cream, some fruit, but it kind of leans a little more Like a plum date kind of a little darker for me on the fruit part. Yep. Um, not the finish, a little bit of leather, definitely a nice oak component. Sits on the middle of the tongue really nicely.

Like it sits very heavy on the tongue.

What I'm not getting on it is, um, I'm not getting any citrus at all. Maybe a little bit of coconut.

I haven't got that yet, but I'm starting to get like some, like the more it's opening up, like some like really, like he said, darker fruits, like a black, really black cherry. And I think that black raspberry is a nice descriptor for it.

That's impressive. It's a good whiskey. It is good. Good whiskey. You know, just to be able to put that many different components together and have it come out good, it's an accomplishment.

And no youth.

I mean, sure, the components of the two years may have been very small, but I mean- But you know, some two-year whiskeys really bring something to the table. You cannot get an older whiskey, so- That's true. You know, as long as they're in good proportions, must have been a heck of... There was a lot of labor in this one. I was going to say, you think with 50 states, he just put 2% of... No, I think he was probably... It probably started out trying to be very careful and after 20 or so said, what the hell?

It seems to know how many... I'm sure when he did this, he just had like all kinds of blends of it. And how long it took him to do this to get it down to what he went with.

Because you can't really taste as you go, because the very next thing you add to it is going to change it. So you almost have to taste each whiskey that you're going to put into it and decide how much of it's gonna go into the final, and then do it. And then taste it and see if you messed up or not. And if you did, adjust the proportions and try it again.

Because you can't taste it piecemeal along the way. Because you might make it awesome, and then the next thing you put in it turns it to crap. So there's no way to know. It has to be many variations that he went through before they stopped.

But well done. That's fun. All right.

Yeah. Are we ready guys? Does everybody know where they stand? Yeah, I do.

I think I know my top three. Yeah, I got my top three. Okay. Uh, I'll start. Okay. My number three is going to be the Kentucky County 12 year. That was a lot of fun. I like, uh, like I said, I'm not crazy about American whiskey, but that one works well blended with that bourbon and the extra oak finish on that American whiskey. It's nice. Nice price for a 12-year bottle. Dan, you want to go up?

Third place? I'd say the Kentucky 12.

Changed from that six, didn't you?

I did. I did. I think it's a lot of fun. Just a very nice pour.

Yeah. I'm going to stay with you guys. I think the 12-year from 15 Star, the Kentucky. Kentucky County.

County 12-year is a solid third place. All right. We'll keep saying mortar. My number two is going to be this one, the Los Liner, United States of Bourbon. I love it. But it just got a little outshine today, but that's what. Yeah. And I'll get we'll get there when I or I'll get there when when we get there. But that's a lot of fun. I am so glad to have gotten this bottle as a release from them.

So, Dan. Well, I'm going to I'm going to differ. I'm going to go with the Dragon Khan. I think it's a fun. You know, at price point, the fun, just a great introduction to people that sometimes are overwhelmed. You know, as we drink, we attend to, I certainly and my friends tend toward the higher proofs and we get a little, it's a little snobby about the lower proof stuff, but that's just, that's just fun.

With it being hot outside. Yeah.

You know, with all the fruit flavors and on the nose. The summer sipper. Summer sipper. Put that baby on some ice.

I was going to say, you've got that nice pool to sit there. I'm going to let you take that one home with you.

There you go.

I'm going to go with the law standard for me for my second place. I think it's a good whiskey. I think it could have gone wrong, Adam. It didn't. It didn't go wrong. It went well.

Brave.

They're very brave. Yeah. Got to be brave to be American, right?

That's right. All right. And my number one today is going to be that copper and cask. Wave the flag. Steven's doing some magic with his finishes and blends and all that. And that's just a really good pour.

I have to agree with you. I mean, hands down, copper and cask is... I can pour that every day and enjoy it.

And it's a nice proof point. Nine years, 80 bucks. Again, their stuff is really reasonable, folks.

Yeah, I think I agree with you. So I'm going to go with that one too. The copper and cask is definitely a notable or higher score. for me, it's definitely, it took the cake today, I think. Dan, I'm with you. I understand exactly what you're saying. Summertime, a nice crushable fruity pour like that just tastes super good. It does. It's all about where you are in the moment and it's not necessary. And sometimes you do, you get caught up in the in the deep, rich, dark whiskeys and the high-proofers and you forget about the stuff that's well-crafted at a lower scale. Pretty darn good. But I think all of our distilleries did great today. I agree. It's great. Great bottles up there.

Everyone was worth trying. You don't get anything off putting on any of them. I mean, they're just all great pours.

And Dan, we really appreciate you, by the way. I think we'll just let our listeners know you are our very first Inner Circle supporter on the website. So for those who don't know, The Bourbon Road has a new website at thebourbonroad.com. We've always been at the bourbonroad.com, but recently we revamped the website and we no longer really advertise on the show. We're more in supporter focused. And we have different levels of support. There's obviously a free tier. And honestly, most of our members are free tier members. And there's nothing wrong with that. It's great. If you can support us, we appreciate it. If you can, we love you just the same. We'd love to have you as part of our roadies. But Dan, you were one of the very first to subscribe at the upper level. which is called the Inner Circle.

It pleases me.

And one of the things that gives you is that 8x multiplier when you enter the randomizer drawings.

It hasn't won me anything yet. It hasn't won you anything yet. But that's quite all right.

I was going to say, in its defense, he won something at the special tasting at the Frankfurt Bourbon Museum. There was a really special event with David Sandland of the House of Commons, and Freddie Johnson, and he won something there.

You're right. I am not complaining. You know what? I'm a winner being here today.

You're 50% for the weekend.

Get to try some great bourbons and whiskeys.

Our first level of supporters are called encouragers, and it's the free tier, and we'd love to have you. Come on the website. We're trying to build that community, or rebuild that community that exists on Facebook because so many of our listeners just don't do Facebook. Yeah. I hate to say it, but not everybody's a Facebook person, right? Right. But the Bourbon Road website... Starting to trend it away from Facebook. Come on the Bourbon Road, sign up, create your account. Be happy to have you in the free tier level called Encouragers. We also have three other levels above that where you can give. And with each level, you get a little bit extra something that we kind of offer up to sort of help say thank you for helping to support us. One of the things is the randomizer multipliers that haven't benefited you yet.

I will eventually, for sure.

But you're also going to get a t-shirt. Hey, all right. And at the inner circle level, you also get to come on a show, which you did today. That's right. Pretty cool.

And like I said, I think I'll let you walk with that Dragon Con bottle. Wow, let's talk about a winner. That's awesome. But it looks like we've got about 50 plus signed up on that.

It's kind of slowly building. I like it. It'll slowly build and that's perfectly fine.

It's a learning curve for me too. You're so used to opening up and going to the Facebook or Twitter or whatever. You have to kind of remember to go back to the old fashion website, but boy, what a great site you have. Thank you. I appreciate it. It's a lot of fun. A lot of great people in there. I feel like I'll have a ton of new friends. Frankfurt Bourbon Society has been the best value you could ever imagine for us. People and the bourbon that I get to taste, but look forward to meeting more of the inner circle from the Bourbon Road.

Yeah, we've got a few now. Well, we've got members at every level supporting us, which is awesome. And it's great for Todd and I because it's not always what we want to do, go out and hustle for advertisers, right? Sure. And it's nice to have listeners who just think we do good work and want to help us out. So it definitely is great. We do appreciate it. And if you're a listener today and you haven't been to the bourbonroad.com website, You know, just come on, join us, make yourself an account, upload your picture, put a little bit about your background in there, share a few posts in there with our fellow roadies and enjoy your time there. We just added live streaming to the website, so Todd and I are going to do an event here pretty soon where we Maybe we'll go through a tasting and we have people in chat on the website and follow along with us. That'll be fun. Todd, just tell us about what giveaways we've had so far and who's won.

One of the first giveaways we gave was, well, actually Doug Keller gave away was a print of his painting that will be at the Frankfurt Brewery on the Banks auction. Beautiful piece. It's a Rick Halsey of Wild Turkey. Yes, yes. And it's gorgeous. That went to Alan Quiet. I believe Alan... I'm going to say he's in Ohio, but I could be wrong. He's been a member for a while. I was going to say, Alan's been on the Bourbon Roadie for quite some time, too. May of 2020, actually. He's been around a long time. So long time listener. And then we just gave away the very... We were lucky enough to get... Jim and I both got media packages from Green River, their honey barrel. So I just gave away that package, which contains a little bit of honey and the, is it called a honey spoon? It's like they got the spiral thing and you know, you dip the honey and drip it out. It's got like the grooves on the end, almost looks like a little beehive. And then of course the Bardstown honey. And that's going to Adam Dorman, another He's a long-time listener and he's also one of our big encouragers on our website. Yeah, fantastic. Got a few other things. I think we've got another Green River product that we both got a release from and we'll put that up there. I've got a couple other fun things to give away.

And we've got some other things to give away, including a book and some other things. You know, we, we get a lot of, uh, uh, promotional items that get given to us hats and T-shirts and things like that. And we'd love to pass those on to our, our roadies. We'll be giving those away as a randomizers. We also have some events up on the site. Um, some things that are coming up.

Yeah, I think we're going to try to, you've even said it. You've got a bunch of little. one, two ounce pours. And we're going to try to have something that the, it's a local one. We'll have it at the corner Rick house in Frankfurt, probably maybe next month. I've been at a hundred sample bottles. Yeah.

So everybody's going to walk away with stuff.

So, okay. That will be fine.

And I don't be surprised to find a birthday bourbon or a 21 in there and who knows what's going to be there.

So that'll be a kind of a Kentucky event. But if, We'll try to announce it soon. That way, if you happen to be in Kentucky on the Bourbon Trail, if you will, hopefully you can swing by to that because that'll be fun. And you can check out the Corner Rick house. Hopefully by then we'll have it freshly painted. Fingers crossed. Yeah. We're going to make it a little more cozier, I think.

So all these things are in the roadie bar on the Bourbon Road website. So when you come to the Bourbon Road website, you're going to see all of our shows and blog articles and whiskey reviews and all the stuff that all the public sees. But there'll be this little thing that says sign up. And if you sign up, it's all free. You don't have to pay anything. Just come on in. You'll be able to access the roadie bar. We hope you'll put your picture up. We hope you'll give a little bit of a bio who you are. If you've been a roadie on the Facebook page for some time, we'll look you up and see when that started. We'll make sure you get credit for all the time you've been a roadie. It'll move you up on the list anyway. You'll get your own ID card.

You'll get all the messages coming out from everybody letting you know what's going on. One thing I wanted to add is I talked to David Salin. He's going to give bourbon roadies that have their little ID card, they'll get 10% just like the Frankfurt Bourbon Society. So if you're at the House of Commons in Frankfurt, yes, I know it's, it's in Frankfurt, but we're, I'm actually going to start reaching out to some of the folks we've had on the show, like copper and cask and things like that. And hopefully we'll get some more discounts and things like that. And all you'll have to do is kind of show your roadie ID and maybe a discounts on tours and things like that.

And you can't, you can't fool it. It's got a QR code when they scan it either says you're real. Bonafide. Put your retina up there.

Bourbon road. I scan.

All right. Well, it's been a great time today. It's been great to have you on Dan. We've had such a good time. Such a, it's always fun to have, uh, a rodeo on who's been a follower for a long time. Somebody who's really enjoyed the show, who's also a friend that we hang out with and drink whiskey with and loves bourbon as much as we do. It's always fun. We always have a great time.

We do.

All right folks. So, uh, thanks again for stopping in and listening to this episode of the bourbon road. We do try to put one out every single week on Wednesday. Sometimes we'll have a guest on like Dan, uh, we'll sit around, drink some whiskey, have a good time. Sometimes it's an industry expert, a distillery, a musician. Who knows? We just jump all over the place. We're always having a good time. Just make sure you scroll up to the top of that app you're on. Hit that subscribe button. That way, next time we release something, you'll get that notification letting you know. You can throw them headsets on, them earphones on, those ear pods in, whatever you use to listen. Just dissolve away and listen to an hour of the Bourbon Road podcast. It'll get you down the road, right Dan?

Absolutely.

All right. I must. We'd love to have you. Um, like I said, in the meantime, get onto the bourbonroad.com sign up, get your free account, uh, hang out with us. We'd love to have you there, but until the next time we'll see you down the bourbon road.

Where the good times roll Passing bottles like a piece of soul Every pore's a memory, every sip a spark Lighting up the night in the Kentucky dark Yeah, we laugh too loud, let the worries go Find a little truth in the afterglow Ain't no man, just the ties we've sewn On the long winding berth Here's to the nights that turned into dawn To the friends who stayed when the rest moved on To the clink of glass and the stories spun And the quiet peace when the night is done On a bourbon road we ain't alone Every mile's marked by the love we've known From barrel to bottle to the hearts we hold there's a fire that never gets old so pour it up let the moment slow a little bit of life in every glow yeah forever we'll call this home on the long winding bourbon