Single Barrel Limited Edition Dropped

Four Roses announce that they will not releases their Single Barrel Limited Edition (SBLE) in 2015 (an indefinitely). This was originally reported by Fred Minnick on his blog and  is now making its way around the bourbonsphere. In a release Four Roses names “bourbon shortages” as their reason for cancelling the release. The SBLE was first released in 2008 to celebrate 120th anniversary of Four Roses. Check out the list of all of the Four Roses Single Barrel Limited Edition  mash bills by year. read more

Diageo to Bring Back I.W. Harper

Based on TTB filings approved on Monday Diageo is bringing back the I.W. Harper brand to the US. We don’t have a lot of information but here’s what we can gather from the filings.

– Two releases. One Non-Age Stated (NAS) (assumed to be 4 years+ since it’s “straight bourbon” with no age statement) and the other 15 year read more

Is Bourbon Age Important?

There’s a lot of emphasis placed on a bourbons age. Some brands state the bourbons age on the label with pride while others, for multiple reasons, choose to leave it off. Recently, there’s been several brands that decided to drop the age statement from their labels (Grab Jim Beam Black while it still has the 8 year statement). Prices often increase with the age of a bourbon. Are older bourbons really worth more? Or, is it just more expensive to produce older bourbons and we accidentally correlate price and quality? There’s no denying age is a key ingredient in bourbon quality but it can also be a bourbons downfall. Age is the fickle beast of the bourbon process. read more

The Most Underrated Bourbons/Whiskies

What if some of the best bourbons and whiskies are the ones that go unnoticed? The bourbon that never receives the attention or accolades but tastes just as good as the special releases. A few weeks ago I read a post about most underrated bourbons (sorry, I don’t remember where but if someone comments the article I’ll cite it here) so I thought I would give you my list of underrated bourbons or whiskies. This isn’t an “under-valued” list but rather great tasting bourbons that, for whatever reason, don’t receive the attention of some of their counter parts. Also, this is my opinion. Feel free to agree or disagree. read more

Best Bourbon/Whiskey Released of Fall 2014

Special releases and limited editions are something we talk about a lot on Bourbonr so every fall we let you vote on which release you liked the best. It was a tough choice but a winner has been crowned! There were close to 1,900 votes cast over the 3 days of voting. If a whiskey didn’t receive more than 10 votes I didn’t include it in the chart. read more

2014 Fall Bourbon Release Voting

Voting Ends at 11:59 PM on 12/31/14

Back in July we listed the Fall Bourbon Releases and now it is time to vote for your favorite. Several of these bourbons/whiskies have already won various awards this year but I would like to hear the favorite among Bourbonr’s.

You don’t need to have tried every release to cast your vote.

[wpgform id=’2423′] read more

The Bourbon Gray Market

A couple of months ago FiveThirtyEight posted an article about the secondary market in the sneaker industry. Now, I’m no sneakerhead (although I do still have a pair of gray Jordan XI in my closet) but the article was extremely interesting and I couldn’t help but draw comparisons from what is going on in the sneaker industry to the current bourbon market. The sneaker industry releases special edition shoes to which people camp out for, riot over and in general go a little too crazy over what is, in my mind, “just a shoe”. Sound familiar? Nike (Buffalo Trace) releases special edition Air Jordan’s (Pappy) which are by far the most popular and bring the highest secondary prices. However, there are other releases like the Lebron’s, Kobe’s and KD’s (BTAC) that also fetch multiples on MSRP on the secondary market. read more

Buffalo Trace Announces New Experimental Release

TLDR: Buffalo Trace aged 5 barrels of their wheated mash bill for 12 years on floors 1, 5 and 9 and is releasing each floor under the Experimental Collection. See my tasting notes below.

FRANKFORT, FRANKLIN COUNTY, KY (Dec. 9, 2014) Earlier this year, Buffalo Trace Distillery released an experiment consisting of barrels aged for the same length of time on different floors in the same warehouse.  The experiment was met with great interest, as many bourbon connoisseurs are thirsty for knowledge about how atmosphere affects the taste of their favorite spirit. read more

WhistlePig Boss Hog “Mortimer” Rye Whiskey Review

I’m going to jump straight in to the review. If you’re looking for more information about this release check out my post about the WhistlePig Boss Hog Mortimer release here

Boss Hog Mortimer Details:

100% Rye Whiskey

117-124 Proof

Aged nearly 14 years

50 Barrels selected  (probably around 6,500 bottles based on a rough calculation)

Retail: $189

Boss Hog Mortimer Review Notes:

Nose: bright ripe cherries, caramel, piney, honey Taste: sweet spearmint, soft rye notes. Well balanced. Finish: a little hot with wood and mint

Overall:  read more