57. Happy Birthday Bourbon Road

We did have a whole stack of episodes stacked up and now we're kind of out of those.

Well that's kind of funny you mention that because I mean you and I were supposed to go to Mexico on a joint vacation with our with our wives and so we said you know what we don't want to worry about this podcast thing while we're down there we might record an episode while we're down there but we don't want to worry about it so let's record half a dozen or more we had more than that I think episodes in advance have them all in the in the library waiting to release on schedule and let's go enjoy ourselves in Mexico and not be worried about coming back and having to schedule podcasts and stuff. And then came coronavirus. So anyway, so we have been releasing those episodes. Obviously, we're not able to go to Mexico. We had to cancel our vacation. and we're sequestered just like everybody else, and we've been releasing those episodes on a regular basis. I'm sure everybody's been like, what the heck? It sounds like they're going places and doing stuff, but that was all done before Corona hit.

Welcome to another trip down the Bourbon Road with your hosts, Jim and Mike. So grab a glass of your favorite bourbon and kick back.

We would like to thank Tommy and Gwen Mitchell from Log Heads Home Center for supporting this episode of the Bourbon Road. Find out more about their fine rustic furniture at logheadshomecenter.com. Hello everyone, I'm Jim Shannon. And I'm Mike Hyatt. And this is The Bourbon Road. And Mike, we are one year old today. Well, not today.

Yeah, happy anniversary, I guess. Happy anniversary. Absolutely. It's a lot of shows.

It is. It is. We don't have exactly 52 episodes.

I think we've got, I don't know exactly, we just released 56, I think, wasn't it? A couple extra episodes there, here and there. We threw a bonus in, a couple of bonuses in. Yeah, I think that was some nice stuff. Um, so today to celebrate, we got a whole lineup of knob Creek bottles. That's right.

So today is a day by the Creek knob Creek to be exact, right? Yeah. A lot of times you say Jephthah Bend Creek, but today it's knob Creek.

Knob Creek. We're gonna drink some knob Creek. Uh, yeah. We've got, how many bottles do we have? We've got seven bottles. Knob Creek, six bottles knob Creek. We're going to take in, um, We're gonna drink three on the first pour, micro pours, and then three on the second half of the show. I thought that'd be nice. And we got a couple of nice bottles in there too. Two really nice bottles that probably can't find too often. So some of them are just standard knob Creek bottles and stuff. But the first one we were starting out with is the knob Creek small batch 100 proof.

So Mike, what do you think about Knot Creek? I mean, you've had a few in your collection from time to time. You've opened a few. What's your general thoughts on Knot Creek? Is it a go-to for you? It's not a go-to. That's a guest pool right there.

Somebody that likes something spicier, a little peppery. I don't know their mash bill, but I would think some of them are high rye.

I don't know if it's high, but it's definitely got a little more barrel spice to it. Knobcreeks have a lot of barrel influence.

Isn't that Jim Beam's kind of thing that have more spice to it? They don't do a whole lot of weeded bourbons. None of these are weeded bourbons. That's not what they're known for. They're known for that spice. And this is right up your alley. I'm always pushing you to drink weeded whiskey. So today's it's really your anniversary, the founder of the Bourbon Road. And, you know, this is your brainchild, I guess. Exactly. Would you?

Yeah, yeah. Maybe my brainchild, but I certainly haven't done it alone between you and Randy. You guys have really carried the load. This has been an absolute pleasure. And yeah, Knob Creek is good. It's a good choice today because it's something that I I'm happy to order at any bar I go to. I can order it straight. I can order it mixed in. I like their rye. I like their cast-strength, you know? Well, it's high proof at 120, right? Where you can get it at 100. Yeah. And so it's good stuff. I like the heavy barrel influence from these guys. I think that the profile fits me real well. If you've got a sweet tooth and you're a weeder kind of guy, Knob Creek's not your thing.

I think it depends. We'll see how that. We got a 12-year there that I'm hoping it tastes like candy. I'm hoping. I got hope for that bottle. The rice are a little sweet, so we got a couple of rice in here too. Yeah. I think it'll be a good expression to tell people what we think. We always say, hey, we're not bourbon experts or whiskey experts. We're just bourbon bullshitters or whiskey bullshitters. And we just, we tell it like it is. We tell people it's your bourbon your way. And that's just how it is. We're going to drink through three of these to start with and then three on the second half, but we thought we would talk about this past year and some of our favorite things that we got to do over the past year. Some of our favorite guests, favorite distilleries, and even favorite bourbons that we've got to drink or new expressions that we haven't had before. I think we both got those in our thing. Let's start on this though.

All right. First, I'd like to take this first bourbon we're drinking here. This is the knob Creek. This is a standard, right? This is the 100 proof. Knob Creek standard on the shelf bourbon. Typically, I guess this is around a nine-year bourbon, right?

On the bottle I have, I mean, you were talking about that, that they had taken the age statements off and then they put them back on and, you know, trying to, I guess, figure out marketing. What works in marketing? And maybe they're listening to what people are saying because people are kind of upset when they took those age statements off there. You want to know how old the whiskey they're drinking is. Right. So even some of them rise. it'll tell you the barreled date, you know, it'll tell you the, so you got to figure it out for yourself, I guess. Right.

Well, let's, uh, let's cheers. Cheers to the bourbon road. Cheers, Randy. I know you're out there listening. We appreciated your contribution to the bourbon road for the first 18 episodes and I hope you're listening. And if you are raise a glass with us. Yeah. Cheers, Randy. You're a lot more beautiful than me.

You got that slick back, long blonde hair. up there in the mountain like John Denver, just letting it flow right now.

All right. So Mike, I'm, I'm nosing this and tasting it.

Yeah.

So like, like with most knob creeks, I get that, uh, that woody nutty, um, barrel influence. Um, but it's got a little bit of sweetness on the nose, I think.

Just a tad bit more to me, more oaky, you know, more oak in it. Um,

Would you get that pepper? Oh yeah. Yeah, that pepper kind of presents itself and it's not really drying on the palate at all. I think for a hundred proof, it drinks very smooth for me. It might bite a little bit for you, but for me it drinks really smooth.

I think that first pour of it today was a, it was a little spicy, but after that first, first couple sips on it, it's a, this ain't my everyday drinker. Like I said, it's more of my, Something to have for a guest on the shelf. If somebody comes over and they say, hey, do you got any Knob Creek? Yeah, I got some Knob Creek for here. Let's get you a pour of this. Especially if I saw a 12 year or something, I was like, I pulled something off the shelf like that for somebody. They're going to be like, oh, man, you got me something special. So yeah.

Yeah, a little bit of brown sugar, heavy oak influence, some black pepper. It's got a little bit of a bite to it. It's got a decent finish. I mean, a really good finish for a hundred proof, I think. It's one of my favorites.

This Knob Creek is.

Knob Creek in general as a, as a, as a line of, you know, like a profile.

Sure. Yeah. I like Knob Creek profile. I can see that with you like wild turkey. Wild turkey Knob Creek.

Yeah. They're, they're very similar in some ways. Sure. Yeah.

Yeah, I wouldn't. That's never going to be my go-to. And, you know, people have said, oh, you're going to become a rye whiskey drinker. And probably not. I like it. You know, I probably would mix this more than I would just sit and sip it. Making a whiskey sour or whiskey old fashioned or, uh, Even a Kentucky meal, put that little bit of spice in that Kentucky meal.

I could do that. What other bourbons do you think kind of form that core profile that you like?

Well, of course, wellers. You have wellers out there and stuff. now that Wilderness Trail had come out with their weeded bourbon. I like that. It's all weeded, pretty much. But there are some bourbons, and I'll probably surprise you with the favorite bourbon that I got to drink this year. I guess that's my core profile. This is just a weeded bourbon. I want to try it at every bit I can get.

You want that softer up front, a little bit of sweetness?

Yeah. To some people's surprise, I don't have any pappies in my house. I'm just not lucky enough ever to spend time. go get a bottle or, and I'm not going to pay $2,000 for a bottle either. I just don't have that kind of cash. So I can't afford that. So I just don't have a bottle on it. But I got other bottles of weeded bourbon, as you know, and I really do like those. But I'll drink other stuff up there on the shelf. Rebel Yale.

Well, you are the self-proclaimed weeded bourbon, what is it? Weeded bourbon, King of Kentucky. Somebody called you out. Oh, yeah, Jackie's I can call you out on that.

That's all right. That's a good person to get called out by. Yeah, I want to educate myself on those bourbons as much as possible so I'll know more about them and I know those profiles and some of them are a little bit different. Rebel Yale to me is a different profile than Weller. Some of them were high proof. Bluegrass had a really great weeded bourbon that we tried and I liked. We went up to Indiana and went to Hotel Tango and they had their weeded bourbon. It was really good. So I'm getting there. We did Tennessee Whiskey from Nelson Green Bayer, which I was totally shocked by, and I think we both enjoyed that and stuff. So yeah, that's what I'm looking for in a bourbon. But whenever it's just our standard bourbon or rye bourbon, I'm probably looking at Old Forrester. I do drink a lot of Woodford. Man, I never thought about that. I have a whole bunch of their bottles.

Do you like that brown forming profile?

Probably. And I'll drink some Wild Turkey too. Wild Turkey to me is a good bottle to mix with. I mean, heck, who doesn't have some good whiskey? I think we've shown that we will drink from the very bottom shelf, all the way to that top shelf, and there's nothing wrong with that. But we both have our our standard, I guess, or we would, our flat line, is that what you'd call it? Yeah. I don't know. I don't know what the, I don't know what the term is for that. Well, I'm pouring this. Tell me, what do you, we'll pour our next pour here and I'll tell you what it is after I pour it. What, what was your favorite place when you've, through this whole year, what was your favorite distillery to go to?

Oh, we've been to so many and they're all so hospitable. I have to give a shout out to all of them for inviting us in and certainly giving us a great interview. Probably my best experience in general. It's kind of a toss up between two for me. It's between Wilderness Trail and Peerless, I think. I think I had a great time at both those places. I think I like what they're doing. They were extremely hospitable and treated us like family in both places. Not to say that the other places weren't as great. Nelson Greenbrier was awesome. Woodford was good. Angel's Envy. Old Forrester and just, you know, all the places we went. I mean, I don't know how many distilleries we've been to in the last year. It's more than I can count on fingers and toes, but it was probably those two that I just felt like I got the best experience out of.

And I could see that from you because you're more of a engineering and technical in both of those places. They really took us inside the technical and inner workings of the distillery, the piping and stuff like that.

Yeah. I mean, when you get Pat Heist and Shane Baker on one hand talking tech, then you get Caleb Kilburn talking tech and they're both talking yeast and fermentation and barrel aging and all those technical terms about their stills and everything. I eat that stuff up. I can see your eyes getting heavy and your head bobbing a little bit with it.

Yeah. So for me, it wasn't those two distilleries that even though I have a fondness for wilderness trail, those guys treated us like like I was their brother out there. So Shane and Pat, if you're listening, you know, I got to say thank you for just opening your your house up to us. But probably the two places I loved the most was Leapers Fork Distillery. Those guys are just they're number one in my book. Beautiful distillery, small, Um, they just really, it just kind of all flowed and stuff.

You guys are kind of cut from the same cloth. You know, you kind of, you kind of really, um, gelled. Yeah.

Yeah. And bluegrass distillers, uh, for being what they are, they're so tiny. Um, and I kind of already had my mind what, when I found out that Sam Rock was a lawyer, I had this idea in my mind what he was going to be like. And did he ever surprise me on what he really is? Totally different guy than what I thought. And how they're doing things and how they're building their own brand is great. So that would be my two favorite places. I like them. They have really opened their arms up and shared with us. So that second pour I got for us was this Knob Creek 12 year. That's only a hundred proof.

Okay, so this is the same proof. Now this is a relatively new bottle.

It's brand new. I saw this in the store and I actually called you up and said, hey, Jim, they got some of this on the shelf. Do you want a bottle? Yeah. I actually called another guy and he missed my call and he called me back about an hour later and he's like, what did you need, man? And I was like, too late now? He's like, you think I can get over there and get it? And I was like, nah, they're probably out by now. It was right around five o'clock when I was going to work and I stopped by there. But yeah, 12 year old knob Creek, something that you're not going to see. It's the blue label out there. So I'd say if it's on the shelf, 63 99 is what I got it at.

So let's, let's go. There's a lot of people out there that haven't had this. Let's go ahead and go over the label specifics here.

So on the front, it does have their age statement, age 12 years, um, 100 proof.

That's that, that's, it's pretty, not a single barrel, not a, it's just a small batch whiskey.

Yeah.

No special release, special markings, anything like that.

It doesn't even say small batch on it. No. Actually it does. It says, you know, maybe all, all of it's small batch. Knob Creek's small batch, Kentucky straight bourbon whiskey at a Claremont, Kentucky. There you go. Crafted for superior taste and smoothness. They put smoothness on the bottle. I like that.

Same big black wax dip on top. It's tough to get through. It is tough to get through. You end up with black chunks of plastic all over your house.

Yeah. But that's their standard expression, small little bottle. Skinny enough for a bartender can reach for it, I guess, and handle it. But I think it would still fit in a well, I guess, sideways. It would take up more room than our standard bottle, though.

Yep. So man, I'm getting a lot more fruit on this one than the last one. Kind of a, I don't know, a dark fruit, definitely. Raisins.

Which you expect from that 12-year, right?

Yeah, but the same oak forward profile with that kind of nutty undertaste. I don't know, what do you call it? Underlaying taste? Underlying taste, yeah.

Now I could drink this all day long, right? This would be a good bourbon to sip on.

This is softer up front than the other one, isn't it? Little bit, not quite as peppery up on the front, a little bit more in the back. So this is that white pepper I'm always talking about.

It's not so peppery that it's overwhelming. It's going to bite you, punch you in the throat. It's just there. It's a nice, smooth finish. It's not too dry. Not as much oak as I thought it would have.

But the traditional caramel and brown sugar flavors are there. Not much in the way of baking spice, but I think a lot more of that dried raisin, dried plum kind of darker fruit. Yeah, I like this one a lot. I like this one very well. This is good stuff.

So let's talk about... I've kind of turned this into interviewing you. That's a good deal. Out of all the bourbons you got to try, there's some stuff that you hadn't got to try yet this year for the podcast. What was your favorite bourbon that you got to try?

knock me out of the park, kind of blow me away. I can't believe you just let me drink that. It would definitely be the old Forester 2020 birthday bourbon. I could not believe that. I was just bowled over by it.

That would be my number one too. I've never had it before, any birthday bourbon. So I was so shocked when she comes out of her office and that's what she's carrying and says, hey guys, I'm going to let you try this before anybody else in the world has tried it. Her and like three other people had tried it and then me and you.

I think that's really special. You know, we had that with the same with Mark and Sherry Carter. They came over, actually came over to the house. We set up for a podcast interview there and they broke out three number one bottles. Her magic purse is what I call it. Big leather magic purse she has. I would say that since we were drinking from freshly opened bottle number one of three different batches, we were probably amongst the very first to drink their new batches that they were releasing of those. It's always a treat to be amongst the first to try something. You get that first chance to sort of taste it and call it some notes and talk about it a little bit. And that's fun. Yeah. I mean, you've got to do that a couple different places.

I got to do it down Leapers Fork with their Tennessee whiskey they were going to release. And they had pulled it that day and put it in a bottle for me. And I got to taste that. And then Sam Rock did the same thing with his bottle and bond. Which was absolutely delicious. So it's just always amazing to me that we're getting to be the first people to to sample stuff and I just, you know, I just feel so lucky that we're part of the podcast that where we can go out there and we do get treated a little bit different, you know, and there's nothing wrong with that. So how has your life changed since the podcast started? Cause I know things are not the same for you. Well, you know, I got I got two different seasons of life. I guess I've got my winter season where I work night shift for a regular job and I got summer season where I'm working day shift. So I kind of switch between that and I just got to feel feed the. I've got to kind of adjust to that with a podcast and stuff, but you know, I don't know. I've reached out to more people and my network is built a little bit more. I had about, I don't know, 600 friends on Facebook. I'm right up around 800 now and I have an Instagram account. I didn't have an Instagram account before. I've learned a lot, so much about social media. And so many people have lent a hand to helping us out with our social media.

I don't know if people know really kind of what behind the scenes, when we're not on air, what parts of this podcast you take care of and what parts I take care of. I mean, they may have an idea, but they might not know. I kind of handle the podcast technical side of things. The website, the podcast editing, the publishing of the podcast, the getting it out on all the different media networks, and doing the audio editing, and all that kind of stuff. And you, on the other hand, you handle the public facing part of it. So you do all the social media, and you write the blogs. And you're the face that's out there. You're the guy that's kind of...

This is definitely not the face for radio. I'm just a big ugly mug.

But you're the one that's kind of interacting with our listeners.

Yeah. And I've tried to do that much more. And I've drug you into it a little bit. Tried to drag you out of that dark room, I guess. The dark room. The back room.

Yeah, the back room.

The studio. And taking a photo once a day. So put a photo once a day up on On social media, I've learned that if you do not do that, then you end up people forget about you really fast. So you almost have to put up a photo a day that a post on Instagram and Facebook takes anywhere between 30 and 45 minutes to do and do correctly. Instagram's a little bit different than Facebook, but you can share it from Instagram over to your Facebook account. Not so many hashtags, so you have to go back, if you share it, then you have to go back and delete hashtags off there, because some people get annoyed to that. And then Instagram doesn't have these private bourbon groups, and Facebook does, and I belong to about 30 of them. And I think some people get irritated that I post into every group. But what I always say is not everybody like me belongs to 30 different bourbon groups. So I want to get good content out there and I feel like I've gotten a lot better at it. I'm coming up with better questions. Definitely have gotten way better with my photography and I'm doing all my photography off a cell phone. Some people might not know that. But I spent a little bit of time there.

And I've seen the Apple commercials where they're talking about, you know, people are using their phones for all kinds of fancy photography now. So I think it's a good piece of photography equipment.

Yeah, and I'd probably like to get a bigger camera, but I got other things, other hobbies I do. And this is still for me as a hobby. We don't make money off of this. We probably spend more money than we'd ever make off of off of the podcast. So, you know, I do have a tripod and I use that quite often. It allows me to do video shots. It allows us to go and take nice still photos and stuff where my hands not shaking or something.

I see when you set up that tripod. So you set up that tripods when you do them on Instagram. What's it called? Interview? You do Instagram Live and it's like when you set up the camera, it's always like your bottles are the center of attention behind you. Might get your head in the center of the screen, but no, you got them weller bottles and everything sticking out. That looks pretty good.

I think people want to see that we're actually drinking the bourbon. I'm proud that we I'm proud that we do do that. We drink our bourbon. It's not a collection. I had a signed bottle and opened it the other day and I sipped from it. And then I sat there just looking at it and I probably ruined a $300 or $400 bottle of bourbon by drinking it. But I think that master stiller wanted that bottle to be drank, not set up on a shelf and be a collector's item. Because at some point, I'm going to die and I'm going to pass away and my son probably is the one, he's a bourbon drinker. And he, I think he would come over here and just, you know, Vivian would say, Hey, you can have all this bourbon. So yeah. What have you learned this past year? Have you learned a lot from the podcast?

I think I have. Yeah. So, you know, you've mentioned many times how we're just, uh, we're just amateurs, you know, we're not professional tasters or bourbon drinkers or anything like that. But what I have learned is that, you know, um, You know what you like, regardless of how advanced your palate is or how well you are at tasting bourbon and calling out notes. At the end of the day, you know if you like it or not. And nobody can tell you you like something if you don't. So I've tasted some juice. Let's call it juice. I won't name any names. We've tasted some juice that doesn't hit the mark. We've tasted some that are just out of this world. I think we're professional enough. We're able to say something good about just about anything we drink. Honestly, I don't think anything out there doesn't qualify to at least be a mixer. What do you think about that?

I said something about that the other day. Somebody asked a question on one of the Facebook groups and I said, what's your top dollar for a mixer? And I said $100. And people got upset about that. I said, hey, you're whiskey your way, you're bourbon your way. If I buy it, you know, sometimes I want to experiment a little bit. Does it taste any better? But I've said many times the cocktail was created to make whiskey taste better, right? For rot gut and stuff back in the roaring twenties when people were just making hooch. I mean, it was made to make stuff taste better. So, You know, can you take something from the bottom of the shelf? Is that Pappy? That'd be sacrilegious probably. But even a weller 12 year, would I pour that in a cocktail? No, I'm not going to pour that in a cocktail. Yeah.

Well, that choice can be made by the person that owns the bottle, right? Yeah. I think that for the most part, you know, I've had some, look, we got a lot of bottles, Mike. Some of them are, I would say most of them are appreciated. There's a few of them that are not our favorites. But I can tell you right now that if I make a mule with something that's less than sipping whiskey, I drink the mule. It's fine. I don't have a problem with it. It may not be the best mule I've ever had, but it's all right. I mean, it's good. Sure. Yeah. I'm not going to drain pour any whiskey. Never have, never will.

I understand when people say that. They said they'll drain pour, make it into a cocktail or give it away, give it away, cook with it, do all kinds of different stuff.

inject it in that pork butt, it'll be all right.

Yeah. I mean, I do that. Some people would probably disagree with me. They say whiskey's not good with beef or pork. Some people agree with me. Some people disagree. I use a lot of whiskey for cooking, for apple pies, to inject in a pork butt. I use a cup of barbecue sauce to a cup of bourbon and mix that together to inject it in my pork butt. I've made all kinds of different stuff with it. We had a bourbon-themed night here one night and everybody had to cook with bourbon. So I think there's different things to do.

So what have I learned? Let me take this last 10 minutes of conversation and sort of narrow it down. What have I learned? Every distiller out there that's making whiskey is putting his love into it, putting his effort and his sweat into it. It may not match what I like to drink, but I still got respect for what they're doing. It may not be a bottle that I want on my bar, but I still got respect for what they're doing. I think people don't realize how important the cocktail industry is and how important it is to have bourbons and American whiskeys and rye whiskeys that are made specifically for mixing purposes.

So let's do that because I got another question on this half for you. So the next thing we got up for our first half here is a Knob Creek Single Barrel. It's at 115 proof. It's a select, single barrel select, so it is a single barrel. And this is bourbon too. This is actually a rye. This is a rye, okay. The straight rye whiskey. All right. Go to that next. So we're just working our way up by proof. Yeah.

And this is a 115 proof. It doesn't have an age statement on it, but, um, I would imagine it's a little bit younger than nine years. Um, but maybe not. Maybe it's a nine year whiskey. Um, it is, uh, 115 proof, 57.5% alcohol. This is a barrel select and, uh, I can't read the label from here, so I'm not going to bother. But, uh, Mike, let's check it out.

So this right here is like a fruit loop cereal to me. It's got that sweetness in the nose.

Yeah, it does have a sweet nose to it. Fruit loops. You know, I am getting a little bit of fruit loops. It's so funny how somebody can like cause you to have that memory, you know, that, you know, the funny thing is I was just fixing fruit loops this morning, uh, for my grandson and he, um, I could smell it. I didn't eat it myself, but I could smell the Froot Loops and that does bring back that little memory from just this morning. I'm also getting kind of a little bit of mint and dill, but it's just a hint on the dill, but mostly mint. Just a little bit.

I could get some Life Saver candies in there too, maybe that. Maybe that lifesaver like breath mint, you know, that's, that's kind of what I get.

I guess, you know, I almost say a little bit of green grass, kind of a little bit of green grass in there, fresh cut grass.

Well, I will tell you what I sipped on it. It's got some pepper on it. Um, on that back end, it kind of bites a little bit, maybe a little cayenne pepper. Boy, that's sweet. Sweetness on the front end. Yep. And maybe not so much now that I'm. Hmm.

Compared to that bourbon, it's a bit sweeter, I think.

Yeah, it's definitely sweeter than the bourbon.

So what was your favorite guest that we've had on? Oh, you and your favorites. Let's see. Boy, I haven't had time to think about that. How would I answer this one? I didn't even know this question was coming. Who's been my favorite guest? Definitely Jackie's icons up there. Between her, Elizabeth McCall. I like the ladies, I guess. Yeah, both of those were great interviews. Who else? Bo? Bo Garrett? He was a lot of fun.

David Jennings, a lot of fun. So my two, I have two favorites, I guess, of three, really, I guess, because you named three, I'll name three. So Dustin Collins, there you go. I thoroughly enjoyed interviewing him and he played live music on our show for us. And he was just as about as humble of a person that I've ever met. And you could just feel his life story coming out of him. I thoroughly enjoyed that interview with him. Peggy no Stevens to me. Kind of sitting there with a royalty with her. I felt, you know, she's been through the business. She knows what she's doing. She's written books. She's just released a new book. the nicest lady you'll ever meet. That to me, what Southern Charm is all about is Peggy No Stevens. And then once again, the whole team down at Leapers Fork, how they treat us. And I wish you would have got to go down there. They just, Lee Kennedy and Matt and April, they just treated us great and everybody does. And I don't think we've ever walked into a place and we've gotten treated badly.

Yeah, that's why these I think that's why these favorite questions are so hard for me because I mean, honestly, I mean, they're all special in one way or another. Yeah, and that's kind of why, you know, I say it's hard for me to choose favorites because each and every show that we've done and I'm not trying to be kind of politically correct here, not upset anybody. I'm just saying that each and every show that we've done has been special in its own way. And whether it was a musical artist we had on, or we had an author on, or we've had somebody in the food industry, or a chef, and we've had people from all those places. Every one of those interviews has been cool in its own way. I mean, really cool in its own way. And the fact that we've gotten to sit down with these people and drink bourbon with them and talk about what they do, It's just friggin' awesome. I mean, it's so much fun. So much fun. And yeah, I've got a few favorites, but they're all cool.

Well, I feel the same way. I mean, how can you not, like Steve Coombs, sitting in a speakeasy with him or going up to Hotel Tango and talking to a disabled veteran that's started his own business up or Wilderness Trail that not only do we go over there and do the interview, but they also invite us back to do the Kentucky State Barbecue Festival. And then we get to meet this monstrous barbecue personality, Big Moe Cason.

Big Moe Cason. What a huge name and what a huge personality to have on the show. You know, we had Whiskey River on and then a few months later they show up on America's Got Talent.

Yeah. I mean, so cool. So cool. The trips we've got to take too. And we'll talk about that in our second half. The trips we've been on and road trips we've been. The true Bourbon Road has been great. But we'll talk about that on the second half. We'll finish this up right here. Take a little break. Take a little break and we'll come back. Sounds good.

We would like to thank Tommy and Gwen Mitchell from Loghead's Home Center for supporting this episode of the Bourbon Road. Loghead's Home Center, nestled in the hills of Kentucky, is an industry leader in building handcrafted rustic furniture. Family-owned and operated, they take pride in offering only the very best for their customers. The Logheads, and that's what they like to call themselves, are skilled woodcrafters who are passionate about creating rustic furniture for people who appreciate the beauty of natural wood. Owners Tommy and Gwen don't just sell the rustic lifestyle, they live it. And you can be sure that Loghead's furniture will always be handcrafted in Kentucky by artisans who embrace the simple way of life. Loghead's rustic furniture is made from northern white cedar, a sustainable wood that's naturally rot and termite resistant. Its beauty and quality will add warmth to your earthy lifestyle for generations to come. Be sure to check out everything they have to offer at LogHeadsHomeCenter.com and while you're at it, give Tommy and Gwen a shout on Facebook or Instagram at LogHeadsHomeCenter. So we're back from our break and Mike, what do we have in our glass now?

So now we're drinking the Knob Creek Single Barrel Reserve. It's their nine year that you can almost buy it on any shelf. It's 120 proof, right? 120 proof, small batch is what they say on the front of it. So I think they put it all there and we talked about that label.

Yeah. So I mean, when you, when you read a label and then the label says single barrel and small batch are both listed on the label, it kind of makes you go, what? Yeah, it's confusing. But I guess a single barrel is the smallest batch, right? I guess. And maybe Knob Creek's just trying to get the most use out of their labels.

Well, if they could reuse that right there, I guess, on another label, then that makes sense to me. But they'd have to be 120 proof though.

Yeah. I don't know. Some people might say, no, it's not a batch unless you mix it. But you know, they're doing their thing.

They are. And they, they obviously are selling plenty of whiskey out there, right? They're not hurting for money. I don't think. Of course right now I think everybody's probably hurting for a little bit of money, but I don't think they're hurting at all. They're, they're going to survive this right here. Let's check it out.

Oh, that smells a lot like a, but there's a lot more caramel in this one.

Yeah.

Almost butterscotch.

Butter pecan ice cream.

Yeah, I can. Yeah, I'm getting the butter on the nose. No doubt about it. Yeah, I would say this one leans butterscotch a little bit. Not real sweet on the nose, but it's got that butterscotch-y kind of, I don't know. There's a chemical that is butterscotch. I don't know what that chemical is, but. If Shane was here or Pat, they'd probably tell us. Break it down for us. Yeah. Tell us what that was.

Acetyl or something. I don't know. Sweet, sweet on the nose, but sweet, sweet on the taste too.

Yeah. But I think it's sweeter than the other bourbons, but it's not as sweet as that. Right. We just had.

It's over a bit of 120 proof though. Yeah, that's a good bourbon. It'll give you that old Kentucky hug.

Yeah, it's a spicy bourbon, but that's not rye spice to me.

That's barrel spice. That is. There's a total difference. That's that warm spice that goes down in your chest and kind of warms you up. It's not that bite on the tongue.

So we've worked our way up here from 100 proof to 115 and now we're at 120. We're still on our way up though, right?

Oh yeah. I think we got one or two more, a little bit, a little bit more peppery.

Yeah, I really like this one a lot, but it's got a lot more spice on the back end. The finish on it is very long on this one. It really sticks there. It's got a little bit of a kind of a, um, a sour, kind of a sour back end on it for me.

I see. I don't get that. I mean, that's our two different palates and stuff. I, it has a long finish on it to me. It's not drying. It's, um, I still, I get that aftertaste of just sweetness. It's a, I could drink this. That's good. I want to say sweet tart. No, make tart on the back end.

Yeah, that sweet, sweet tart. Sweet tart. I said sour, but I mean sweet tart. Yeah.

Or even a soury, like sour gummy, gummy worms. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's that candy. I think both of those are.

Yeah. That's a, that's a great bourbon. I'll tell you what, that's something that I need to have on my bar. On your shelf. Yeah. On my bar. Don't doubt about it.

So when you first started the podcast, you know, and you're what inspired you, who inspired you to start this out?

Well, you know, somewhere back, you know, I got into bourbon, it's been a while ago, but I got into bourbon and it was actually Weller 12 that really opened my eyes. I mean, I've been drinking bourbon for a lot of years. I actually was drinking 80s wild turkeys just because that's when I was drinking whiskey. I was in the 80s. But Wilder 12 kind of opened my eyes, kind of said, wow, there's some really great stuff out there. And, you know, it's somewhere along the way I started

kind of searching out more information on it, try to become a little more knowledgeable.

And I started watching a little bit of YouTube. I think I started with YouTube before podcasts. And It's Bourbon Night with Chad and Sarah was kind of something I latched onto early on. And I watched them for a while and I went to one of the user meets and I was kind of, you know, in their chat rooms when they were online live and kind of really enjoyed that. And then Perry from This is My Bourbon podcast started listening to him because he was on their show every now and then. And at that time, you know, there wasn't a lot of whiskey podcasts and bourbon podcasts and whiskey tubers, they call them on YouTube. There were a few. And along came a fellow out of Clumps, Ohio named Jason C, Jason Collori. And he had a show called The Mashin' Drum. I started watching him. And we became friends. He came down and hung out with me here in Kentucky, and we spent some time together. And somewhere along the way, I said, you know what? I think I might like to do a podcast. This is kind of cool stuff. And I think I can do a little bit different take on it and just have a good time. You know, appreciate life on the Bourbon Trail, kind of.

And that's when I called up Randy and said, Randy, let's do this thing. And he said, I'm in. Let's do it.

And that's kind of where it started. But yeah, my inspirations were This Is My Bourbon Podcast, It's Bourbon Night, and The Mashing Drum. I'd say those three kind of really, there's others, but those are the three that kind of inspired me to do this. Three very successful. All three very successful. Absolutely.

Yeah. And I think they're, whenever you look at somebody that's very educational and knowledgeable in the bourbon game, as far as bourbon media or bourbon social media, those three are right up there in the top and stuff.

Right. And they've been around a while and, you know, they've got, they've all got, you know, quite a number of episodes that have been recorded and they've got staying power. You know, they've, they've, they've got their system down. They've got their, uh, they've got a good program and they keep it going and they keep their audience, uh, Waiting for the next episode to come out.

Now those are three, the three listed are all besides the couple, but they're married to each other, correct?

They are now. Yeah, Chad and Sarah are now. Now when they started their show, they were just friends. And they got married. Yeah, it blossomed into something else later. So yeah, no, they didn't start as a couple.

But I'd say the other two are just them by themselves.

Yeah. So Perry, well, actually Perry's got a couple of co-hosts that come on his show as well. Kurt and the Swan, you know, they're on the show with him. And so the trio, those three kind of format the show. Now Perry did probably his first hundred episodes by himself with guests sometimes. But now he's, he usually got somebody else on there with him.

I think that's for us. That's might be one of the most challenging things for us to do is both of us have a farm. Both of us, you have two successful businesses, really three. full-time, I work full-time, both are married, sort of juggling like six or seven different schedules, then you throw a podcast schedule in there.

Yeah, the last thing we needed was something else to work on, right?

Yeah, and we both have different hobbies. I like to hunt, that's a whole different season by itself and I'm a very sociable person, so I like to go out with my friends all the time and That includes you guys. We try to hang out as much as possible, but trying to fit a podcast schedule in there and then scheduling that with the distillers or with guests can be a nightmare sometimes. We did have a whole stack of episodes stacked up and now we're kind of out of those.

Well, that's kind of funny you mentioned that because I mean you and I were supposed to go to Mexico on a joint vacation with our with our wives and So we said, you know, we don't want to worry about this podcast thing while we're down there We might record an episode while we're down there, but we don't want to worry about it So let's record a half dozen or more. We had more than that I think episodes in advance have them all in the in the library waiting to release on schedule and let's go enjoy ourselves in Mexico and not be worried about coming back and having to schedule podcasts and stuff. And then came coronavirus. So anyway, so we have been releasing those episodes. Obviously we're not able to go to Mexico. We had to cancel our vacation. And we're sequestered, just like everybody else, and we've been releasing those episodes on a regular basis. I'm sure everybody's been like, what the heck? It sounds like they're going places and doing stuff, but that was all done before Corona hit.

Yeah, I guess, what's a three P's, right? Yeah. What's that? Prior planning, preparation, I don't know, heck, what I'm saying. The three Ps of life, preparation, planning, and performance? Performance, I don't know. Great, better performance, I guess, yeah. So to me, that's what we were doing. We made sure we had a plan in place. We made sure we prepped for everything and we were good to go for a while. Now we're back to that, it seems like square one, which we're not. Trust me, we're getting some guests lined up right now as we speak.

Well, last week's episode, we had on Spirits of French Lick, and that was the first time that we had done an actual audio interview using that new software. We had done an actual live event with it before, but we had never done an audio interview before using it. And we learned a few things. The audio wasn't the best, but it was fine. You could listen to the episode and enjoy it. It was fine. We learned that you cannot sacrifice using good equipment to do a recording. You can't just throw on your AirPods and do it. It just doesn't work.

Yeah, me and you had sat out here to drive away and talked about that if we had to do it again. trying to make everything better. If we do have to do it again, then we're both using the same headphones or earbuds and trying to figure out how to get the guests to have the right audio equipment. It was super difficult. But hey, I wanted to move on to this next

Oh, wait. So final word on that, on that single barrel. I drank it down. It has some good stuff. I mean, that's really good. So anybody who's listening out there, Knob Creek, single barrel select, nine year old, 120 proof. rock solid.

Yeah, I'd get a thumbs up from both of us. I think that was a great sweet bourbon, um, not too much spice, but it is 120 proof. You're gonna, it, yeah, it'll kick you in the shorts. If you try to sit down and drink a bottle of it. So what's next, Mike? So I kind of mess this up. This one, we're going to step down just a notch, uh, to back to 119.6 proof. This is the Cast Strength Rye Whiskey from Knob Creek. It was a limited release. It was barreled in 2009 and released in 2018.

Okay, so this is a 2018 bottle. This one's been sitting on the shelf here for a while now. It's not something that you're going to probably go out and find on the shelf right away, but it is a cast ring thrive from Knob Creek.

Well, they do have, I saw last year, 2019. So is it going to be every year? Right.

But this 2018 bottle, you're not going to be able to get. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. So this will be something a little bit different, um, that we can pour our pores, pour here.

Now I still have a memory of that, uh, of that single barrel select rye whiskey. We just had a few minutes ago. I can still remember that, that, uh, that sweet, uh, a little bit of mint, a little bit of dill and, uh, what I said, fresh cut grass, cut grass.

This ain't a single barrel though. This is a big, a very large batch. Yeah.

It's not even a small batch cast strength. Yeah. We're moved up in proof. There's a little more mint on this one. It might just be because of the upped proof. But it's definitely sweet, just like the other rye.

That's a cast drink. That rye is powerful. Yeah. That's not my jam right there.

I might even mix that up. I'm getting a little bit of anise in it, a little bit of licorice.

I can taste a little licorice in it. Even black licorice, you know, just not any kind of licorice candy.

I can get that. I've said it before, you know, when you go into like an Indian restaurant and you eat Indian food and as you're checking out at the bar there at the cash register, they got that little that little dish full of seeds that you can reach down and grab and to clean your palate. It's that, it's that, it's that anise, that anise seed or whatever it is.

That's some definitely, like I said, powerful stuff. And it's, it's a little proof that 120, but it just has a little bit more bite to it to me.

And this is a nine year ride.

Yeah. Yeah. Now this would be so rye, a rye whiskey for maybe some of our new listeners. It's a more than 51% or more 50%.

And Knob Creek is going to be what they call a Kentucky rye. It's going to be, um, not too much more than 50% rye.

Between 50 and 60. And then, and then some corn.

Yeah, they don't release their mash bills, but the second flavoring grain in this case is going to be corn. And that's where that sweetness is coming from. And then I don't know what the percentages are in the mash bill, but this is definitely a sweet, fry whiskey, Kentucky style. And, um, yeah, I think it's pretty good.

So some of the places we've had, we've collaborated with, um, been pretty awesome, right? We've had dad's drinking bourbon. Yep. Big, big John, you're out there. Shout out to you, man. We had Jason from the mashing drum. Absolutely. Beating on his drums all the time. He's an actual drummer.

He is a drummer. Yeah.

Uh, we had three, three fellows from old, uh, bourbon lens, young cats.

Yeah. I'd call them, um, bourbon lens collaboration. We did. We had, uh, we had a third pour where we had YouTubers on and we had, um, we had, uh, Jason from the Mashin drum on. We had Scott on from My Bourbon Journey. And we had Dan on from Dusty Dan's Whiskey Reviews. And that's an episode that we had where we did a bottle, kind of a bottle challenge. Everybody brought a bottle. They were poured secretly by the ladies into numbered flasks. And then we tasted through them and we voted as a crew on what we thought was the best. And we had a prize for that. And that was an epic night. It was so much fun. We've got to do that again. But anyway, yeah. So these collaborations, I think in general are a lot of fun and they bring together listeners from different you know, everybody's got their followers.

Yeah. We had Mark Rucker from, from really at the time he was an Instagrammer.

Yeah.

Big following Instagram. And now everybody knows him as the bourbon life. And now he has his own podcast. To me, that would have been a collaboration with us both and stuff at Instagrammer.

Yep.

So I think each one of those, those teams or they've all taught us something. We brought, they've each brought something to the table that said, Hey, we could do this different. And they've given us inspiration too. We might see them doing something or trying to come up with ideas that are different, but sometimes their ideas are so good. We want to run with that idea.

And these collaborations, we always say rising tide raises all ships, right? People hear us say that all the time.

I bet I, I bet I've messaged A thousand people had said that whenever they liked our stuff or thanked us for likes. I say that every time, rising tides raise all ships.

So when we have somebody from another podcast on, we have somebody on from a YouTube channel and we do a collaboration show together, we both get a lift out of that, right? We both win. And the listeners win because they get exposed to something they might not have heard before. We've heard it so many times. You know, we've had these collaborations and one of our listeners will say, I am so glad you did that because I didn't even know Jason from the Mashin Drum existed. Now I'm watching his channel too and it's awesome. We're adding to their library of things that they listen to and watch and it's just, it's awesome. And we've got some more things planned, right?

Oh yeah. We actually have a really big show that'll be coming up in the next month. It'll involve five or six different podcasts and maybe a YouTuber here or there. So history wise, have you learned anything new about bourbon or whiskey. We've had a lot of history buffs on, right?

We have. One of the things that I learned, one of the things that still surprises me even today is the scale at which they produced in the late 1800s. How big those operations were. You know, you think about Jack Daniels today and you think about Jim Beam. You know, you think about Brown Foreman, you know, with Old Forrester, Woodford Reserve. You think about the size of these at Heaven Hill. You know, you think about the size of these distilleries and, you know, Heaven Hill's producing 1,300 barrels a day, right? And you think, man, these guys are really producing a lot of booze, right? They're not even close to what was being done.

Yeah, what Nelson Greenbrier was doing back in the 1800s.

Yeah, the late 1800s, they say the average adult male, and adult male back then was 15 years old or older, But the average adult male drank 18 gallons of whiskey a year. That's a lot of whiskey. Yeah. Now, we weren't the population that we are today, but they were saying the average adult male. So population doesn't matter, right? It's the average adult male.

But also soda wasn't around. So you usually had probably buttermilk or milk or you had some just water to drink. That was it. Already you drank some spirits.

But I would like to know what that number is today. You know, somebody out there probably knows, you know, what the average adult male drinks in gallons of whiskey or bourbon a year right now. I would love to know what the number is today. I don't think it's 18 gallons.

The average person probably drinks less than two gallons. Probably so.

So when we look at, you know, you say, what in history surprised me the most or what do I remember? The fact that when you walk into the, um, the distillery, the new distillery out there in, uh, the castle and key that used to be the, uh, the Taylor distillery and you go in there and you see the old equipment and the, and the size of it is just huge. huge. And how they were moving that many barrels a day and doing it down the Kentucky River just amazes me.

On flat bottom boats at that. Yeah. That is a pretty amazing thing. The things I've been amazed at were just got the doors open to us like we've had Michael Veech on that just as a He's a history book himself. And then we had Peggy Noe Stevens on. She's been in the business forever. She's just full of knowledge on the bourbon history. Steve Coombs, the author of Bourbon Justice. Yep.

And, you know, Brian Hara with Bourbon Justice in the books that he wrote. You know, just so much history being brought up and, I mean, just amazing stuff.

We're trying to bring that history to the bird. Even myself, I'm always researching something. The back history to JTS Brown or the back history to Wild Turkey. You guys had Rare Bird 101 on. He is just full of knowledge. Even Bo telling the inside stories of giving tours there. But all that back history to me is super fascinating and the rich history that Kentucky and Tennessee both have together is just, it amazes me. And there's so much more to learn there and stuff. When people come to Louisville area or Kentucky, there's rich in history with bourbon. Absolutely. How much time do we have left? This is 22 minutes, so we'll do our second.

So we got one more pour after this? Yup. Okay. We'll be done. All right. So Mike, any last thoughts on this? I know you said it's not on your bucket list. So let's remind the user, we would talk about a lot of stuff. We're still drinking the Knob Creek Cast Strength Rye 2018 release.

119.6 proof. Couldn't get it right to 120, could they? No, probably just put a little bit too much water in it. Yeah, I would probably mix this. I hate to say that, but I'd probably mix that. That'd be for me. I'm not going to drink, but we talked about that. I'm never going to drink or something. I'd mix it. I bet I'd make one badass.

I'm going to tell you what. I'm going to tell you what we were drinking this weekend. Chad and I, you know Chad. Chad and I were drinking, you remember that eight and sand from MGP? We've been drinking that eight and sand and he's been having bourbon and cokes and I've been having mules.

There ain't nothing wrong with that.

There you go. Eight and sand. Now eight and sand for anyone who doesn't know is a bourbon blended bourbon whiskey from MGP. So blended meaning that there's other stuff in it other than bourbon, right? Probably some cane sugar whiskey or something like that.

It's got some bourbon in it because it, MGP, everybody knows MGP makes bourbon. Well, it could just be American whiskey in there too.

Could be some American whiskey in there. Who knows what it is? They don't tell the whole story. But that one for me, I didn't personally think it was a sipping whiskey, but you know what? It made some fine mules as far as I'm concerned.

And there, there's nothing wrong with that. I think, uh, I've got some cabin steel underneath my counter and every once in a while break that out and make myself a old Kentucky meal with it.

And Hey, but that's primarily for barbecuing, right?

No, I use old crow for barbecue. I try to stick to that. You know, it's worked every time, but now that I do have some bottles that are bottom shelf, you know, Vivian says, Hey, I want to make something. Pick a bottle. She made some banana nut bread the other day that she put bourbon in and man, it was awesome. Now she used Buffalo Trace for that. That was the first bottle I could see and she was on me.

So we got one pour left. One last pour. All right, Mike, what is it?

This is a big bottle right here. So this is a Knob Creek 25th anniversary edition. It's a single barrel, it's 120.9 proof. So we're stepping, nothing in the 130s though, so not too high.

But that one was picked by, wasn't that one picked by Fred?

It does. I mean, it says master distiller. I don't think it says on there who was picked by, but I think it was picked by. I mean, it's kind of, it's a celebration bottle. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So I've had this bottle for a little while, but you know, it's still sitting at about 80% full, isn't it?

Yeah.

I don't sit down because it's kind of a special bottle. I just visited on occasions. I've got a number of bottles like that, that I'll just, I think we had, Oh, we had that, uh, we had that live event where we had the bourbon roadies on, right? Yeah. And that's one of the bottles that I sipped on that night. And I brought it to the interview with Bo Garrett, but we ended up drinking some other things at night.

Yeah. I think he brought decades at night. We had some Turkey products. Yeah. Which is, there's no surprise there. He's a Turkey guy. Right.

All right. So I'm, I'm nosing this bad boy.

You know what I get? I get barbecue sauce.

I don't know why. All right. I'm going to, maybe molasses. I want to say something to you on that. Cause you get me on the chart hot dogs and I'm going to get you on barbecue sauce. Yeah. This one reminds me a little bit of the, um, the 12 year.

Maybe it's that molasses that.

Yeah, it's very, yeah. Sorghum, a very sweet brown sugary kind of, um, sweetness. And again, on this one, I think what's reminded me here is that little bit of dried raisin or plum, kind of prune, I don't know, prune, rump, dried plums, dried raisins, grapes. And this one's got a little bit of a kind of a dusty note on it. When I say a dusty note, it's because I do get a little bit of that butterscotch, just a hint of butterscotch on it. And I get a little bit on this one, not like that 12 year though. It's sweet. Yep.

A lot of pepper on this one.

Yeah, this one is definitely a lot more spicy.

I don't mind it, but this is our sixth pour or two though, so I don't mind it so much. It's a little different. Each one of these had its own character to it though.

Yeah, so we've been waiting in Knob Creek here for a little bit, haven't we?

Yeah. I mean, we haven't had Knob Creek on a lot. I don't even know if we had it on the show. I'd have to really look back and see that if we had drank any Knob Creek, maybe somebody brought one to a barrel or to a bottle challenge. And that was my first. time on a podcast was you guys invited me to be a guest and we was, I think it was under 20 bucks or something.

Bottles under $20 challenge.

$20, $25 somewhere in there.

So we like to do bottle challenges where everybody brings a bottle. The bottles are obscured. Nobody knows what they are and we all drink from them and then we pick a winner. And how'd you do that night, Mike?

I think I got third place. I think you and Randy cheated me and you had Brian Hyatt was there with me too. And he's not related. We're not related to each other.

No, he's H-Y-A-T-T. You're H-I-A-T-T. Yeah.

So we both came on there and I was trying to be a comic that night. I brought old fighting cock with me. And I'd actually did my research on it and stuff and I learned a lot before I came on the show and stuff. But I thoroughly enjoyed myself that night. And then you guys had said, hey, Randy's moving. Would you like to be a cohost? I think Randy had asked me afterwards, what could we do better on the show? And I felt like I was going to hurt somebody's feelings or something. I was like, God dang, these guys are asking me this. And the only thing I said is, let's be humorous and just be transparent to people who we really are. I'm not braggadocious or anything like that, I guess is the word. I don't know if braggadocious is the word, but just who I am. I wear sweatpants and a t-shirt at home and mow my grass with my dog on my lawnmower. Just that kind of a guy.

I think if we had to summarize what we would like people to think about the Bourbon Road, this is my perspective. You know, if somebody's listening to the Bourbon Road, I like them to think these guys are not pretentious. They're not trying to pretend that they know a lot about whiskey because we don't. We're not trying to pretend that we're able to pick notes out of whiskey, like some sommelier or something, you know, we just, we, we can't, whenever we call out tasting notes on a whiskey, it's cause it's, it's bringing up that memory of something that we've had in your case a few minutes ago, it was. Food loops or barbecue sauce or whatever. And for me, I've called out charred hot dogs and um, whorehound candies and you know, whatever it is, you know, we're just, Just like anybody out there, regardless of where you are on your bourbon venture. You know, you know what you like and you know what you don't like.

I think that time, you know, if you've been drinking whiskey for a while, you obviously know what you like, but I'd say, Hey, we also want people to go out there and try new stuff and try these. You know, I couldn't say enough about craft distilleries and how much I've learned about whiskey from these craft guys that are, they're trying new stuff. They're not trying to reinvent the wheel. But they're trying to make it run a little smoother.

I would say in this, in this year, since we've been doing it. you know, and probably a year before that, maybe two of drinking bourbon. Um, I don't, I don't chase bottles anymore. I haven't chased a bottle in a long time. Not that I wouldn't like to get a bottle of something here and there, a bottle of Pappy or something like that. I think I would, but I don't stand in lines. I don't get in lotteries. I don't chase bottles anymore. There's too much out there that's special. It's just sitting on the shelf that you don't realize. Um, there's other things out there from these craft distilleries that are yet to be discovered. Some cases it's young. Let's be fair. Uh, but I can, a lot of times when I'm drinking these young whiskies, I can almost taste what they're going to be a little bit. And I look forward to it. I don't mind drinking a young whiskey. I'm not saying it's best part of my day, but, but a lot of times I can taste that whiskey and go, yeah, it's young right now, but I can see that this is going to be something special in a year or two. If you know, I mean, and I'll tell you what bluegrass distillers, let's talk about those guys again. They're four year old stuff. It's spot on.

I think if you have, let's say when you did a little time traveling, right? Yeah. And let's say we go back to the 1800s. And we were able to visit Jack Daniels when they first opened up, Jim Beam. They said we could have went to Four Roses, and we could have went to E.H. Taylor. And we tasted all their stuff when they first started, that first two to three years.

I bet they were shipping some young barrels. What do you think?

Oh yeah. Sure. When you come to today and you compare that to, I would almost imagine that today's stuff is just that much better. Nobody starts out a hundred percent perfect. You know, it's kind of, it's kind of like life, you know, you gain that experience over time and stuff. We were all 18 years old at one time starting out as young adults and I probably didn't know nothing. That's true.

Well, Mike, we get out of this whole COVID-19 thing and we start to get out on the road again and visit some distilleries and talk to people. I think 2020 is going to be a great year.

I think it will be. I think hopefully you're going to see some stuff from us. Hopefully you'll see a little bit of merchandise this year. Hopefully you'll see some picks. I would be excited to do maybe a pick or two this year from the bourbon road. And I think we have our bourbon roadies. I think we have enough bourbon roadies. We're at around 300 in our private Facebook group.

So yeah, let's talk about this. Where are we at on Instagram?

Instagram, we're going to break 5,000 I think this week. And Facebook? Right around 3,000.

And then roadies, how many? 300? 300. And then what's our reach on a weekly basis? How many people do we reach?

I think in a week, really on a monthly basis on Facebook, we're reaching about 88,000 people. That's somebody they're interacting with. That's a lot of people to be interacting with. That's a small city, I think.

We've actually been now the number one spirits podcast on iTunes. multiple times this year. We're not there all the time. It's like the music charts. You don't stay at the top very long, but we have some ups and downs. We've been the number one spirits podcast on numerous occasions and we certainly expect to be there again. And we appreciate all the listeners that get us there. No doubt about it.

That's who gets us there. If people wouldn't listen, we wouldn't be there. And I couldn't be thankful enough for those guys. And we got 37 reviews on Apple iTunes, all great reviews of us and stuff. People want to hear about history. They just want to hear us talk about bourbon. And I think that's what we're doing.

Non-pretentious bourbon bullshitters, right?

We're definitely not bourbon reviewers.

All right, Mike, well, why don't you take us out?

So we just talked about it. You can find us on Instagram and on Facebook at The Bourbon Road. You can go to our website, read our blog, thebourbonroad.com. You could ask you on our private Facebook group. It's called The Bourbon Roadies. We have a lot of great people in there. We've had some guests in there.

Weller. Yeah, April Weller.

April Cantrell Weller is a friend in there. Lisa Wicker. I think Steve Coombs in there. Pat Heist from Wilderness Trail. We've had some great people in there, and they come in there and talk to our listeners. We have some great listeners in there. Actually, one of our listeners was a guest on the show, Jason Waller. He is one of our moderators now, and he's been a great help welcoming new roadies. So Mike, if somebody wants to reach out to you on Instagram, uh, at one big chief, one big chief, obviously the famous dog Woodrow on there quite often.

And I'm Jay Shannon 63 and we are out on this show, but I'll tell you what guys, we've got a big year coming up. 2020 is going to be pretty awesome and we hope you listen to us and tell your friends about us and join the bourbon roadies. Yeah. And, uh, we'll see you down the bourbon road. We do appreciate all of our listeners, and we'd like to thank you for taking time out of your day to hang out with us here on the Bourbon Road. We hope you enjoyed today's show, and if so, we would appreciate it if you'd subscribe and rate us a five star with a review on iTunes. Make sure you follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, at The Bourbon Road. That way you'll be kept in the loop on all the Bourbon Road happenings. You can also visit our website at thebourbonroad.com to read our blog, listen to the show, or reach out to us directly. We always welcome comments or suggestions, and if you have an idea for a particular guest or topic, be sure to let us know. And again, thanks for hanging out with us.