505. Yokai, Mars, and Purple Tops: Four Whiskeys, Zero Borders

It's been a week of Mondays but the weekend's here Dust on my boots and a smile with my beard Neons humming low whether 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've paid Amber light and a crystal glow A little burn and a 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 mail, just the ties we've sewn On the long winding bird

All right, Roadies, welcome back again for another show airing from the Bourbon Road Bar in Simpsonville, Kentucky. It's good to be back with Todd. He was flying solo last week. Todd, did you have a good time with the Ricks and Ricky's? Yeah, two Ricks and me.

Yeah, it was a lot of fun. Their new line is really, really solid. Good price points, obviously good blends. And yeah, that new black corn explorer they've got is really interesting.

It's fantastic. Yeah. You know, the interesting thing about it is, is that, you know, they're, I guess they're kind of popcorn farmers, right? And that black corn is something that is popcorn.

Yeah. And that, I thought that was, I was kind of wondering, like one of the things I first brought up about that black corn was, uh, what color the mash turn, because, you know, as you well know, we've done some crazy mash bills that AMC's come up with at whiskey thief. And one was using an Arnold Palmer, corn and it's a rainbow corn and that thing was like purple and pink and all kinds of colors with that mash after it was cooking and stuff.

Well, I appreciate you handling that solo for me. Let me take care of some personal things I needed to do. It's good to be back. We are actually We're entering this first half with two whiskeys that you've set aside for us here, but neither one of us have had a warmup pour today. So we apologize to the first whiskey.

Yeah.

Fresh, fresh pallets. So what does that do for you when you have a whiskey in a tasting and you haven't warmed up yet?

Well, I think probably what I'll do is probably ignore it and then go ahead and give it a sec and then go in for that second sip. And that's where I'll start. Hopefully I'll start getting some some good notes and, you know, form an idea of what what we're drinking to kind of.

Well, it's an unusual port. It's something a little bit different than we've had in quite some time. It's from one of our faves. Yeah. What do we got?

We've got the Barstown Bourbon Company Distiller Reserve. This is a Mars single malt Japanese blend.

And this one's been a little bit, it's been out a little bit. So we have had it sitting in the queue now for a couple of months, I think.

Yeah, it just didn't really fit anything. I don't know. It's kind of an interesting one. And, but we found a spot for today and it's kind of an eclectic, uh, for some we got going on here this time. So, I mean, I'm looking forward to it.

This is, this is, this is great to have whiskey, four different whiskies that are like all very opposite of each other, I would say. Maybe the first two, not so much, but the last two are way out there. Way out there for sure.

It'll be fun.

It'll be fun.

So a little bit about this. This is a partnering release that bridges Kentucky bourbon and Japanese whiskey traditions in an entirely new way. Japanese single malt whiskey from Mars Komagatake and Sunuki distilleries was shipped to Barsound, Kentucky, where it was introduced into barrels containing mature bourbon. Rather than a traditional finishing approach, the Japanese whiskey and Kentucky bourbon were aged together in barrel, allowing the spirits to fully integrate and evolve, emerging 12 months later as one. The final year of aging allowed the products to develop and find balance together. It also added additional wood sugar and barrel character after a warmer Kentucky summer. So this has 69% Kentucky distilled 10-year bourbon, 74 corn, 18 rye, 8% malted barley. 8% Kentucky distilled 16 year, 75, 13, 12. That's 75 corn, 13 rye, 12 malted barley. 20% of the Mars Como Katake distillery, five year, 100% malted barley. and 3% Mars Sunuki distillery, five-year, 100% multi-barley. So like Jim said, this was released in late May. It's a 375, kind of like the Normandy and the, what was it, cathedral. It's part of that release series. So $100 for a 375 bottle. Probably going to be hard to find, but you could probably find it obviously at Bardstown on the bar and local bars and things like that. We're going to let them know.

Just a little bit about the Japanese barrels that were introduced here. These are obviously Japanese single balts, but one of them is Umeshu plum barrels aged in the Japanese Alps. The second one is a Sakura cherry wood aged in the volcanic south. So, two very distinctly different Japanese single malts, aged in very different woods, and then brought to Bardstown to marry with our wonderful Kentucky bourbon whiskey. Right, and that's what is becoming a popular thing.

The Pursuit guys used that for their... The cherry wood? Cherry wood, and it was fantastic.

All right. Well, I'm ready to check it out. And like we said, we're going to give it, uh, you know, an extra extra sipper to this extra sipper to in the beginning, but nose first. Oh, that's really nice. Nice bright nose. Yeah. I'm getting the plump though. Yeah. There's like, uh, almost orchard like, uh, like you're walking in a spring day. Very nice floral fruity nose to it. Now, have you drank a lot of Japanese single malt? A scarce few. I do like them. I appreciate them, but they're not in my normal rotation, I should say.

Yeah, like some of the hibiki.

Yep.

Yeah.

Yep.

It's not a big market here either, I don't think, so we don't really see a whole lot.

Yeah. The color of this is, uh, you know, what you might expect out of Bardstown on one of their, uh, crafty bourbons. It's very nice, uh, medium amber. Um, but the nose lets me think that it's going to be a little bit lighter on the palette, but maybe not. Which is kind of crazy.

It's got a little bit of that 16 year, only 8%. So probably not enough to change the color too much though. First taste. Yep. Cheers. Cheers.

Oh, not that, um, first wash bitterness I expected. No, that was nice. That was really nice. It is fruity. It is sweet, but it's got a, like a real preponderance of wood flavor to it. Like maybe the 16 year really kicked in a lot of nice oak and spice. All right. Back to the nose. A little bit more on the wood side now when I go to the nose, a little less on the sort of fruity floral aspect of it. It's a little savory note going on there too. Just a little. The plum's kind of darkened a little bit and gotten richer and deeper. Another sip. It's got a nice, uh, mid palate sting to it. It's almost like it's a flavor bite. It's not like a spice bite. It's intense. The flavor is real intense and concentrated and It leaves a tingle all over. Yeah. It sits well on the palette. It really does. It's not super viscous. No. Oh, and I think I failed to mention 109.8 proof on this. Okay.

So this is our, our low proof. We're doing it by proof today. Yes. So that kind of gives you an idea of what you're in store for folks. There's a little orange marmalade kind of thing going on too. Just a hair after those plums.

Now, one of the things they said in their promotional materials they sent with it is what emerged belongs to neither tradition completely, right? But it belongs to the space in between. So it kind of, they kind of, they drifted towards each other, became a little bit, yeah, they filled the space between the two. They had like this really neat, I don't know, just saying, I guess at the beginning, curiosity doesn't stop at borders, it follows the liquid into the dark of the barrel. into the quiet of a year where two traditions were never asked to change, only to inhabit the same space, breathe the same air become. It's pretty cool.

It is pretty cool. Yeah. And I love like, I mean, they are really pushing the envelope. I mean, yes, other people are doing Sakura and finishes, but I mean, I feel like they're taking it to another level a lot of times. Like that cathedral with the wood from Notre Dame, uh, And just, yeah. And then the one we love, the amroot.

Oh, yeah. And they do it so tastefully. They don't overdo it. They're very, very precise about how they introduce these other flavors to the bourbon. They hold a great deal of respect for the bourbons they start with. And then they bring in these other flavors to enhance and excite them. without overpowering them. And sometimes you get things that are finished like this where they just go a step too far. And I don't think I can remember a case where Bardstown's gone too far.

And do you recall, did he, did he, does he start with a base or does he, I'm talking about Danny Calloway. Does he start with like the blend? He blends the bourbon first and then decides where to go with that. Do you recall?

I don't, I don't recall. I'm not even sure that came up in your chat, any of our interviews, but yeah.

Right.

It's a great whiskey. Really, really good.

Cause I'd be curious to know with the nine and 16 year, did he marry that first and then, or, you know, like, I'm just curious what the process is there.

Yeah, I think, I think you need all four components and, and that's what you work with.

It's almost, it's almost too hard to start with two already blended and then decide what you want to do. But like you said, he may have like taken that nine, the nine year and they may have wanted to start with that. added the Japanese single malt and then needs a little 16 year old, a little more depth, a little more oak spice. Well, yeah. So how much of the base bourbon was in there? The base bourbon was 69%. Okay. Yeah. So that's a pretty... Yeah.

So maybe their original intentions were to be somewhere in the two thirds range of their base liquid and then to use the other three to get it where they wanted it.

Try to get almost like a melon thing, too, like a honeydew kind of thing.

Wow, so nice. I know it's a good start. All right. I want to save just a little bit of that. I want to make sure I can come back to it because it is quite an impressive whiskey.

All right, moving on, but kind of keeping it in the Japanese. territory if you will, and I believe Bardstown, I believe this is Bardstown Distill-it. But this is not their product. Not their product. So this is Yokai, small batch bourbon. Y-O-K-A-I? Y-O-K-A-I. Okay. This is the third release of Mugen Spirits based in Louisville, Kentucky of their Yokai series. Mugen Spirits was co-founded by Kojin Tashiro and Justin Delaney. Tashiro was born in Japan, but raised in Kentucky, and his idea was to bring his Japanese heritage to the spirit of his Kentucky home by blending Kentucky whiskey whiskey with Japanese folklore. So Yokai is kind of a broad term for like supernatural monsters, spirits. I love like like those like old karate or not even the old ones, but some of those crazy like, uh, crouching tiger, hidden dragon type thing. So I've seen, I knew what Yokai was. So it's, yeah, it's like demons and kind of weird creatures. So said the age is seven to eight years, 117 proof with an MSRP of 99.99. Okay. But what has been done to this? This is, I'm pretty sure it's just probably a blend of, I'm from what I understand is Bardstown distillate. Okay. So seven to eight Bard, Bardstown. All right. So kind of ties in with that first one.

Yeah.

Cheers. Cheers.

Got a really good nose to it.

A little bit of light cherry, caramel, a little more traditional bourbon here. Paris, apparently some of those first releases were like single barrels and they were, I think they, one of them was hazmat. Wow. Yeah.

Yeah. This has a, like a vanilla cream nose to it. A little bit of cherry, a little bit of butterscotch cream.

That's a good one.

I don't know, but it's not butterscotch. It's a, it's caramel.

The one cool thing about these, the series is the art. Uh, he gets a Japanese artist to, uh, do the labels for them.

Okay.

Great nose. If you saw the label on the store, you'd think it was a Japanese single malt because it's got like the Japanese. It does look that way. Yeah.

It's pretty cool. I'm going to take a taste.

Cheers.

Cheers. That's completely different than what I expected. It's got an intense palate. Soft palate though, but it's got some big flavors. You're right. It's got some big flavors. Just the, just a minor sizzle on the front of the tongue. It really, it really settles in on the crown of your palate, right in the middle. But I am feeling the hug as I swallowed. It's a little smoky. You're getting a little smoke. A little bit.

That sizzle picked up on the second sip.

Yeah. This is verging on pop rocks just a little bit.

Not quite, but yeah, it's good to get that back tingle. Whereas the sizzle on the first one was kind of all over. This one is like really hitting the sides in the back.

Wow. I'm trying to, I'm getting some kind of fruit here.

Not sure what it is. I'm almost getting like a little bit of almond.

It is leaning a little nutty, a little woody. Major sizzle though. Wow. Now it's moving to the back of the palette, settling in. So the front's really kind of traditional bourbon notes. I think, you know, your vanilla and caramel, a little bit of cherry. As it moves back on the palette, it gets a little more smokier, a little more oaky. It's got that sizzle effect. Got a pretty decent finish on it.

Yeah. I mean, this is a, if this is Bards down to steal it, like I think it is, this is, he got some good barrels. I mean, this is excellent. This is really good. Yeah. It's got that red hots. A little bit of a, yeah, the red hots candies. Trying to come up with that fruit is, but I'm going to throw something at you. Like those green jolly ranchers. Oh. The apple, like that green, almost like. Cosmic apple, or whatever it's called, that nuclear apple. Yeah, it's got like a candy.

A little bit of a candy green apple. Yeah, I can get that.

I think that's something we're starting to see with Bardstown's distill at a lot of times, since it tends to have that apple, green apple kind of vibe to it a lot of times. But, hmm, yeah, this one just kind of came out of the blue. They, you know, you, you probably see where I, where I provide my replies. They'll send us an email like, Hey, you want to try this? I'm like, sure. Send it along.

Yeah.

Um, yeah, it's always nice to, to, to mix and do.

I hate to say mash up because that's probably Jason's turn, but I really love when we kind of mix up the game a little bit and put some different things together. It's fun.

Yeah. And I think. You know, the one thing we, you don't see a lot of reviews of this one. It's kind of hard to find things like this. And you know, if it's good, we'll talk about it. We don't care.

Well, Todd, we've got an event coming up here in about a little bit more than a month. Yeah. And you want to tell the folks about it?

So yeah, August 22nd, it's a Saturday. We are going to have a gathering at the Corner Rick House, the Frankfurt Barber Society building. Probably, I think, what we said, about five to eight. We might get some appetizers and cheese trays and things like that or something like that. Yeah. You have sample bottles galore and I have quite a few too. So I think I've actually been thinking about a crazy idea to do with those. So folks might come in and maybe, who knows, like press a button on my phone for a random number and that'll be the pour they get or something. I don't know. But just, you know, you've been wanting to get rid of

to them. In other cases, we haven't. Or maybe we've had two sets of samples. But I would say between us, we're probably going to have 100, 150 samples, maybe. Yeah. And then we might have a few bottles of things that we've had recently. Other things. Yeah.

Now, there will be some members. We're going to invite the Frankfurt Barber Society members. And there's always a good nucleus of those. And some of those folks you've heard on the show. And let's see, what else? It'd be a good chance for you to use your roadie ID card from the website. We're so excited. If you can make it, I mean, we know some of you out of state, it's going to be hard, but if you're going to be in and around that time, hey, think about it. And some of our Kentucky roadies, hey, come on down and make a night of it in Frankfurt. There's plenty of places to stay.

You never know what Buffalo Trace might be releasing that day.

That's true.

They had a single project two days in a row this week, apparently. Yeah.

But it should be fun. There will be like a $5 charge. And that's more for the Frank Burbank Society. You'll become like a temporary member. And that's just kind of like, it's an insurance kind of thing. So not that big of a deal.

$5 charge and show your ID and come on in and hang out with everybody.

Yeah. And yeah, it'll be a good time. I mean, there's a lot of great folks in the Burbank Society and there's a lot of great roadies. So I hope some of them can make it. We'll put something on the Burby and Rhodey's Facebook page soon, and we'll obviously put something on the website. Hopefully you can go to the website and let us know if you're going to try to make it.

This will be a sign up to attend. Yes. Item, yeah. So you will need to go to the bourbonroad.com website and choose sign up and go ahead and sign up. There's no charge. We just need you to be a member. Come on in, sign up, get your ID card. It comes with your account. And then when you get on there and you go to the roadie bar, one of the options at the roadie bar is the event calendar and it'll be on there. And then all you'll need to do is find this event. August the 22nd from around five to eight. I think it should work. And it's a great location. It's a lot of fun. We'll have a great time. Just go in there and. Click that you plan on attending and your name will be automatically added to the list and then we'll know how many to plan for.

Yeah, who knows? Maybe we'll give away some door prizes or something too.

Yeah, that'd be great. You never know. It's a good excuse to get to Kentucky, you know, come down from Ohio or Indiana or come up from Tennessee or, you know, even further than that. If you haven't been to Frankfurt in a while and you want to hit up the distilleries, make it a weekend. For sure. Be a lot of fun. All right, so Todd, great first half, two really, really good Japanese-influenced whiskeys. Yeah. And the second half, these won't be Japanese-influenced. Now we're going to take it a different direction. But they're going to be good. Yep. All right, so 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 you know 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 Todd nice our tasting notes our rating for the whiskey We even cue up the episode on the tasting notes To where we tasted on the show. So as you're reading our tasting notes, you can play it 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 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 lists 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 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, welcome back, listeners. We are diving into another round of pours that we've gotten. Actually, this bottle that we're going to dive into is one Jim picked up. But before we dive into it, we're going to let you know in the first half, we tried the Bardstown Mars, a really interesting blend of Japanese whiskey and Bardstown distillate. And I think that other might be that 8% or could be some 16-year turkey. That's their mash bill. Oh, yeah. Yeah. We didn't even think about that. Right. Wow. And then we tried the third of a series from Mugen Spirits to their Yokai small batch blend. And as far as I, you know, doing my due diligence, I found that I think it's Bardstown distill it and it was a really nice small batch.

Yeah, I think they're both great pours and it's going to be a tough call in winter, winter chicken dinner today. Yeah, but we're getting ready to dive into something I don't think I've ever reviewed a Willet on here.

I'm pretty sure I haven't.

They don't come across the Tasty Mat very often.

No, but those single wells are really pricey, so there's a reason for that. Good, but pricey. But this is the Willet Estate Small Batch Bourbon. This is a cast-ring whiskey aged four to five years, blending 70% to 80% of Willet's high rye mash bill, which is 52% corn, 38% rye, 10% malted barley, which that's a pretty high- That's a high rye. High rye for sure. And then 20% to 30% of their traditional bourbon mash bill, which is 72% corn, 13% rye, and 15% malted barley. It does say proofs vary by batch, but I believe this one that we have is $126.6 and has an MSRP of $65. And it said batches are roughly made up of about 50 barrels or so.

Yeah, you can find this on the shelves, depending on your local retailer, anywhere from $65 to $69. And they're pretty available.

Yeah. It was nice to see. I mean, they have their green labels, but this is a purple top. And yeah, they kind of drop the price on it. So this is kind of an every man's will it, if you will.

Every man's purple top.

Yeah. That's right.

All right. Well, I'm ready to check it out. And we've had this before personally, but. Oh yeah. Yeah. The nose is great. Yeah. Wonderful. Well, it's spice. I love it. It's one distillery in my mind that if you really want to get to a place where you can identify a distillery from a nose and a taste and be able to say that's this distillery, that's that distillery, start with Willet. It's probably the easiest one to do a distillery ID on in my mind. I would think so. Their rye is very noticeable.

It is extremely. Are you a, uh, just that, uh, the, what is it? The, Will it the genie bottle? Do you like that one? I don't. I'm not a big fan of that one.

I'm going to, I'm going to concur with that. It's just, it's a little too much. Uh, but you know, they're, they're bottled and bond, uh, uh, What's it called? Bardstown?

Yes.

The Bottle and Bond. And I used to be a big Noah's Meal guy when I first started getting into beer. Their Bottle and Bond recently took big awards in San Francisco. So I think it's, I mean, they make great with, they make really good whiskeys. They're a little, Because of their spiciness and their bite, they can sometimes be polarizing to people. You either like willets or you don't. And if you like them, you usually really like them. But they are typically, at least as far as the single barrels go, very expensive and can be hard to get your hands on some older ones. 18, 20 year old stuff is hard to get your hands on for sure.

I'm getting your... The spice gum drops.

Spice gum drops. Great nose. Wonderful nose. Truly will it. It's got just the right amount of ethanol for the proof it's packing. Nice balance between sweet and spicy and a little bit of oaky. It kind of sits in this kind of trifecta of flavors there on the nose. Just a little bit of that grain from the pot still.

I'm ready to taste it. Same. Cheers. Cheers.

Yeah. Wonderful. Intense spicy bite.

Finish drops off a little quick on that first sip. Okay, that's better.

Yeah.

It's, um, I'm getting a little nice.

Yeah. Yeah. This has like a real hound. Yeah. A whore hound, a nice little bit of, um, like, like root berry kind of, um, sassafras almost like a root beer float.

Yeah. And there's like a big old Maraschino cherry on top and some whipped cream kind of thing. Yeah, that second set really brought out the, it's brought the, improved the finish, but it's still a little short.

But it stays up front. I mean, the front side of your pallet really stays impressed by it. Yeah. And that might be why it feels like the backend drops off a little bit. It's got a great oak balance to it. Yeah, it's like for me, it's a great balance of oak and spice and sweetness. Yeah, that sweet upfront and then gets a little dry. It's a good whiskey. Now, this is, you know, as far as willets are concerned, this is kind of a value pour. This is a small batch. It isn't a state whiskey, but it's also a small batch. And it's meant to kind of bring purple tops to the masses. So be it. Yeah, which we appreciate.

You got a purple top over there on the Bourbon Road bar, don't you?

Yeah, I've got a... I used to have a couple of them. Melody had one and I had one. We each had a pick. And I'm trying to remember which one I've got. I don't know. It was a private pick.

And I've never been to Willet Distillery. I've been a few times. I hear what's the big menu item that's always shrimp and grits.

Is that it? I don't know. I haven't eaten there. You haven't eaten there? No. Now I've been to the distillery a number of times, but I've never had a meal there. A lot of people swear by it. Yes. It's kind of on that, uh, if you're going to visit Bardstown, uh, and heaven hill and will it in, I'm trying to think of what else is in that general area and beam. You get the beam is not too far away. Um, uh, preservation are too far from there. Right. But yeah. Um, heaven hill, Bardstown and will it is a good day. Yes. And you can eat, uh, you can eat twice. You can eat once at Willett. You can eat three times. You can eat three times. Evan Hill has a restaurant now. Oh, that's right.

They do the five brothers kitchen or something like that. Yeah.

Yep. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Right. Or you could just forgo that and go to Mammy's.

I should go there for breakfast.

I do like Mammy's. All right, well, I'm going to need a little sip of water after that one. Well, it does make a serious impression on your palate, and it can affect that next pour. Yeah, that's solid. That's a good whiskey. It's a good $69 whiskey.

All right, our last pour, and this might be the underdog. But I reached out to the folks at Bluegrass because I knew they had some seven-year single barrels of their blue corn bourbon that they had just been releasing. And I'd say, I can't remember who did it first, if it was Balconas or them. But I think Balconas may have been the first and then- I think Balconas beat them to it.

Yeah.

One of the early pioneers for sure. So this is a limited release of one of the early pioneers of blue corn barrels. The match bill is 70% blue corn, 21% rye, 9% malted barley. This particular barrel is borrowed at 129 proof. MSRP is $70. You can find this at Elkwood Farm, which beautiful place if you're in Midway, Kentucky, which is Probably 15, 15 minutes from a Frankfurt or so. Yep. Go check it out. It's gorgeous. They have a great facility. You can sit out a really nice place. Sam really did it up. And that bar is cool. The bar is cool.

Yep. All right. I'm nosing it. Ooh, it's been a minute since I had a blue corn whiskey, so I'm not sure what to expect here. All right.

If I say it's got a little blueberry, I guess, I mean something a little different.

Yeah. I'm getting a, I am getting a little bit of a corn graininess on the nose.

Um, which is funny because I was meant to mention that, uh, that pot still, there's a little grainy grain, just a hint of graininess on the, uh, will it? Yeah.

Yeah, a nice nose on this. It's a little subdued, but it's definitely corn forward. What was the match bill again?

70% blue corn, 21% rye, 9% multi-barley. OK. Yeah, this is like blueberry pie. I don't know why. It's the blue thing. It's the blue thing. Yeah, which if you're interested in blue corn, we did a whole show on blue corn. It's been some time ago, but I don't recall the episode.

Go to our website.

It's easy to find.

A lot of people are using it in their, well, like, uh, Jeff that does the red, white and blue. Right.

Well, and then the, uh, 15 stars guys. Yup. Rick and Ricky, they have their red. That's red, white and blue is in two of the products we tried last week. All right.

Cheers. Cheers. Oh, that's nice.

Little buttery. It is buttery. It doesn't attack the hat. Hit you with the proof like I was expecting either. There's a little hug, but.

Yeah, I'm getting a hand pie like a what? Hand pie hand pie. OK, you know, like the hostess hand pies. OK, a little bit of hand pie. I like it. Maybe it's blueberry hand pie. Let's go with it. That's a great palette. It's not exactly following the nose. It's a little more buttery, a little bit more pastry. No kind of glazed pastry kind of. It's nice. There's some citrus.

Almost like a burnt orange a little bit. That's got a great finish on it. Yeah. I'd been hearing great things and actually reached out to a buddy that works there. Shout out to Richie Cheatham. Thank you, Richie.

Yeah, I would say this one might take the finish for the day. It's really good. Very nice finish. The nose and the palette don't exactly match. So I was a little, a little surprised at the first sip. But that buttery wash came over, and it had that sort of pastry hand pie kind of thing. Hand pie. I like it.

Now, it's funny how we talked about the sizzle of those earlier pours, whereas this is just like, would you say it's like a little bit of a numbing sensation? Rather than the red hots, this is just kind of like a, Like a little burn almost.

Yeah.

This has got the slow burn. Yeah.

And it's, this is a really good whiskey, Todd. I know. Wow. I, you know, I'll give it a little few negative points for the transition from the nose to the palate a little bit, but, um, wow, it drinks really well. Yeah. I thought that the nose was a little, um, a little light.

Yeah.

Little unassuming, like a little bit of trickery going on there.

And you know, as well as I do that, you know, if we had another barrel or a single barrel from them, it could be a whole different ballgame too.

So this is a single barrel. This is a single barrel. Yeah. It could be different next time. This is a, this is a good barrel. What do we know the barrel number?

Uh, it's on the bottle, but I didn't bring it over here with me to read it off, but this is the one that should be in the house right now. If you happen to be in that area. Okay. Yeah.

I mean, um, I would say pick up a bottle at 70 bucks.

Yeah. That's 10 a year. Um, I will say this. They do ship, but this was not on that. So if you recall, we tried the Elkwood 18 and they had the French Oak and some other some of their midway selections on there. And actually, I think they had a toasted single barrel, which we're a big fan of too. So go check them out.

Yeah, it's a great place. I mean, we've had we've had Sam on the show two, two times in our history, I think maybe three, yeah, three times. We fed him on three times. Um, Great guy, great, great distillery project. I mean, just a beautiful place at Elkwood Farm there. And the facility they built is top of the line. I mean, just absolutely gorgeous. The bar is, I love the colors in that bar and the way they painted it out. Yeah, it's just dark and... I could spend the whole day there. Dark and comfy, yeah. I could stay there all day.

Because you'd think you're sitting over those nighttime, you didn't have windows.

Yeah, I know when you're coming to the Bourbon Trail, you're traveling in from afar. Everybody's going to hit the big boys. You're going to hit the Buffalo Trace and Four Roses and Wild Turkey when you're in that general area. Don't take a pass on Bluegrass. I think it's definitely worth a visit.

Or, I mean, if everything's booked, which can happen, stop in some of these small places. There's a lot of little Kentucky distilleries that are making some great stuff.

If you manage to get out of Buffalo Trace early in the morning with your bottle, then maybe go hit bluegrass and then maybe finish up the day at Whiskey Thief. Yeah. Or you could go keep going that way and hit pepper and all kinds of good stuff. Dark arts. Yeah. I mean. Yep. So many choices. So little time. All right. So now comes the time, Todd. It is time for whiskey. It is time for winter, winter chicken dinner, and it's always hard to do.

Yeah. But I'm going to go back through them here real quick. I've already started.

You've already started. Okay. Going back to the Mars now, our first pour of the day. Just a wonderful whiskey. Yeah. Very well done. Very respectfully thought out and constructed.

Are we going to do all four today since we only have four?

Yeah, let's do it.

Let's do all four.

And then the, uh, what'd you call this? Yokai. The Yokai. Good, good. It's solid. It is really good. Hmm. This is going to be, we always say it's going to be preference. It is. Well, with Willett in there, it's definitely going to be preference. Yeah. All right. Oh, I definitely got the. Yeah, it's number one. Oh, the knees. Yeah. Off that Willett. Yeah.

Which is good. Sometimes I get that menthol. Um, will it product? Sometimes it's a little overbearing green top.

Somebody got to finish today. Somebody else got the nose, but we don't rank all that. I know I'm trying to think for a long show. I know I'm just trying to be fun thinking to myself.

I know this is a tough call. It is a tough call.

Yeah, I think nose doesn't carry as much weight as palate for sure. So I think I've got... But where does Finnish rank in that? Man, I know. I got it, I got it.

Okay, you want to start?

I'll start. So my number four. is going to be the Willet.

Okay. My number four is going to be the Yokai. Okay. It's really good, but it's nothing out of the box. I mean, after hearing they had some really amazing single brails. I wish we got samples of those, but that is very solid. It's a little over that $10 a year mark. But I mean, if you're a Bardstown fan and like Japanese culture, it's really cool. And it's really good. Don't get me wrong. It's fine margins again today.

Yeah. So, you know, for my, my choice there, and I'll take, uh, the Yo-Kai as my number three. Okay.

So we're flip-flopped on three and four. Yep. Cause I'm going to go the Willet as my number three.

Okay. So both great pours, uh, it's just, I think. I think the Willett is just, it's just a good solid middle shelf whiskey from Willett. So, um, by far 65 bucks, you should go pick it up. No doubt about it.

And I'm interested to see if we can maybe like, if I see another batch, it's a little different.

Yeah.

You know, like I'm sure, like I said, Something a little different proof. Maybe we'll grab another and have something to pair too.

All right. Well, this is really hard because one just tugs at my heart and the other one really impressed me. I'm going to go, my number two is the bluegrass. Number two is the bluegrass. Okay. That's really good though. It is really, really good. Um, Sam, your guys are killing it. You know, we've had a number of your whiskies and they're, they always impress. I can remember going there early on and being impressed with their whiskeys, but not where they are today. I mean, they have really blossomed. Really good. And the number one? The Mars. The Mars. Take me to Mars. Take me to Mars. Really, really good. Another... Another knocked one out of the park, Danny and the crew.

And again, threw bluegrass up against some bangers, if you will. I mean, they held their own quite well. But there's a uniqueness to that.

And I don't think it was easy to choose between the bluegrass or the Mars. I think that they were...

I think the uniqueness of the Mars is what kind of swayed me. Right. Right.

Great. Great lineup time. A lot of fun. Always fun. So four really good whiskeys, just to sort of wrap up and talk about them again. Our first place pick was the Barstown Bourbon Company's Mars release. And I don't remember the price on that. It was about $100 for $3.75. Got it. Yeah. So it's about a $200 full liter, but you get it to $3.75. Great, great pour. Our number two place whiskey was the Bluegrass Blue Corn Single Barrel. Single Barrel, 70 bucks. 70 bucks. Get it at the distillery in Midway, Kentucky.

Maybe available at some stores, maybe at local Lexington, things like that.

Todd and I were split on three and four. So it means tied for third, yeah. Yep. So yeah, the two next tied for third, one was the Willett family estate small batch. This particular bottle was 126.3 proof, I think. And the Yokai, which was at 119? 117. 117 proof. Two great pours, both of them good. Totally different from each other.

Yeah, definitely on those two. But nice roundup. Yeah.

Really good. Uh, all great whiskeys, uh, check them out. Uh, definitely check out the bourbon road.com. Uh, it's our new website. It's up, it's running. We're hanging out. There's lots of posts flying up. Now we've got, um, members signing up every single day. We'd love to have you join up. If you listen to the show. And you have not yet gone to the bourbonroad.com and joined up on our website. We certainly love to have you do it. As we mentioned early in the show, we got some events coming up. Todd's going to be posting our sample soiree for the 22nd of August. And I mean, for the poultry amount of $5. I mean, Rob Carter's got to show, right?

He should show. Yeah. Sign some autographs and things. Yeah. Famous Rob Carter. That's right.

It's going to be a lot of fun. You do need to be a bourbon roadie. You do need to sign up on the website and get your ID card. You'll have to show it at the door and you'll have to cough up that $5 for that temporary membership to the Frankfurt Bourbon Society. Keep things legal. But we'll have a ton of pores in there. I mean, I'm going to say, probably somewhere around 100, 150 samples, I guess. Maybe not.

And you've been there, so you know we also have bottles in the back from bottle shares and things like that. There's all kinds of whiskey.

Yeah, we will not run out. It'll be three hours of total fun. And just make a weekend of it. Come to Kentucky, hang out, visit a few distilleries, just reserve Saturday evening from 5 to 8. And there'll be some things to munch on there. Don't worry about dinner, just come and We're not going to fill you up, but you'll have something to pick at. There's a lot of good restaurants too.

That's right.

All right. Well, every week, Todd and I put out an episode. We sometimes we have guests on like last week, Todd had 15 stars on Rick and Ricky came on and it was great. Um, we've got samples coming all the time. So we're doing these sample shows and getting through a lot about us. I think we're up to somewhere around, uh, 1,350. tasting notes on the website. Wow. Yeah, it's a lot. Searchable by distillery, searchable by proof, searchable by rating, all kinds of good stuff. I mean, if you like caramel whiskies, just type in caramel. If you like something with You know, a little bit of finish in it. You know, type in finished with Steve.

Let's just say I typed in 15 stars just to find what episodes they've been on and it literally gave me the two episodes they were featured on and then all the ones where we'd reviewed their, you know, on other shows. Yeah.

I mean, aren't Tasting Nose a little bit different than anybody else in addition to getting the rating and the Tasting Nose, Nose Palette, Finish, all that kind of stuff, which you would expect. We also cue up the episode to the exact moment in time where we talked about it. So if you just hit play, it'll play the 30 seconds or so around the tasting notes on that particular whiskey.

So pretty cool. Pretty amazing. Yeah.

We'd love to have you check it out. Make sure if you're listening to us on your favorite podcast app, you scroll to the top, hit that subscribe button. That way every week you'll get that notification that Jim and Todd have dropped another episode. You put your headphones on and join us for another trip down the Bourbon Road. We do it every week. We'd love to have you with us. 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 Lighten 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 a ties-leaf song 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