67. Bulleit Blenders Select with The Bourbon House UK

Oh, for sure. My dad asked for one of his, a while back, my dad asked for one of his friends to come over. He was a big Scotch man and I wanted to try and get him into drinking some bourbon and he was mad keen. He wanted high proof, high proof, so I gave him some Stag Junior, some Knob Creek single about 120 proof and he was knocking them back, knocking them back, knocking them back, loving it. He was sitting on me bar stool and his missus said, right, it's time to go. He got up. Did his legs work? Did they? Hell, no chance his legs were working. He nearly fell straight on his face. And he was like, wow, man, you definitely have some good juice in here. And it's like, yes, that's what it's about, isn't it? You got to try different things. You got to love what you drink. And it is what it is.

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, where are we today?

Well, we're in that social media land again, Jim. We're just fighting off the COVID and keeping away from that stuff. So we got a special guest on today, right? We do. We do. And he's not from near here, is he? Well, he'd be over in that, I would call it the English whiskey trail. Is that correct?

That is correct. Across the pond.

Across the pond. So we got Sam from the bourbon house. He's an Instagram page. He's an Instagram famous. He's Sam the man. He loves his bourbon though. And that's an oddity over in England, I would think.

Yes, I suppose. Over the last 12 months, to be fair, things are definitely growing over in the UK in terms of bourbon hunting, bourbon buying. So yeah, things are on the up. So if you like in bourbon at the moment in the UK, it's not a bad place to be, to be fair.

Now you got to ride around 20,000 followers on your page. A lot of followers throughout the world, right?

Yeah, unbelievable. I mean, I started my page January last year. So to have 20,000, just under 20,000 followers in that short of what 16 months, 17 months time is unbelievable really. So a massive shout out to all the guys who follow me because it's amazing. Totally blown my mind really. Never thought I would get to sort of that figure, nevermind in such a short space of time. So cheers.

And what you're famous for is whenever you get a package from somebody, your excitement you show is just, it's just awesome. You rip that package open, you show everybody, hey, look what I got sent. And I love that and stuff. Great entertainment. It just makes a person feel good watching you get to open one of those packages.

Like a big kid at Christmas, that's all I can say. I can't contain myself. When I know there's going to be some brown juice in there, what else can you do? You've got to get into it. You've got to get it open. You've got to see what's in there, haven't you? So yeah, can't help myself. Genuine excitement. And the stuff that I've been sent over the past 12 months, 18 months is mind blowing. So it gives me goose bumps. You've probably seen from my videos sometimes, literally I've got hairs standing on the air, standing up to attention, opening something, nearly losing a finger, cutting into a box. But Hey, you got it. You got to be happy. Aren't you? You got to be happy.

I'd like to get into all this detail and talk about your collective. You've got a great wall of whiskey behind you. I'd like to talk a little bit about that and talk a little bit about how you got into the let's call it a sport, but first Mike, to get rid of that itch. I think I'd like to taste whatever we got going on first here. What is it?

So, you know, we had, we connected with Sam in the bourbon house and we'd send him a special bottle and we're going to drink that in the second half. But because we live in Shelby County in our big distillery here, one of the big boys on the block is Bullitt. We're going to start out with Bullitt's 10 year bourbon. I think that'd be a good start for us. What do you think, Jim?

I'm kind of excited. It's been a minute since I had it and it's a shame because we live right here, right?

Oh yeah. You know, that's a, sometimes I just forget it's on the shelf and stuff and I see it back there and I'm like, Oh, I'll have a sample today. So I knew that Sam, did you have a bottle of that 10 year?

I do. Yeah. And funny enough, the 10 year actually, uh, It's one of the bottles that I recommend people to buy, sort of the next step. So if they're buying an off the shelf, I don't know, a normal wild turkey or a normal bullet, sort of the next step is if I ever get a recommendation, I give a recommendation out, sorry, I do use bullet 10. I think it's a good solid, solid bottle to sort of the next step, the next level.

What do you call the next step after a gateway? Well, so you've got a gateway, which is the easy way in and then the next step is like

Um, but middle school, middle school. Yeah. Middle school. Fair enough. Middle school. So I think this, this 10, this bullet 10 year is, is similar to a four roses, single barrel in the UK. They're both for coming to just under 40 pounds. So you can get them pretty easy. And I think it's, uh, yeah, as I'm sure we'll taste in a minute, I think it's pretty decent juice.

Well, let's, let's do that. Let's try the sucker. All right. It's got a beautiful nose on it.

What do you think of the color?

A lot of four on there. It's, it's a little bit on the light side, you know, like you talked about as some four roses juice, I think in this, in this bourbon.

A little bit, a little bit on the, like the honey, honey dew, honey glow side to it a little bit. I do, I'm a big part, big fan of a darker whiskey, but I mean, the color's not, not too bad. I think it's, uh, it's fairly decent, but a little bit on the honey, honey glow side.

Yeah, I'd say that. I agree. It's got that amber glow to it. And this is, uh, this is what 91 proof, 92 proof somewhere in that range.

Yeah. It's a 91.2 proof. Um, that's a pretty standard forum. They say right around on their website, they say 90, 90 proof is what they say.

Yeah. Sweet. No, it's like a floral, floral rhinos.

Um, yeah, it does. It does remind you a little bit of a four roses, doesn't it?

Maybe a little bit honeysuckle.

I would say honeysuckle, that's a country boy thing.

Yeah, it's got, it's definitely got a nice rich oak on the nose though. I mean, you get that, you definitely can smell that, that significant amount of barrel influence there. For a 10 year you would expect that though, right?

I also get a little bit like a, like a cereal, cereal note, just a little bit like a tiny earthy cereal. bit of green to it, just a little bit.

A little bit of cinnamon toast grinch, Mike.

Well, I don't know about cinnamon toast grinch. I was like honey nut, honey nut Cheerios, I think. Yeah.

Well, I'm picking up a little bit of spice on that though. Just a little bit. Well, let's, let's go ahead and get into this sucker.

All right. Let's got some little bit of pepper on the back end.

Yeah. Nice little bit of spice. It's definitely a bit of spice. Coats the mouth well, definitely.

It's definitely, I'm picking up a little bit more fruit on the pallet. It's not real thick. It's a little bit thin, but we did just have another dram before we popped in here and it had a little more body to it. I think we'll blame it on the foolproof.

So Sam, this, this is a, to me is a nice expression. Like you said, not a gateway bourbon, but a, um, that second tier to where people could drink it. It's got that little bit more spice on the back end, a little bit more refined. I don't know. I'm getting, I'm still getting that light fruit on that, like a peach or something.

What do you think to the finish, like the end sort of mouth feel? I've gotten a bit of heat in my mouth still from it. I think it's fairly decent. That sort of traditional brown sugary caramel is at the back there. I enjoy it. I certainly wouldn't shy away from that. If someone gave me that anytime, I'd be happily drinking that. It's a decent pour. I think it's all right.

It's not very oily. It's not very, it's, it's a drying, um, finish to it. To me, I would expect out of a 10 year, I would expect that, you know, it might have lost some of that oil in the barrel itself. Maybe.

I think it approving down and probably, I don't know, is this a filtered whiskey? Is this chill filtered? It probably is at 91. I think it might've lost a little bit of that there, but I would say that even with that said, the finish on this is quite lengthy. It's a long finish. It sticks around. And you definitely get that barrel char on the finish. Yeah, I could get that.

So Sam, over in England, you guys play a little bit of soccer over there, right? Or as you call it, football.

Football?

Yeah. What's your club?

Oh man, I'm a big Man United fan. Now all my followers, all the Liverpool fans and everyone's going to unfollow me now, but yeah, I'm a massive, massive, massive, massive United fan. Can't hide it. Um, I've been since a small boy, my dad supports him. So he's brought me up as a United fan.

Yeah, there we go. Do they have a chant for United?

Uh, there's a few, but I'm not going to, I'm not going to chant them out on here. Definitely not.

So is the season going to start back up pretty soon?

Yeah, next week it starts up. I mean, to be fair, it's tough times being a United fan at the moment. Things haven't been as glory days as they used to be for us, but I think we're on the up. Football's going to come back, so yeah, you've got to look at it. I'm a positive guy, so you've got to be positive, you know. Be happy, be positive.

You can always fall back on the bourbon, right?

I'm always falling back on the bourbon, mate.

Always falling back on the bourbon. So do you ever post any Instagram photos where you mention Manchester United? Do you ever do any sport related postings? A bottle of bourbon next to a ball or anything like that?

No, I don't. I've always not connected the two, to be fair. I've kept my bourbon as my money united, but I've never brought the two together. But maybe I should.

Well, now that you've stepped out and made your declaration to the world, right?

Well, you can, we found out that you can, I'm a Dallas Cowboys fan, um, for, for American football. And we found that that can alienate part of your listeners that aren't Dallas Cowboys fans. So I guess you're right there to keep the two separate and, you know, keep your bourbon pages about the bourbon itself and the love of it.

Yeah. I mean, bourbon sort of, uh, Unified football used to be my, yeah. To be fair, Bourbon sort of like, I'm so passionate about it. It's gripped me. It's like taking over. It's hooked me. It's, yeah, I'm fully two feet in, in the Bourbon world.

Now, what are your mates, your mates over there, what do they think about the Bourbon? Cause most, or most English whiskey drinkers, are they more Scots or Irish whiskey drinkers over there?

Anyone that I know, I try and convert to bourbon. I'm not doing a bad job, to be fair, so yeah. Obviously, a few of the lads come around. They share some of the juice with me. They've fallen in love with it. A couple of mates have started big collections themselves. Yeah, so doing all I can to support the brown juice over here, that's for sure, guys.

So the bourbon house, home of Sam, the bourbon evangelist.

Something like that, yeah, for sure. So Sam, what was your first bourbon you tried? Can you remember that?

I can, yeah. I mean, to be fair, I would say my proper bourbon journey started maybe three, just over three, four years ago. I used to collect a lot of spirits, different spirits. Anything with a nice bottle, I would buy. This is before the bourbon house was actually built. I used to keep it in my house. Anything that looked fairly decent, whether it be a gin, a vodka, brandy, a scotch, I would buy a nice shaped bottle, give it a try. I had a couple of bad experiences with scotches, but I I watched a film called Bullet to the Head. I don't know if you've ever heard of it. It's got Sylvester Stallone in it. Every bar he went into, he pulled out a bottle of Bullet and he even went into a bar and pulled it out and stuck it on the table and I thought, I need to get me some of that Bullet. Funny enough, we're talking about Bullet today because Bullet was the first bourbon I actually properly brought. I went into a supermarket, you could buy it there, 18 pound, I think, 20 pound. It came with one of them ice crushers, like a Hessian ice crusher that you can smash up ice in it. So not only did it get me hooked up on bourbon, it got me hooked up on bourbon merchandise, and the trouble started from then, really. So yeah, ever since then, it's... It's been bourbon all the way for me.

So I picked up on a little something there as you were talking, and Mike, you may already be aware of this, but he said he kept his bourbon in his house for a while, but now it's in his bourbon house. So let me get this right. You have a bourbon house. That's not just the name of your Instagram page.

No, no. It's an outbuilding on my... I bought my house a few years ago, five, six, seven years ago. And it came with like a, an outbuilding on it. And ever since I bought the house, I knew I was going to turn it in to a, to a bar. Um, and it was originally going to be at like a sports bar with different merchandise, different basketball shirts. I've always had like a, a fascination with American sports and, and just you guys, just America in general, really, I've been quite keen, you know, just love everything about it. Um, so yeah, I, uh, I planned for the outbuilding, I kitted it out, wood clad it inside, did the roof, did the floor, made myself a bar, yeah, and fell in love with bourbon and the rest is history, I suppose. So I do remember, sorry, I do remember, so I thought I had quite, at that point, I thought I had a fairly decent bourbon collection, maybe 40, 50 bottles. And from my post you can see all the different sized like cube shelving on the back. I did all this by hand, I did it myself, put all the different cube boxes up on the wall. I remember going in to get all the bottles from the house, finally bringing them into me to me bar, smiley, happy. As you know, I'm quite a positive guy, happy. Put them all on the shelving, step back and thought, oh, wow, I'm going to have to spend a lot more money to fill them up. So yeah, that sort of gave me an excuse to go buy a lot more bottles, to be fair, because I needed to fill them up. Yeah, there we go.

That's a pretty amazing story. So your wife pretty much kicked you out at the bottom line.

To be honest, Mike, I've got a pretty amazing wife because she's so understanding and she drinks bourbon as well. And if she didn't, I think I'd be living in here because the amount of money that I spend and the amount of time that I dedicate to looking for bottles, searching on the internet, speaking to people, Yeah, maybe I wouldn't have a wife if she wasn't so understanding and liked the bourbon as well. So hats off to her, I have to say.

Yeah, me and Jim definitely both understand that a little bit. We spent just a little bit of time on bourbon and not hunting it so much, I guess anymore, but more just talking about it to people and building our brand and getting connected to the bourbon world and the bourbon culture. We just, you know, it's fascinating. You spend hours just discussing different brands and the history and even other whiskeys. You know, you can start talking about scotch or you can talk about Irish whiskey, you can talk about Japanese whiskey. I'm talking about rye whiskey. It's just endless possibilities with whiskey itself.

I'm sipping on this 10-year bullet here. And the more I sip on it, the spicier it gets. I don't know if that's the same for you, Sam, but that spice is beautiful.

I said at the time, I think it's spicy. I think it's, I mean, I drink it quite a bit. I've, uh, I'm a, I'm a big fan of it. And, uh, I think it's got that spicy, it's, it's, it carries, it's got a decent finish to it. It's, it's, it's decent. I don't know how much, how much does a bottle cost you guys to be fair? I'd be interested to know what you pick a bottle up for.

Well, the bottle of the second bottle, the 10-year, I think, goes right around 40 bucks, 50 bucks. And then that Blender Select is right around 60, 65, I think, somewhere in that park range. You know, Bullitt's really been around for a long time. and it was just reintroduced in the late 80s. It started in 1830 as a, it wasn't even a high rye bourbon then it was more of a, just a, a rye bourbon. And then the founder of Bullitt, Augustus Bullitt, he died in around 1860. And I think he's the guy that just went missing and they couldn't find him right before the civil war. And then in 1987, Tom Bullitt, the distant grandson or great-grandson of Augustus there, he started back up the brand. And then in 1997, it got sold to Seagrams and then Seagrams sold out and then Diageo bought it and they just kind of remade the brand into that high rye, high rye bourbon and stuff we know it for today. And it says Frontier Whiskey on it, you know, that's the, that's their motto and marketing, I guess. And Kentucky was once the Frontier, I guess the Frontier wasn't a gym.

Yeah. I mean, it was part of Virginia at one time, right? It was Virginia at one time.

Yeah, it was Virginia. And then they, they kind of broke off from Virginia, but it was known as the frontier. You know, you got guys like Daniel Boone and Davey Crockett, um, coming through here and right here in Shelby County, um, Daniel Bruin's brother, he, there's actually a statue of him right downtown here in Shelbyville. Squire Boone. Squire Boone. Yes, sir. So, uh, 2017, they, they were out at Stitts Weller, the famous Stitts Weller, distillery right outside of downtown Louisville, uh, Shively, uh, Kentucky is what it's called. And then the 2017, they spent about $115 million on this beautiful piece of property, 300 acres just by us, a little lake called Geist Geist Creek Lake, a beautiful facility, so many Rick houses and stuff. And now they're producing about 1.8 million proof gallons annually out there.

Huge operation.

That's a lot of whiskey coming out of there.

And a big, and a big employer for our area. Cause we're kind of rural here in Shelby County. So we're, you know, we're outside of Louisville by about 25 miles from downtown center of downtown Louisville. And we're about what? 40 miles from downtown Lexington, about 15 minutes from Frankfurt.

Just about that, about 15, 20 minutes from my house. You can, you could be to four or five distilleries if you really wanted to be. And today I did that. So what about your house? Are you close to any distilleries right there? The Bourbon House, are you close to anything over there?

Oh, no. I'm based smack bang in the Midlands. So yeah, nothing. I mean, nothing's too far away. Nothing's too far away in terms of a car journey. But yeah, the only one distillery I've ever been to is in New York this year. I got invited to go over to King's County distillery. And wow, man. The smells, the ambience, the feeling that you get from that distillery for me was amazing. It's got me hooked and I need to come over definitely and do the Bourbon Trail one day. Yeah, maybe for my 40th in a couple of years.

So you were supposed to come this year, right? This year you were supposed to make a trip.

No, I was meant to go to Mexico this year. I wasn't meant to go to the

to come over to you guys now.

Yeah, we know all about it. It is on the radar to do and I hope to do it in the next two years to be fair. And we're going to meet up and share a drink definitely if I do come over. We should do it.

You can see I got that Mexico color going on right now.

Yeah, so Mike and I had actually recorded an episode for our in preparation for going to Mexico together. We were going on vacation together to Mexico and we had recorded a pre Mexico episode on like the 12th of March and on the 15th of March, everything got shut down. So we didn't, we didn't end up going. So there's a, there's a lost episode that'll get released someday in the future. I don't know.

But you guys know the mash bill on this, this 10 year right here or any other brands. Do you know the mash bill on it?

I think this one we're drinking a 68 corn, 28 rye and four barley. Yes, sir.

Hit the nail on the head.

And that 28 rye, you know, that's, you know, that's a wild Turkey territory right there.

It carries through that right spice. Like you said, you can definitely tell it's there. It lingers around. It's definitely notable.

Now, most of your bourbon you get over there, it's released over there a little bit at 90%, right? Is that what it's released in England at?

What? As in most bottles are?

Yes.

Yeah, well, Buffalo Trace is actually, we get 80% stuff, which I didn't realize until six months ago. I didn't realize when everyone was saying Buffalo Trace in America, you know, is standard is good, good juice, whatever. I've always been slightly disappointed with Buffalo Trace in this country, but because it's 80%, it's for sorry, 80 proof. Yeah. And I managed to pick up a bottle of the 90 proof stuff and wow, can you tell the difference of that 10%? It makes such a difference. So yeah, so Buffalo Tracy is slightly low, but I think the rest generally are not the same as what you guys get. I think only Buffalo Tracy, the one that I know knock it down a little bit.

So your first bourbon you said was, what was your first sip of whiskey? Can you remember that?

probably a young age, drinking scotch, having a sip of it and trying to be sick after probably to be fair. Because I think as the older you get, your palate changes, correct? Absolutely. I think the older you get, you fall into whiskey. It's sort of like the it takes a mature palate to get around it. And funny enough, when you first start drinking it neat, it can be hard. I mean, I first started drinking, my bullet, I never drank it neat, I drank it with Coke. And I'm a big believer of you drink your bourbon however you want to drink it. If you want to mix it, you want it iced in it, you want water in it. If anyone ever comes to my place, the bourbon house, and they ask for rock your father the splash of coke i'm not pulling a face i'm giving them to what they want i want them to enjoy that drink and that's important to me. What i think it takes a while to sort of. Break down from drinking it with a mixer with water to me if i'm making sense it takes it takes a bit of time takes a bit of work. Uh, and yeah, so now I drink my neat, um, big fan of it. Uh, so yeah, there we go.

It's a journey.

I mean, it's not something that massive journey.

Yeah. You can't, uh, you don't know where someone is in their particular journey, you know, and they may be at the coke coke and bullet part of their journey and more power to them. And at least they're drinking bourbon, right?

Too right. Too right. Yeah, definitely. Um, and it's funny how, how quickly, once you start drinking it neat, how quickly you can, break down different flavors and start enjoying higher proof stuff. So I'm part of my journeys now when I'm big partial to a higher proof drop. I really like it. I think around that 100 and anything from 100 to 115, 110 proof is a sort of sweet spot. I enjoy that. Anything high, I do like as well. But I think certainly there is a sweet spot around that sort of figure I just said.

Well, I'll tell you the other night, uh, me and Jim recorded something else, uh, with the old cohost, Randy, uh, kind of like a reunion episode. And I always thought I didn't have a limit of what my proof was. You know, I'm usually, like you said that to me, 90 to 115 is, is my sweet spot right there. That's a pretty good range. You know, you find a great bunch of bourbons in that range and I can go higher, but they just have to, you have to really appreciate it and love that whiskey. to go a lot higher than that, you know, that 130 range in there. You're talking about some complexity there with those whiskeys. So it's meant to be sipped and just slowly enjoyed. But Jim brings over, it was a rye whiskey and it was 145 proof and that stuff is powerful.

So it was a barrel bourbon high proof hazmat rye, 146 I think it was. And actually I didn't bring it. We had it sent to us by one of our listeners and we had it during a listener episode, like Mike said, and it does not take long sipping on that to realize that it has some effect on you. And I noticed that a lot when we were editing the episode. I was like, oh my gosh, my editing got so much harder after we drank that 146 proof.

The tongue starts rolling really funny when you're drinking something like that.

Oh, for sure. My dad asked for one of his, a while back, my dad asked for one of his friends to come over. He was a big Scotch man and I wanted to try and get him into drinking some bourbon and he was mad keen. He wanted high proof, high proof, so I gave him some Stag Junior, some Knob Creek single about 120 proof and he was knocking them back, knocking them back, knocking them back, loving it. He was sitting on me bar stool and his missus said, right, it's time to go. He got up. Did his legs work? Did they? Hell, no chance his legs were working. He nearly fell straight on his face. And he was like, wow, man, you definitely have some good juice in here. And it's like, yes, that's what it's about, isn't it? You've got to try different things. You've got to love what you're drinking. It is what it is.

Okay. So we're coming up on the break now and, uh, we've got another bottle to try in the second half. But, uh, I think Mike, let's take a few minutes. Let's take a pause for our listeners and, uh, we'll finish up this 10 year and when we come back, we've got something special for them, right? Yes, sir. All right. 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.

Hey listeners, we're back for our second pour here and we got the bourbon house from the UK over on the pond, Sam the man, the bourbon house. And so Sam, we had sent you a bottle over there that you couldn't get over there. Me and you had chatted back and forth and I had posted a photo of a bottle of bullet and you're like, man, I wish I could get a bottle of that. So we sent you a bottle there and it took forever to get over there. I think it came over back over on the Mayflower or something.

It did. Trust me, if you would have believed how many times I checked that tracking number, I'm surprised my phone never blew up, to be fair. I checked it that much. It finally came. Unbelievable. Firstly, honestly, thank you so much for sending it. When people send me things, it's mind-blowing. This is as good as it gets. Can't get it in the UK. Never seen a bottle, so I'm honored to have it on my shelf.

Massive thanks, guys. As we were talking about before, that's the bourbon culture and stuff. And me and Jim receive plenty. And we always want to send plenty back out to listeners and to friends and family. We want to send them bourbon that we get and samples and stuff, which is the way you should be. Give more than you take. And that's the way me and Jim feel. But I sent you a bottle of bourbons of the Blender select from bullet. That's a 100 proof bourbon. It says it's over nine years old in the bottle. Um, probably meaning that there's, might be a little bit of older bourbon than there. Wouldn't you agree with that, Jim?

Yeah. I mean, 10, 10, usually that's the case, right? When they say, nine years or something. And it's a blend. There's going to be nine years, the youngest age, right?

The youngest. Yeah, most definitely. Well, it says the minimum age is nine years and Ebony major, one of their rising stars at bullet right now, she was the blender for this. Um, she, I think she did a fine job. So let's, let's get into this sucker, right? Let's do it for sure.

I have to say, even before I take a sip, I think the color is so enticing. I mean, I don't know if it's the lights in my bar, but it looks like a, I don't know. I love the, I love the color. I do. I do love the color. I think it's very, very decent.

Getting some vanilla bean out of that and a little bit of honey.

I get dark fruits, like maybe a cherry.

Yeah. I could get that like a dried, what about dried cherries?

Yeah. I don't get massive ethanol burn. No, for a hundred proof, I think the, yeah, it's nice.

The retail on this is 49.99, which is not a bad retail. Let's go ahead and, let's go ahead and sample this sucker.

Wow. What a difference, right?

Yeah. It's got a lot more meat to it, hasn't it? Definitely.

Oh yeah, most definitely got some oak in it. I get some like maybe that corn, the corn's coming out a little bit more on this one, like sweet corn. I don't know how much corn you guys eat over there in the UK.

I'm not a big fan of sweet corn. Corn on the cob on the barbecue. Definitely. I've been living off it in the sun. It's been hot. My wife's always chucking a corn on a cob on recently on the, on the barbecue. I have to say definitely big fun.

So I can get that, that charred corn on this, uh, coming out of it. I can definitely get that rich fruit that comes out of it.

Caramel. Definitely that, that traditional note of caramel is there.

That's definitely an oak Ford. That toasted oak is definitely coming out of this. So will this be in a hunter proof? This would be right up your alley, Sam.

Yeah, no, definitely. Big fun. Big fun. Um, it's got that nice sort of mouth coating, spicy rye. What you get from the obviously that rye, um, the high rye, uh, content. It's just nice, nice mouth coating. Feel it on the tongue. Um, I have to say as well, I don't know if you can see the legs on the glass. It's got, it's, it's, it's decent legs on the glass. Uh, Very impressed. Very impressed. Certainly a step up from the 10 year. And what, what did you say the price was again? What's the different, the 10, $15 different in between the two?

So it says 49.99, but me and Jim live out in a rural area and stuff. And I think you'll get it more 60, 65 out here. That 10% markup probably, you know, you're going to get it, but I'm still for that price. I, you know, I'm happy to pick up a bottle of it and, um,

It's good for me too. I think this one definitely differs from the other in its mouthfeel. I mean, that's where it shines, right? I mean, it shines in that creaminess and that oily. I guess, you know, once you get the proof up a little bit, you don't have to do the chill filtering as aggressively anymore in order to prevent the flocking of the whiskey. So this has got a little bit more of that oily, viscous mouthfeel that's missing from the tenure.

Yeah, definitely a step up. Yeah, really enjoying it. So cheers.

So it says Ebony, she hand selected all these barrels for this. And then she tried, I guess it says she tried 100 different like distinct liquids or combinations of blendings to come up with this one blending right here of what she really wanted. That's pretty amazing that the company would spend that much time and effort to make a beautiful expression of America's spirit.

For sure. Yeah, I agree with that. Definitely. Blending whiskey is a labor of love. And although, you know, let's face it, you get to drink whiskey while you're blending. So it can't be all that bad. That's a rough job right there.

I was just gonna say, I think they've done a good job on the label as well. It's like a massive, I mean, the bullet bottle is quite a masculine bottle already. So now I like the shape of it. I like the offset, like the tilt on the bottle label, but the black and the bronze label on the bottle, I think is a nice touch.

Definitely extremely happy to have it on my shelves guys, so yeah. You know, you said it's masculine, but the way they made the bottle lies nice and narrow, so a woman or a lady bartender or whoever's drinking it, they could still pick it up nice and easily. It's more of a flat bottle.

Is that right? Is it?

Yeah. So, and it's skinny enough to sit in a well at a bar. Some bottles are too big to sit in a well, but a lady could pick this up, not have any issue where I'd just pick it up like this right here, straight on. It's easier to pick up.

But yeah, I really do like the label.

Now, the standard bullet expression is pretty much available in every state and around the world, right? I mean, you can pretty much get that anywhere, but the select is only available in like about 15 to 20 states, right? Is that correct, Mike?

Yeah, it was definitely a limited release. I don't know the list of states that was released in. But it was a limited release. That's a nice thing. I don't think there's nothing wrong with that. They got to kind of test that market out there before. And it's probably even a limited batch of what they could make. You know, then you would have to have a new blender select number two, I guess, if they have a couple blenders there.

All right. For our listeners, I did look that up while you were talking. Currently, this is available in Arizona, Colorado, Washington, D.C., Illinois, Maryland, New York, California, Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Texas, Georgia, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Tennessee, Ohio, and Oregon. And one bottle in England.

Damn straight. It's the only one I've seen as well. I've never seen it in this country. massively privileged to have it guys. So yeah, thank you again.

So Sam, how did you come up with the idea to say, you know, you said you had some bottles and your collection was growing. What made you decide, say, hey, I'm going to take a run at this and become an Instagram celebrity?

I don't know is the honest answer to that guys because I feel like I've done nothing different to anyone else. I'm just a genuine guy who is passionate about bourbon. love buying the bottles love love going on a hunt for bottles one of the big things for me is is buying a bottle not online i mean you can but i love looking online i'm my my drives my wife crazy i check online all the time and it's crazy in the uk because if you You check different sites at different times of the day, different things come available. You can check at 12 o'clock at night and there's three bottles come available. And if you don't snap them up by the morning, they've gone. So it's crazy. But can't be going to a shop somewhere. I mean, I'm based in the Midlands in the UK, so I haven't got that many local liquor stores, sort of independent smaller stores that I can go to and have a rapport with a shop owner. But London, Manchester, Birmingham, there are shops there that I love going to buy a bottle, creating a memory, remembering what I bought from that shop, having a bit of a chat with the owner. It may cost you a little bit more, but I love doing that type of hands on buying a bottle. Um, and it's frustrating, obviously the current time I've not been able to do that. So I've increased my online shopping. Um, but I do love going to buy a bottle from a shop, uh, and getting to know someone do love it.

So it's really no different than it is here where if you really want something pulled out of the back room or something special and you want a good price for it, um, you're going to have to build that relationship. You're going to have to get to know that person. You're going to have to shop there. Right.

For sure, I think it's probably the same as anything. It's not what you know, it's who you know. If you build up a rapport with someone, you do get looked after. My eyes have been opened up. I mean, when I first started buying bottles of bourbon, I had no idea how hard it was to get hold of certain things. Obviously, the more knowledge you get, you know what's harder to find and decent prices for certain things. But yeah, it does appear to be the same. It's who you know. And if you build a rapport with someone, they look after you. If you spend money with them, then generally, they can look at you first and hopefully sort you out.

It sounds like the, uh, you know, the market's a little bit different in the UK than it is here in the U S we have a very limited number of states that are allowed to have commerce in over state lines by, uh, FedEx, by UPS and so forth by shipment. And it's kind of limited here, but Kentucky has just passed in this last year, uh, the law to allow shipments of bourbon to leave Kentucky. And we're really looking forward to how that affects the whole bourbon industry. I think it's going to affect it a lot because, you know, now you're going to be able to, if you're in a state that allows shipping of liquid inside the US, you know, you're going to be able to order from Kentucky. And that's a great thing. You know, that's a great thing.

Can only be a good thing, can it not? Yeah, it's the same. I mean, the UK, it's a funny one. I would say it's never been as booming as much it is for bourbon at the moment. The amount of new bottles that are coming to the market weekly is unbelievable. New riff is you can now get new riff on certain websites, which is amazing. You can go into a local supermarket, Sainsbury's, you can find Baby Hudson. Some other supermarkets are selling Makers Mark 46, Wild Turkey 101, when 18 months ago, 12 months ago, you know, it just wasn't there. So things are on the up. It can only be good really.

Absolutely. So what do you think the bourbon house is going to go forward? How do you take it forward and grow it even more?

I don't know. I'm just going to continue to do what I do. I can't do anything other. Like I say, if someone sends me a box, I get goose pimples when I open it, whether it's a Jim Beam Black or whether it's a Stag Junior or a Pappy. I treat everyone. I get excited by them all. I'm going to continue to do what I do. I love being part of the bourbon community because the main thing about me being on Instagram, which I have learned, is this bourbon community that comes with everything that you post. It's just like an amazing thing to be part of. So I hope my followers grow. If they don't, then I'll continue with a small amount of followers because I love doing what I'm doing, guys. So yeah, I appreciate all the support.

I got to say cheers to you. You're a great steward to the bourbon community. Your excitement is contagious and we do hope to see you grow and just keep doing what you're doing. You know, you got that personality that people love. You're a, it seems like you're a people magnet is what I would call that.

Yeah. I'm all or nothing type of guy, Mike. So if I'm going to do something, I'm going to do it and I'm all in. My chips are all in. I'm enjoying what I'm doing. So yeah, long may it continue.

I want to revisit this bullet select just for a minute here. Very similar to the tenure that we had earlier. This one, the spice on it tends to grow on you a little bit as you sip on it more and more. And, uh, I would say again, we've got kind of a, a long finish. We've got something that I think this one displays a little bit more balance than what we got from the 10 year. This one feels like it's more rounded. What do you think Sam?

Yeah, I think, I think it's a great proof. I think it's a tongue coating all around great color. decent bourbon and I'm extremely happy to have it guys and I feel honored to try it to be honest because I never did I think I'd get to see a bottle never mind try it so I've said it again I'm going to say thanks to you guys for sending it to me amazing.

So when you think you're going to be able to make it out here to Kentucky to do a trip you said before your 40th birthday

Yeah, so I'm 38 now, 39 in January. So with my Mexico holiday being sort of postponed for this year, maybe next year, I can make it out there. Maybe, if not definitely the year after.

Do you ever get to get over to other European countries and try to find bourbon over there too?

Yeah funny enough last year we went to Spain and one of my followers the European Bourbon Hunter asked me to go over he's a friend of mine and I went over with him. And yeah, he's a big bourbon. He actually drinks all his bourbon with Coke. He's got a big collection. He's growing it all the time. He's passionate as I am. He's taken from me my sort of passion. I've sort of spread it to him and he's contagious and he's well into it like I am. And I went and visited him. And I managed to find in Spain a couple of dusties, my first proper dusties, because you don't really get dusties in the UK. I picked up a Wild Turkey, like a late 80s bottling of Wild Turkey 101 and a Wild Turkey 13 year for insane prices for like 30 euros, which in Spain, I didn't expect to find anything. So yeah, amazing trip, a couple of amazing bottles and some amazing memories made.

So you've got quite a wall of bourbon behind you. I've been thinking about this the whole time we're recording. How many bottles do you have? They're not all in view, I'm sure, right?

They're not all in view. They're not all in view. There's some on the sides and they're getting everywhere. Like I say, when I first built the bourbon house, my shelves were empty and I thought I had a lot then. So now I've obviously got more than I had back then. I think I'm pushing close to 200 maybe. I haven't counted for a while, but I think I'm pushing close to a couple of hundred.

So Sam, where can we find The Bourbon House and yourself on social media?

So yeah, you can find me on The Bourbon House on Instagram. Hook me up with any messages. I'm always here to have a chat too. I reply to every single message. So please chat with me. It's all about the Bourbon community. I'm a big part of it. Hopefully it continues. Hook me up with a message and I'll certainly reply. Cheers guys.

Well, Sam, I got to say from the bottom of our hearts here in Kentucky, we appreciate you coming on with us today. We appreciate you sharing whiskey with us and sitting out here with a little bit of fellowship and talking about bourbon, talking about bullet, just sharing your collection with us to get to see that. You just keep up the hard work and then more good things will come to you.

Well, I really appreciate you saying that. You're the first, this is the first sort of interview sort of live podcast or sort of chat I've ever, I've sort of ever done. Couldn't have spent it with a better, better couple of guys. So I appreciate you inviting me on. Honored to be on your show. Hope we continue to stay in touch, stay chatting, and massive thanks, guys. Loved every minute of it. So, cheers.

Awesome. Cheers. So, we are The Bourbon Road. We are at thebourbonroad.com. We are also on all social medias at The Bourbon Road. You can find us out and about from time to time as we are visiting distilleries and events around the world. Mike, where can they find the roadies?

So you can go into our Facebook page and then you click on there. You can find the bourbon roadies. It's a private Facebook group. Come in there. You got to answer three questions. I'm pretty easy. Are you 21? Do you drink bourbon and do you, do you want to play nice? We do not talk about politics. We don't talk about religion in there and we stick to whiskey and we have a family in there.

So you can find me at one big chief on Instagram. I'm Jay Shannon 63 and we'll see you on 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 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.