62. Union Horse Distilling

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.

Well, today you're in for a treat. It's our very first short format Craft Distillery Monday episode. And this week we're featuring Union Horse Distilling. And each week we'll release a new episode focusing on a different craft distillery. We would like to thank our friends at Premium Bar Products for sponsoring this episode. If you're ready to step up your game at your home bar, check out premiumbarproducts.com to choose from their wide selection of glassware, all of which can be custom engraved with your personal message or logo. And there's no minimum order. So after the episode, head over to premiumbarproducts.com and check out everything they have to offer. Now let's get on with the show. Hello everyone. I'm Jim Shannon. And I'm Mike Hyatt. And this is the Bourbon Road. And today, Mike, who do we have with us? We got Wilson Torres.

Did I say that right, Wilson? Yes, sir. You said it. Thank you, sir. Thank you very much. Big Chief. Is that how you say that?

Yeah. So we got Wilson here with Union Horse Distilling Company out of Lenexa, Kansas, about 20 miles west of Kansas City. I was actually out there a couple months ago and I tried to peek in there and they would close that day or something and it just never hooked up. So we hooked up with Wilson. He's one of our roadies and here we are. Yes, sir.

Thank you, gentlemen. Appreciate you having me on here. On behalf of Union Horse Distilling Company, the Garcia family that started the distillery in 2010. We are very, very excited to be part of this today.

So Jim, this is going to be a new weekly thing for us. We're going to bring a craft distillery on, or we're just going to drink a craft distilleries drink for Mondays and try to get those names out there, talk about their whiskey. Cause some of the dang whiskey is pretty dang good as we know, right?

Yes, sir. It is, and I'm looking forward to today because you've sent us three.

What I did is I, uh, I took three of five that we actually make and I played to your fit, you know, to your taste buds, uh, or your palates as I should say properly. Um, so what we got first up today is our rolling standard Midwestern, not four grain whiskey. Um, I personally feel it's a gobstopper of a whiskey, if you will. Um, it is, uh, three whiskies in one. So what we did is we took the corn, the wheat, and the rye, and we made about a five-year-old bourbon. And then we did bourbon to be exact. And then what we did was that malt whiskey. We made two. We made a 100% malt whiskey that was aged for 18 months. And then we made a second malt whiskey, which was 80% malt, 20% wheat. And then we aged that in an X bourbon cask for a while. And then we blended them all together. And this is what we got today.

All right. So this is, uh, this is an American whiskey. Yes, sir.

It's considered an American whiskey. Got it.

Well, let's get straight to it, Mike. And I know you don't have to tell me you already have.

I think I beat you to that, Mike. You can see me drinking on it. So why Jim's nose and his and stuff. I get a lot of fruit in the nose on this. Almost like a cherry juice fruit or something. I don't know. Something else there.

For me, it's very floral. But I'm getting that oak kind of prevalent on the nose. A little bit of corn in there. Yeah.

I get a lot of the malt.

Yeah. The malt shines through actually. It really does.

Yeah.

And it's, it's, I can't really tell. It's some kind of a lighter fruit for me, Mike, peach or a pear, maybe a pear.

I think I could, I could get, I was, well, I was going to say, I always say nectarine when I'm drinking whiskey for some reason. And maybe that's what I'm getting. But I could get a pear off this too.

It's a stone fruit for sure. Yeah.

Yeah.

I don't know all the stone fruits. What are all the stone fruits, Mike? We've got peaches, pears, plums, what? I think a cherries. It's got that cherries.

You can consider a bunch of stuff, stone fruit. I think, uh, doesn't a papaya have a, a nut inside of it or something? A papaya has a series of seeds. Yeah. Maybe it's what's the one, there's one that has a big mango mango. Yeah. And I think actually, actually a, um, um, guacamole avocado. It was a stone fruit, actually. I could be wrong.

It is considered a fruit though, actually. You're actually correct.

Some listener out there will be like, you're wrong.

Well, I've never, I've never gotten avocado in my, in my drink though.

So never now you're going to think about it. We're going to dress up one time.

Well, he, he, he mentioned Gobstopper earlier. Now that, now that's, um, that's a Willy Wonka reference, isn't it?

Yes, sir. It is, it is, it is a Willy Wonka reference. Um, my family calls me Willy by, by, you know, just by any, Finally, I say whiskey gobstop because there's an amazing transition in flavors when drinking this rolling standard. You either get the malt, the bourbon, or another facet of flavor, and then it rolls into something else, and then it rolls into something else. By the time you're done, you look at it, you're like, man, that was pretty darn good. It all works well together. Usually, gobstoppers do that.

I think this is some excellent juice right here. I mean, that weeded, obviously I'm a weeded guy and man, I love this right here. I could drink it all day long.

I appreciate that though. Hey, you know, like I said, I played this right. I was like, we have one shot with these gentlemen. We need, we need to make sure we get them right in the, right on the nose, on the palate and get those smiles on their faces.

You got a lot of, a lot of chances with us.

I'm getting a little bit of sweet corn on the palate though. I do get the sweet corn on the palate and it transitions a little bit more. It's funny because the vanilla doesn't come out I think until the finish.

It's funny you say that. Like I said, to reference back to the Gobstopper reference that I made, those flavors, those layers that come through, As you sip on it, they build even more. They get a little deeper. They get a little richer after for me on my palate. After the third sip, I get chocolate. If you, if you smack the roof of your mouth, you get chocolate. That's really weird, but it's right on the back end of your tongue. You smack it against the roof of your mouth. There's some chocolate, dark chocolate, some cocoa. Remember that I call it the Nestle quick factor. You know, remember that powdered Nestle quick? We used to put it in our, in our, in our 2% whole milk and whatnot. And you put that just, you just needed just enough to make that, that affecting your chocolate ice chocolate milk. Oh, it's fabulous.

I was going to ask you a question, Mike, what do you think about the finish on this?

Um, it, it doesn't have a long finish on it. Um, very, very sweet. I can still taste that sweetness, almost like I'm chewing some bubble gum or something. Um, it's not, it's not drying at all.

Yeah, it's not going to chocolate for me. It's probably a medium finish, I think. Fair to say. And it's not going to chocolate for me, but it is going vanilla and oak. I'm getting vanilla and oak on the finish. And a lot of times I'll get that up front, the vanilla, a little more up front. And I did get this yoke on the nose on this and it was very floral. I think it's a fine expression of American whiskey. I think a lot of people would appreciate it.

So Wilson, we're going to go ahead and move on to the, uh, straight white and why, why were me and Jim are nosing that, that reserved straight bourbon whiskey. Tell us about the history of union horse, um, how that got started and how did it get the name union horse? Absolutely.

Fabulous questions. That latter question I appreciate very much. So, uh, so union horse, uh, again in Lennox, Kansas was started by four siblings, the Garcia's we have Patrick Damien, Eric and Mary Garcia. Each of them were in their own. you know, career path of some sort, but you know, as strong a community as they are for, you know, second generation Mexican-American family, very strong whole, very strong family. And they're like, hey, we need to do something. We need to leave a legacy here. We need to do something for our family and build it. So we thought that they would go beer because Patrick, our master distiller was actually a brewer at Boulevard Brewing Company in Kansas City. So they're like, you know what, everyone's doing beer. let's do something a little bit more all American. So they're like, well, let's just take the beer and take it a couple two, three, you know, two, three steps further. And that's whiskey. So under the tutelage of the late great Dave Pickerel, they put together a plan, brought Dave in, he tutored him up. It'll be 10 years come this December that we've been around. And the name Union Horse, at first we were called Dark Horse Distillery. And then there was a winery and another brewery that had Dark Horse as their name or a name of a product that they produced. So we went to Union. We then changed it over to Union Horse. four siblings coming together, you and I put together a strong front to put something all American in, pay homage to the past as they move forward as a family. And then horses, they grew up with two horses, which are on the actual bottles themselves. We have the bourbon bottle, that's chrome. And then on the rye barrel, the regular rye strength barrel, that's steel. They were pretty much, you know, the pioneers in the state of Kansas when it came to, you know, changing some legislation or pushing through some legislation in order to get them started and going down in Kansas. But state of Kansas loved the fact. It's a whole old school family, two, three, you know, two generation deep. They're in La Nexa and they're like, let's do this. And, you know, Kansas City in general is just a great Midwestern town, you know, blue collar, but, you know, great people out there as well.

So who's the, who's the gentleman that worked at Boulevard?

That is Patrick Garcia, our master distiller who signs and bottle and numbers every single bottle.

So you tell Patrick, so I'm a ordained minister and we have some friends that live out in Kansas city and live in St. Louis and their daughter lives in Kansas city. And she wanted to know if I could marry her and her husband. Yeah, I could come out there and do that. Nice. So I did this ceremony and then their reception was at Boulevard. Okay.

At Boulevard Brewery you mean?

Upstairs in the big building. And they had like 40 beers on tap at their deal, unlimited beer. This guy walked up to me and I'm still like in my suit and stuff. And he, it's probably two in the morning. He was like, sir, he's like, you are the drunkest preacher I've ever met before.

That's just beer. Yeah. Oh yeah.

Yeah.

Some of the Midwest best, you know, that's something that, you know, it's, you know, when they set out to do this, you know, they were, they just went, didn't want to open up another distillery. I mean, we all know, I mean, since the 2004, 2006, there's two, you know, from 40 distilleries. Now they're over 2000. That's considered craft or artisanal, you know, distilleries. I think we were very well welcomed, very warmly welcomed. Um, instead of Kansas, Missouri just took us in like, you know, the cousins that we are next door to them. And, you know, we just Midwest is our grounds, you know, so we are Midwest branded born.

All right, Mike. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna go, go through all my tasting notes on this, if you don't mind. And then I'll turn it over to you and you can go through your tasting notes on it. Uh, and that way we can sorta move through this and get onto our next one. All right. So a traditional caramel, uh, on the nose. A little bit of nutmeg, I think, and corn. And I, you know, I got the corn on the, on the American too, and I'm getting it on the nose here as well. It's sweet. Um, but on the palate, you know, the oak shines out, but it's a little bit of a younger oak flavor, but the corn becomes cornbread. And on this one, Mike, on the American, we're getting light fruit, stone fruit on this one. It's more dark and the finish on it. It's got a long finish. And the thing about it is, is a little bit of butterscotch shows up, but it's kind of a minty butterscotch.

I'm getting vanilla wafers on this is what I'm getting with just a hint of like banana in there. So this would be some banana pudding in a bottle for me. Right there. Yes, sir. Big Chiefs named it the banana pudding of whiskey.

Banana pudding of whiskey.

I'm, I'm pretty impressed with this. The finish really does stick around for a while with this, but it's kind of a minty butterscotch for me. It's kind of, I think it's a little unusual, but it's good.

This, this is a little bit lighter Wilson in color than the other rolling standard. And is there a reason for that? Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely, sir. So as mentioned, the rolling standard has malt in it. When you make a malt whiskey, obviously it comes out clear, but after it ages, it becomes a little darker. It allows itself to absorb a lot. I mean, of course, whiskey gets 100% of its color from the barrel. malt whiskey in general allows, it's just a soft grain. It really just allows itself to be manipulated. And it just really allows itself to absorb color and then, and then it's, but it's, it's flavor into the whiskey. With the reserve bourbon that you just, that you just tried out, that's an 80 corn, 20% rye mash bill.

And that's a five-year-old So there's no, there's no malt, there's no malted barley in that at all.

There are no malted barley in that.

It's a straight two grain bourbon. So the distilleries notes on this is creamy vanilla, maple, and smoke. That's a, I can get all that in this right here.

There's a little bit of that smokiness on the back. Yeah. And I think in that place of the oak, yeah, that oak flavor that, or note that Jim mentioned, that's what I get from as well.

Or maybe that's that charred, charred oak, the smoke I'm getting in a little bit. So that the third whiskey you sent us is the reunion rye whiskey. Um, and that's correct. This is going to be right up. I think this is gonna be right up Jim's alley right here.

Oh yeah. Yeah. Again, as I mentioned, I made sure that I first impressions everything. So I made sure that I would touch on all, you know, both of y'all's, you know, this is, this is, this is, this is big chief beware on this one, right? I think Big Chief is going to have some favorable comments to make on this personally.

This is cast strength and this is 112.3, right? Yes, sir. 112.3? That is correct, yes. And 100% rye.

100% rice.

So we use, as mentioned, five rye barrels. So it's not a Kentucky rye, it's 100% rye whiskey. Kind of a Maryland rye, I guess, would it be called? No, actually our rye, we source from North Dakota. But I'm calling, I guess when I say Maryland rye whiskey, you know, the traditional rye whiskey out of Maryland is my mindset, I guess, there. I see what you're saying. Well, me and Jim are nosing this, uh, Wilson, tell us where our listeners can find you on social media and then, uh, tell us about the tour at the distillery and where you're sold at.

Absolutely. So as mentioned, you know, we are down in Lenox of Kansas, just about 15, 20 minutes, just directly west of Kansas city. Um, the city of Kansas city. Um, you can find us on the internet. You can find us on social media at Union Horse Distilling Co. Again, that's Union Horse Distilling Co. You can find myself. 312 Made, that's M-A-D-E as their brand ambassador that does as much as possible in order to get this good family juice out into your hands. We are Midwest born and bred. So you can only find us really throughout the Midwest. We have hit the coasts. We just got into the state of Georgia in a good city of Atlanta. And that's pretty much what we're going through right now. So we're home on this brand. We're really, really strong in our roots here in the Midwest. We're hoping to build a Midwest market up really well and entertain the folks on either coast because they travel to.

Are you guys being sold online anywhere?

We are being sold online at Drizzly. And then that's where we're at right now in the state of Illinois. We are sold online via Binny's. and a couple other private online companies that we're still working with to get those things out. But for the most part, you find us in your local mom and pop and your large big box stores. And as far as tours that you mentioned Mike, and Jim, we have a beautiful event space that's built into our distillery. We have a 25,000 square foot facility. And a good portion of that is dedicated to event spaces of different sizes. Um, so whenever each month is booked, whatever day is available, whether it be a Sunday or Saturday, sometimes a Friday, we'll take that day and we'll do a distillery tour. So, you know, call ahead, email ahead at tours at unionhorses.com in order to add, start on, you know, planning for your visit to Casey and maybe make it part of our distillery part of that as well.

Well, 25,000 square feet of event space. That's quite a bit. That's a lot. That's a lot of space.

Yeah, they did it right.

I'm going to go ahead and go through my tasting notes on this, Mike, and then you can come through after me. Is that all right?

Yeah, let's do it.

All right. So yeah, this is a spice bomb. No doubt about it. It's not hard to believe that this is 100% rye. Is there any malted rye in this at all? No, sir. Straight up rye. It's all straight up rye. So on the nose, I'm getting a real spicy clove. I mean, a real, I'm really getting clove on it. And a little bit of peppercorn. And on the palate, the clove is there as well, taking another sip. And cinnamon and pepper, all the nice spicy stuff that you expect from a bold rye. I'm getting a little ginger too. That may be all that ginger beer I drank last night, Mike. I don't know.

Uh, ginger beer and a Kentucky mule or just ginger beer and straight up.

Uh, I had a ginger beer and Kentucky mule. And, uh, I think, I think there were seven bottles of whiskey down by a Creek last night by fire and, uh, they were getting, they were getting, I think one of the bottles that got brought it, it left about a quarter of whiskey left in it. Yeah. Oh, wow. Oh yeah. There were some bourbon drinkers there last night.

No doubt about it. A couple, a couple, a couple of two, three, as we say here in Chicago.

No, I do believe the ginger is in your whiskey. I'm getting the ginger from your whiskey. So that's, um, that's interesting because I don't always get that, but, um, the finish on it medium, like fair to Midland.

Fair to Midland. Yeah. So, so what I'm getting out of this, I do get some butterscotch out of this. I've get a little bit of cinnamon candy. You know, the, the, the, I guess I call them cheap ones, but the red cinnamon candies you can get in the store. And then I get some Heath bar, like that toffee in the back end of it. I get a little bit of that and I get that peppers coming through, but it's like a sweet pepper. I don't even know what, what's a sweet pepper. Like,

a red pepper are sweet.

Yeah. I get something like that coming out of that and stuff, but I do got a name for all three of these whiskeys. Oh, I love it. That's just what I was.

This is my favorite part right here. I'm waiting for this.

So there's three whiskeys here in there, each one a little bit different. Um, and I love that stuff. You got three great expressions here. Um, whiskeys that you drink from a craft distillery and we're just not pulling your chain there. I think Jim would agree with me. These are all drinkers. Um, So I'm going to call these three bourbons right here. These three whiskeys I got, I'm going to call them ZZ Top.

Oh, I love it.

And that last one there, right? We got, this is old, this is old Billy Gibson right here. Billy Gibson.

All right. Yeah. I knew, I knew that ride would sit. I mean, I knew it was up Jim's alley, but I was just like, I think big chief is going to have something wonderful to say about this person.

I think it's me and Jim will probably, I'm going to be honest with you. This bottle is going over to Jim because Jim is a ride whiskey guy and I love my friend Jim. So I told him, I said, you'll get the right bottle. I'm the weeded guy. I'll keep the white. We didn't know it was probably split that reserve. Yeah. But I could drink this right here. I think the only thing for me on Rise now is the nose always fools me. It's fooled me every time it seems like, with the exception maybe of like angel envy or something, but every other ride I've drank, I'm like, man, I don't like that nose. And then I drink it and I'm like, this ain't all that bad. And maybe this is because it's a hundred percent right. I don't know. Me and Jim won't have that discussion.

You know, it's funny you mentioned that, you know, a lot of, you know, people that I've done tastings with are just, you know, friends that I've sat around with. And, you know, or even when I talk with Patrick, our master distiller, it's like that. There's just something about that rye that that, you know, it's just it's really opened the doors for me to the rye world, quite honestly. I'd have rye and I'd enjoy it in a cocktail. I never really was one to sit with it and sip it, you know, an evening or whatnot until we just until I had this one. I was like, This is different. And I have this to agree with you, Big Chief. You know, I think it's, I think it's because it's a hundred percent right. And it's a process and you know, it's just, it just. It just, it comes out really well. It's such a pretty good damn ride.

And it's, it's, it's different. So that's what I like. I appreciate it. Wilson. We'd like to thank you for coming on with the horse today. Um, and being our first craft distillery on our new episode, uh, for Mondays, um, we really appreciate you sending us, uh, some whiskeys and stuff for us to try. And we always love that when people share their whiskey with us and, uh, we hope to see you on down the bourbon road.

Yes, sir. Thank you very much again on behalf of Union Horse's stilling family, the Garcia's, myself. We thank you and we hope that you continue to enjoy what we have to offer there throughout the Midwest. And hey, we'll see you down that road as well.

And Wilson, we'll see you in the bourbon roadies. Oh, yes, sir. You know I'm there. All right. 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 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.